What are these Isass processes?

[Terry Pinnell]

OK, thanks Gerry, I'll try that. But, as you may have seen from my
post in the SysInternals thread, I'm cautiously optimistic!

But I was right to be cautious - slow mode has returned ;-(

 

[Gerry]

I was not clear on what basis Terry you had grounds for optimism?


--


Gerry
~~~~
FCA
Stourport, England
Enquire, plan and execute
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

[Terry Pinnell]

I was not clear on what basis Terry you had grounds for optimism?

From http://forum.sysinternals.com/forum_posts.asp?TID=18939&PN=2

"On a cautiously optimistic note, I've so far today had over 3 hours
of 'fast mode', the longest ever. The only thing I've done of any
significance IMO was to clear my Recycle Bin, which had an unusually
high 7 GB.

I also wrote another macro that simply moved the mouse cursor across
the screen for about 500 pixels, one at a time, repeating 20 times.
That ran fast every one of the few score times I tried it. In fact the
test macro started running fast roughly around the time of first
running the new one. We'll see ..."

---------

BUT.... SORTED!

I'm delighted to report that at around midnight I finally stumbled
across the cause! And to call it 'obscure' would be an understatement.
In short it's a bizarre conflict with a great little free program
called AWC I've been using for ages. Steve Murphy's Automatic
Wallpaper Changer, Version 3.0.8.
http://awc.smurphy.co.uk/download.htm

It simply displays random images from any large folder onto the
desktop at chosen intervals. But get this: it's not running the
program that causes the slow mode - it's closing it!

During this whole saga I've typically closed as much stuff as possible
after a fresh re-boot, to help isolate the problem. So amongst other
things I would right-click the AWC tray icon and select Exit. The
breakthrough last night came when I happened to try my test macro
immediately after doing that - and found it slow. I re-loaded AWC:
fast. Closed it: slow. Eureka!

I've no idea what the underlying cause is. Next step is that I'm off
to download the latest version. If that has the same issue I'll post
on the forum at
http://smurphy.co.uk/board/

Looking forward to doing something else soon!

Thanks a bunch for all your support, Gerry. Stay in touch

 

[Gerry]

Terry

What effect does AWC have on memory usage? What size are the image files
being loaded into memory?


--


Gerry
~~~~
FCA
Stourport, England
Enquire, plan and execute
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

[Terry Pinnell]

Terry

What effect does AWC have on memory usage? What size are the image files
being loaded into memory?

If I sort by Peak Mem Usage I get this list which shows AWC in a
fairly high place:

Image Name Peak Mem Usage
aawservice.exe 199,360 K
firefox.exe 182,692 K
SecCopy.exe 6,948 K
svchost.exe 30,980 K
explorer.exe 55,052 K
avgnt.exe 2,280 K
avguard.exe 9,340 K
AWC.exe 12,500 K
agent.exe 30 456 K
MailWasher.exe 14,536 K
MacExp.exe 13,768 K
MacEdit.exe 15,668 K
SnagIt32.exe 14,736 K
winlogon exe 1,160 K
etc

BTW, straying OT, that Ad-Aware service puzzles me. Do you have it? I
can't see it in my list of XP Services. Autorun shows it as
Ad-Aware service Lavasoft
c:\program files\lavasoft\ad-aware\aawservice.exe

From some admittedly brief googling I still don's see why it needs to
be running, do you? I only run my free Ad-Aware every week or so.

Back on topic, I've now upgraded AWC to the latest version, 4.5.36.
But the issue remains! Of course, I can now avoid it, by not closing
the program. But I've posted to the AWC forum and hope to get an
answer soon.

 

[Terry Pinnell]

If I sort by Peak Mem Usage I get this list which shows AWC in a
fairly high place:

Image Name Peak Mem Usage
aawservice.exe 199,360 K
firefox.exe 182,692 K
SecCopy.exe 6,948 K
svchost.exe 30,980 K
explorer.exe 55,052 K
avgnt.exe 2,280 K
avguard.exe 9,340 K
AWC.exe 12,500 K
agent.exe 30 456 K
MailWasher.exe 14,536 K
MacExp.exe 13,768 K
MacEdit.exe 15,668 K
SnagIt32.exe 14,736 K
winlogon exe 1,160 K
etc

BTW, straying OT, that Ad-Aware service puzzles me. Do you have it? I
can't see it in my list of XP Services. Autorun shows it as
Ad-Aware service Lavasoft
c:\program files\lavasoft\ad-aware\aawservice.exe

From some admittedly brief googling I still don's see why it needs to
be running, do you? I only run my free Ad-Aware every week or so.

Back on topic, I've now upgraded AWC to the latest version, 4.5.36.
But the issue remains! Of course, I can now avoid it, by not closing
the program. But I've posted to the AWC forum and hope to get an
answer soon.

OK, it's in Services under Lavasoft, currently set to Automatic
Started.

 

[Terry Pinnell]

From http://forum.sysinternals.com/forum_posts.asp?TID=18939&PN=2

"On a cautiously optimistic note, I've so far today had over 3 hours
of 'fast mode', the longest ever. The only thing I've done of any
significance IMO was to clear my Recycle Bin, which had an unusually
high 7 GB.

I also wrote another macro that simply moved the mouse cursor across
the screen for about 500 pixels, one at a time, repeating 20 times.
That ran fast every one of the few score times I tried it. In fact the
test macro started running fast roughly around the time of first
running the new one. We'll see ..."

---------

BUT.... SORTED!

I'm delighted to report that at around midnight I finally stumbled
across the cause! And to call it 'obscure' would be an understatement.
In short it's a bizarre conflict with a great little free program
called AWC I've been using for ages. Steve Murphy's Automatic
Wallpaper Changer, Version 3.0.8.
http://awc.smurphy.co.uk/download.htm

It simply displays random images from any large folder onto the
desktop at chosen intervals. But get this: it's not running the
program that causes the slow mode - it's closing it!

During this whole saga I've typically closed as much stuff as possible
after a fresh re-boot, to help isolate the problem. So amongst other
things I would right-click the AWC tray icon and select Exit. The
breakthrough last night came when I happened to try my test macro
immediately after doing that - and found it slow. I re-loaded AWC:
fast. Closed it: slow. Eureka!

I've no idea what the underlying cause is. Next step is that I'm off
to download the latest version. If that has the same issue I'll post
on the forum at
http://smurphy.co.uk/board/

Looking forward to doing something else soon!

Thanks a bunch for all your support, Gerry. Stay in touch

Graham,

I've now installed the latest version of AWC, but am disappointed to
find it still gives the same problem. Of course, I can now easily
avoid it by not switching it off. But I'd like to get to bottom of it.
so I've posted to the AWC forum.

If you're interested, AWC (now shareware, full featured for 28 days,
then £5.95) is at http://awc.smurphy.co.uk/download.htm

I'm trying to find a more easily accessible program (maybe built in to
XP) that will move the mouse cursor around. I'd like to use it when
discussing this behaviour with those like you who don't have Macro
Express so can't run my simple macro. Unless of course you trial that
too!
http://www.macros.com/download.htm

 

[Gerry]

Terry

What precise version of Ad-Aware do you have? Do you have Ad-Watch?

Ad-Aware has provoked controversy in recent years over memory usage. If
you want to just use it for the occasional scan it might be advisable
to change the StartUp type in Services from Automatic to Manual. The
complication could be Ad-Watch, which comes with the non-freeware
version and is intended to provide real-time protection.
http://lavasoft.com/cms/support/faqs/why-does-adaware-20082007-run-as-a-service

I have used the freeware version of Ad-Aware but dropped it as it never
found anything of significance. I now use Spybot S & D but I cannot
remember it ever finding anything significant on this computer. It has
helped with troubleshooting on other computers. Spybot has TeaTimer as
an Add-On to provide Real Time Protection. This Add-On uses a lot of
memory but it does control registry changes, which can be helpful.
TeaTimer does seem to work in a more practical way than the UAC feature
included in Vista. However, TeaTimer does not get universal approval.
The benefits of protection are not obvious, although avoiding malware
infestation on this computer may be helped by it's use.

--


Hope this helps.

Gerry
~~~~
FCA
Stourport, England
Enquire, plan and execute
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

[Gerry]

Terry

You do seem to have a plethora of small applications on your computer.
If these are loading at Start Up these have the potential to slow
performance at Start Up more than Services. It also makes me wonder what
affect a programme like Automatic Window Changer has on the rate of file
fragmentation. How often do you need to run Disk CleanUp and Disk
Defragmenter?

7 gb in the Recycle Bin is a lot. Do you use Disk CleanUp or cCleaner?

BTW who is Graham?


--


Hope this helps.

Gerry
~~~~
FCA
Stourport, England
Enquire, plan and execute
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

[Terry Pinnell]

Terry

You do seem to have a plethora of small applications on your computer.
If these are loading at Start Up these have the potential to slow
performance at Start Up more than Services. It also makes me wonder what
affect a programme like Automatic Window Changer has on the rate of file
fragmentation. How often do you need to run Disk CleanUp and Disk
Defragmenter?

7 gb in the Recycle Bin is a lot. Do you use Disk CleanUp or cCleaner?

I run Diskeeper in smart mode daily. Don't think AWC should affect
fragmentation - it;s not writing anything.

BTW who is Graham?

Sorry, another correspondent, my slip!

 

[Gerry]

Terry

Never felt the need to buy a Defragmenter. Freeware versions work fine.
How do you manage to co-ordinate Disk CleanUp or cCleaner to run before
Diskeeper runs?

--


Gerry
~~~~
FCA
Stourport, England
Enquire, plan and execute
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

[Terry Pinnell]

Terry

Never felt the need to buy a Defragmenter. Freeware versions work fine.
How do you manage to co-ordinate Disk CleanUp or cCleaner to run before
Diskeeper runs?

Gerry,

Not sure what you mean? I don't 'co-ordinate'. Diskeeper runs daily as
I said, much more frequently than CCleaner.

Here's a short movie I made for my discussion with Insight Software
(ME developers) showing the effects of AWC closing
- on the ME Pro macro (slows it down)
- on the Recorder macro (doesn't affect it)

http://s154.photobucket.com/albums/s247/terrypin999/?action=view&current=AWCMEPProblem.flv

 

[Gerry]

Terry

It is a waste of of time defragment "rubbish", which is what you are
doing if you defragment without removing the rubbish first. Likewise if
you cleanup and don't defragment you will immediately have a fragmented
volume. Just my reading of the situation.

Your movie is too complicated for my simple mind to understand.

--


Hope this helps.

Gerry
~~~~
FCA
Stourport, England
Enquire, plan and execute
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

[Terry Pinnell]

Terry

It is a waste of of time defragment "rubbish", which is what you are
doing if you defragment without removing the rubbish first. Likewise if
you cleanup and don't defragment you will immediately have a fragmented
volume. Just my reading of the situation.

Your movie is too complicated for my simple mind to understand.

No problems Gerry, it's intended mainly for Insight.

Thanks a bunch for all your help!

Best wishes,