Tech guide: Under your PC's hood

If you are one of those people who absolutely has to know exactly what processes and applications are running on your computer at any given time, I'm betting you don't get out much.

However, there is much to be gained in knowing what is going on "under the hood", because we can use that information to manipulate those aspects of our software and hardware configuration that can help make our machines run better.

It is also incredibly handy, when dealing with machines infected by viruses, to be able to observe running processes and note how they interact with other processes, which can often lead us to where the little pests are hiding.

As with all things computing, there are several ways of determining what these running processes are.

The latest versions of Windows have a built-in Task Manager, invoked by using Ctrl+Alt+Delete.

This utility scans running applications and processes and displays all kinds of cool information, though on face value not much of it will mean much to the casual observer.

It can be made more useful if you click on View on the Task Manager's toolbar and choose Select Columns from the menu. Here you can select some pretty gritty extras.

For example, perhaps you need to know the Working Set Delta figures for all running processes. No problem. Select that option and that figure will be instantly available to you. With a full set of Working Set Delta figures, you are bound to be a hit at any cocktail party and the darling of the after-dinner speaking circuit.

I apologise for the cynicism; I'm actually not sure what this even means. My point is the Task Manager can be a very useful tool for everyone from computer techs seeking to kill running processes to code-cutters who need to know how certain aspects of their code is behaving.

Believe it or not, many tech-type people lament the limitations of the Windows Task Manager and instead opt for more sophisticated third-party programs that dig even deeper and display even more information as well as having various tools that enable us to manipulate running processes and applications.

All good task manager-type applications should have a function which allows us to "kill" processes. This can be extremely useful in case of viral infection or where some rogue process has gone nuts and is gobbling up huge amounts of cpu cycles and other system resources.

Sometimes the Windows Task Manager won't kill a process because it is either protected by the Operating System or considered mission critical and stopping it may cause severe system instability; perhaps even a shutdown.

Some third-party applications don't bother with such limitations and kill even protected processes, though this could only be useful when cleaning viruses or similar.

Another handy Task Manager feature is the ability to increase or decrease an application's priority. This is where you can divert more system resources to a process when it usually would be ascribed less, or lower priority.

For example; try playing Freecell while AVG is scanning. Tough going? That's because AVG is running in high priority and Freecell in low. Assigning high priority to Freecell should enable it to run smoother during the scan.

However, you are robbing Peter to pay Paul; the cpu cycles have to come from somewhere so you should really only reassign priorities if you know exactly what you are doing, otherwise things may end up going slower than they did before.

* Dave Thompson runs a computer-services company in Christchurch. Contact: dave@computerkungfu.com

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