Where do all the cycles go ?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Joe Auerbach
  • Start date Start date
J

Joe Auerbach

I have XP Home, all the current patches. After the system has been up for abt
20 minutes, something kicks off that sucks up all the cycles for about 3
minutes, bringing the machine to a crawl. Task Manager shows Idle at abt 90%,
with a couple of other tasks flashing in & out. After about 3 minutes, the
machine returns to normal. How do I nail which task or process is chewing up
all the cycles ?
Thanx, Joe Auerbach
 
A program is probably calling home for updates; check any virus scan
programs, spy sweeper types, etc and see if you have opted for automatic
updates; which includes Windows itself.
 
Thanx, Jerry, I thought that it might be ssomething like an update, what I
was looking for is a way to identify which app it might be
 
Your processor is idle (System Idle Process) 90% and that's a problem?

It's completely normal for software to do housekeeping in the
background. Not to worry.
 
Sorry, Leonard, but the machine being unusable and unresponsive for that time
isn't "Don't worry, be happy" mode. It's not as if I'm using a 286 or some
such, it's a current Dell with a good processor & 1GB of memory. I'm also not
that loaded up with apps, maybe 2 instances of IE and that's about it.
I agree with Jerry that it's probably one of the background tasks doing
updates, what I'm trying to do is identify which one & see what the story is.
 
In that case, System Idle Process is not at 90%. Please get your story
straight
 
Joe Auerbach said:
Sorry, Leonard, but the machine being unusable and unresponsive for that
time
isn't "Don't worry, be happy" mode. It's not as if I'm using a 286 or some
such, it's a current Dell with a good processor & 1GB of memory. I'm also
not
that loaded up with apps, maybe 2 instances of IE and that's about it.
I agree with Jerry that it's probably one of the background tasks doing
updates, what I'm trying to do is identify which one & see what the story
is.
Click to expand...
Process Explorer might be a better choice than Task Manager.

In addition, your problem may be excessive interrupt service time. Process
Explorer shows this time.
Jim
 
Thanx, Jim, I'll try that. I had only tried TM because it was easiest to
invoke, especially with the machine running in slow motion. I've set up
perfmon to run the next times that I start the machine, if that doesn't show
the culprit I'll try process explorer.
 
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