Since SP2 my XP-home seems to do everything really slowly - servic

G

Guest

Since SP2 my XP (home) seems to do everything slowly. I use the NAV, Spybot
and occasionally others so I'm hoping I don't have any malware. But I do seem
to have a lot of services running and wonder if I can get rid of some of them.
Sometimes when my PC is just sitting there idling, there seems to be a lot
of processor and disk activity e.g. by CIDAEMON can use 30-40% cpu time and
CISVC pops up sometimes too - what are they doing ?
Today 6may05, the computers been on only about 20mins and already CIDAEMON
has chalked up 4m15s of cpu time and CISVC 46s!
(The activity level seems to drop right back as soon as I do something eg
touch the touchpad.)
Note: in one period CIDAEMON clocked up 12:03 cpu mins during an uptime of
about two hours (not all idling) - that seems a lot!
My laptop is not networked; I use it for email and web browsing but no
weird games etc. so I'd be happy to do some pruning.

Is there a list somewhere that shows what they all do ? (eg also:
symlcsvc, svchost (several!), SPBBCSvc, SNDSrvc CCSETMGR, csrss, CCAPP and
other programs eg Apoint, DSentry, RegShave, ctfMon, msmsgs, DLG, alg, cisvc,
spoolsv, ccevtmgr, services, winlogon, csrss, realsched, smss, AptEx ?)
And maybe suggestions which I can get rid of ? Thanks, Gerry :blush:)

ps: even booting-up and shutting-down seems to takes aeons :blush:(
 
D

da_test

Since SP2 my XP (home) seems to do everything slowly. I use the NAV, Spybot
and occasionally others so I'm hoping I don't have any malware. But I do seem
to have a lot of services running and wonder if I can get rid of some of them.
Sometimes when my PC is just sitting there idling, there seems to be a lot
of processor and disk activity e.g. by CIDAEMON can use 30-40% cpu time and
CISVC pops up sometimes too - what are they doing ?
Today 6may05, the computers been on only about 20mins and already CIDAEMON
has chalked up 4m15s of cpu time and CISVC 46s!
(The activity level seems to drop right back as soon as I do something eg
touch the touchpad.)
Note: in one period CIDAEMON clocked up 12:03 cpu mins during an uptime of
about two hours (not all idling) - that seems a lot!
My laptop is not networked; I use it for email and web browsing but no
weird games etc. so I'd be happy to do some pruning.

Is there a list somewhere that shows what they all do ? (eg also:
symlcsvc, svchost (several!), SPBBCSvc, SNDSrvc CCSETMGR, csrss, CCAPP and
other programs eg Apoint, DSentry, RegShave, ctfMon, msmsgs, DLG, alg, cisvc,
spoolsv, ccevtmgr, services, winlogon, csrss, realsched, smss, AptEx ?)
And maybe suggestions which I can get rid of ? Thanks, Gerry :blush:)

ps: even booting-up and shutting-down seems to takes aeons :blush:(
Click to expand...
use msconfig/services tab.
choose hide MS services. What's left is third party.
Put there either by legitimate product installs, or malware.
Enter services.msc from the RUN box.
Find the services that were identified in msconfig. (non-MS)
Rightclick them one at a time and review the
executables path. The folder location should tell you
something about what it may be. Navigaiting to the file
in question using windows explorer and right-clicking it
may tell you more.

Here's a place to tell you abut the XP services.
http://www.theeldergeek.com/services_guide.htm

Dave
 
N

Nepatsfan

CIDAEMON and CISVC mean that the indexing service is running on
your computer. To turn it off do the following:
Go to Start -> Control Panel -> Administrative Tools ->
Services.
Look for Indexing service listed in the right hand pane.
Right click on it and select Properties from the drop down menu.
In the box that appears click on the Stop button.
Also, change the Startup type to Manual (or if you want to
Disable).
Click OK and close Services.
 
G

Guest

Hi Dave, gr8! Thanks for that. I'll check that out. I hope it doesn't sound
like blasphemy but i rather suspected MS software itself since it became
noticeably slower when I installed SP2 (heard the same from some colleagues
too) and I didn't install anything else at the same time.
Anyway, I'll check out the non-MS stuff first. Thanks for your help :blush:)
 
G

Guest

Hi, thanks for that. Um, sorry to sound a bit naive but isn't indexing a good
thing ? If I turn it all off won't other bad things happen e.g. really slow
access to files etc. ? What are the consequences ? I have lots of smallish
files (rather than a few v large ones) and sometimes need to Search etc.
Will all that be disadvantaged if I turn off indexing ? Thanks, Gerry
 
N

Nepatsfan

It's your system. You can choose to keep it running if you want.
My experience has been that it's a waste of resources and disk
space. If you do a Google search for "Windows XP indexing
service" you're going to find that an overwhelming majority of
sites recommend it be disabled. I recall seeing a comment that
unless you had a number of large database files on your machine
it added little if any benefit to searches.

Keep in mind that you can always turn it off for a while and see
what impact it has.
 
G

Guest

Thanks - i only sounded worried coz I have the naive view that MS wouldn't
have something running all the time, wasting resources, unless it were
useful. (ok, don't chortle!) Yep, good idea, I'll turn it off for a bit
and nothing bad happens.
I assumed it was eg indexing all the files on my system and so if I
stopped it/them, ALL accessing would be slowed down. I don't have any big
DB's.
I now wonder: (a) why it's there in general, without advice from MS
and (b) what else is running unnecessarily!

Thanks for your help. best wishes, Gerry :blush:)
 
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