TaskManager Processes

[Magsmom]

Clarification of help info on processes needed. I don't quite understand
several things and the help files are "no help"

1. If a process is listed but has "00" in the "CPU" column, does that mean
that the process is not running at the time being? And, if so....

2. is the figure shown in the "Memory Usage" column, only showing what
memory that process would use IF IT WAS running - or - does it mean it is
using that memory even though it is NOTrunning at the time being?

3. If it shows multiple processes by the same name (ie- svchost.exe) which
all target the same Windows System file, are they duplicates, using up memory
unnecessarily and should some of them be deleted to improve performance?

 

[Leonard Grey]

1. "00" means the process is not using any of the CPU's processing
resources at a given point in time.

2. "Memory Usage" shows how much RAM the process is using.

3. Host services (like svchost.exe -- service host)) are processes that
'host' (provide services for) other services. There are typically
several instances of svchost...that is entirely normal.

To see what processes the svchost.exe is hosting:

F1 > 'Use Tools to view your computer information...' (right-hand
column) > Advanced System Imformation (left-hand column) > View running
services (right-hand column)

 

[Alec S.]

Magsmom wrote (in

Clarification of help info on processes needed. I don't quite understand
several things and the help files are "no help"

The Task Manager lists running processes, anything in there is currently running
and active.

(1) The CPU column lists the percentage of the CPU’s power is being used, so low
numbers are generally better.

(2) Memory is the amount of physical RAM is being used by the process and you
can add the VM Size and Peak Mem columns to get more useful memory info on
processes.

(3) Yes and no. If you run a program that doesn’t start up right away and then
you run it again, you will (for most apps) be running two instances which does
waste resources if you only use one of them. Also, sometimes a program does not
quite end when you quit it, and its process will remain running, possibly using
resources, and you will start another instance if you run the program again. You
could kill those off, although they will be killed when you shutdown or reboot
anyway, so unless they are really causing problems (100% CPU usage, 100s of MB
of RAM, etc.), it’s fine to leave them and let Windows kill them. You should
leave system processes alone because that’s normal behavior. SVCHOST.exe is like
a palette, it contains lots of useful little things inside, so you’ll probably
have more than one.