Radio Program

Data Doctors Radio Program

Harness the Power of the Windows Task Manager

In the early days of computing, determining what a computer was doing was easy, because they could only do one thing at a time. Now, in an age of Hyper-threading, dual-processors, and dual-cores, our home computers are able to run many applications at once. This is wonderful for getting things done quickly and efficiently, but complicates the process of determining what should be running and what should not.

On a modern PC, there are 30+ processes running at any given time. Some of these processes are critical to Window’s core functionality, some belong to programs you’ve installed, and still others are derived from malicious programs secretly running in the background.

The Windows Task Manager has been used by technicians since its inception as a preliminary tool for troubleshooting problems. Tune in this week as Ken, Brandon, and Chad show you how to use Task Manager to detect potential problems before it’s too late.

Join us every Weekend as we discuss your computer questions. It's the Tech Show for Non-Tech People! You can post questions on Facebook .

Original Air Date: Aug 20, 2005

This Week's Links

• Use Task Manager to monitor memory consumption
• Use Task Manager to quit unresponsive programs
• Using Task Manager in Windows 2000
• All About the Task Manager
• Security risks to look for in Task Manager
• Mastering the Task Manager
• Using Task Manager in Windows XP
• Microsoft's guide to the Task Manager