-----Original Message-----
My computer is running slow and is continualy increasing
its virtual memory. I looked in task manager to see what
was running and I have 5 versions of svchost running one
of them svchost.exe - local service is using 116,772K of
memory. The CPU is jumping from 0% to around 70% and the
page file is 1.01GB right now and will go as far as
1.5GB. Is this damaging to my computer? And can I end any
or all of the svchost programs to make my computer run
better?
Thank you for any help
I have windows xp home with service pack 1
1.7 Ghz intel celeron
384MB ram
40Gig hard drive
Mcafee fire wall
Mcafee virus scan
.
It is not unusual to have several instances of svchost.exe
running - I currently have 5. 4 show 0 CPU use and 1
shows 02 CPU use.
svchost is sometimes used by viruses (blaster) or other
forms of spyware/malware/parasites (call them what you
will). If Mcafee found nothing (you did update your
definitions before you ran the program didn't you?)
Try here:
http://aumha.org/win5/a/blaster.htm
and search 'blaster virus' on Google.
A second opinion never hurts.
Online virus scans:
http://security.symantec.com
http://housecall.trendmicro.com
http://www.coledata.com/virusalert.htm
http://www.bitdefender.com/
free trojin scan
http://www.trojanscan.com/trojanscan/scanner.htm
If you find a trojan this advice should help. It comes
from Kent W. England, Microsoft MVP for Windows Security
*** ***
Trojans are stealthy and not always found by anti-virus
software. If you find suspicious processes running or task
manager or regedit is being killed after opening, you
might want to try one of the following tools to check for
trojans (after scanning with at least two anti-virus tools
to get rid of the easy stuff).
DiamondCS TDS-3 - Trojan Defence Suite (TDS), leading anti-
trojan system for Windows:
http://tds.diamondcs.com.au/
Agnitum: Products: Tauscan: Home:
http://www.agnitum.com/products/tauscan/
Mischel Internet Security - TrojanHunterT: Finds and
removes trojans:
http://www.misec.net/trojanhunter.jsp
MooSoft Development Presents The Cleaner:
http://www.moosoft.com/thecleaner/
Hacker Eliminator. - Advanced Hacker Protection:
http://hacker-eliminator.com/
*** ***
I'm not sure if spyware uses svchost but the following two
programs should be upgraded and used every day or so
anyway.
Ad-Aware
Spybot
both can be found via Google.
Hopefully something here will help.
Bill
