How do you find out what your PC is "doing"?

[imported_dvdman]

A lot of the times my PC has major HD activity when I am not doing much at all and it's hard to know what the hell it is actually doing; my best guess most of the time is possibly installing some automatic software updates, but it would be good to know if that was true!?

I've tried looking in Task Manager but it's not that easy to figure out what is happening through that.

So my question is, how do I find out what it is doing, why all the HD activity at that time. Would also be great to know if it's something sinister such as a malware doing something it shouldn't.

Thanks!

 

[snake5]

Windows Vista/7? Like to use uncommon software (games, audio editing, things like that)? Then one of the things to look at is Superfetch. Some do not recommend disabling it, but in my experience, it can cause a lot of trouble - even if you're doing just as little as playing games, it will instantly try to reload what it guesses to be the most common applications back in memory as soon as you have finished playing. And that's where the hard drives go crazy. It will also do the same when the computer isn't used extensively for some time.

You can try to find the service by running the "services.msc" command from Task Manager, Start Menu or Command Prompt. To disable it, first you have to stop it. To enable it again in case disabling it did not help, just set the service to "Automatic" and start it.

 

[Bubbaleone]

A lot of the times my PC has major HD activity when I am not doing much at all and it's hard to know what the hell it is actually doing; my best guess most of the time is possibly installing some automatic software updates, but it would be good to know if that was true!?

I've tried looking in Task Manager but it's not that easy to figure out what is happening through that.

So my question is, how do I find out what it is doing, why all the HD activity at that time. Would also be great to know if it's something sinister such as a malware doing something it shouldn't.

Thanks!

With Mark Russinovich's Autoruns for Windows v11.32 and Process Explorer v15.22 you'll be able to see exactly what programs run when Windows starts as well as the resources being utilized by any process running, in real time.

If you're not currently running a good full-time antivirus, get one. Many very good free versions are available for download on the web. If you're running Windows 7, Microsoft Security Essentials is a good choice.


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[imported_dvdman]

Thanks for the links. Running XP at the moment and yeah, using MSE.