What are all those startup tasks during bootup?

you need to find out what you really need to run things all the time and what is only needed for special events, and what is user-specific, or not necessary at all.

One way is to load Spybot (if you havent already), and click on the tab (under tools) called "system Startup". this will show you exactly what your computer is running in startup, and most if not all of those will have a sidebar telling you what you need and what' unnecessary.

If you have programs that you aren' sure of, type in the name of it at Google, and find a site that will tell you about them, one at a time. You'd be amazed at the junk you can accumulate. And you dont have to delete any of them, just uncheck them in Spybot and see if there's a problem. If there is, go back and recheck it.

If you run XP, you can disable Prefetch totally, and never miss it.
clean out what's in there, and you'll be amazed at how much more quickly things will boot up.

All prefetch does is cache the files you visit, so that in theory they will load faster. What actually happens is that it doesnt empty that cache, and it keeps getting more and more bloated.

Larry N.
I have attached a link to a website that offers an explanation of every normal service visible in the taskmanager for Windows. From experience, It is apparent that many services are used for networked computers, others for special windows protocols and programs that we rarely if ever call on, etc. The file you mention does in fact represent 7-8 services, some of which are good to enable, others less so. I suggest you read the list on the website and decide for yourself what you need to enable and what you can do without....the list includes recommendations and potential consequences of following their recommendations.You can download this list in Excel spreadsheet format and keep it handy when you aren't certain if a service is necessary. This list is only for the Windows services. However, if you see a service running that isn't on this list and you don't know what it is, at least you have eliminated about 95% of the services, which as I mentioned, are Windows services. Good luck and good surfing!

Here is the website: http://techrepublic.com.com/2001-6240-0.html....it is called Windows services that can be disabled.

Hey Larry,

I'm running xp pro /w sp2 and I have 35 running right now, including acrord32.exe (acrobat reader), ares.exe, yahoom~1.exe (yahoo messenger), roxmediadb9.exe (roxio creator), explorer, roxwatch9 (roxio again) that I know what they are, that only leaves 29 unknown. I'm going to format tomorrow and I'll let you know with nothing installed how many are running. to find out what these are, how do I say this, "google it".

To clean a lot out of what's running, run msconfig, go to startup, and disable everything (at your own risk of course). This should speed you up very noticably, if something quits running, re-enable anything simmilar or everything and see if that fixed it. when you restart, if anything besides ctfmon re-enables itself, you prob got bugs.

As far as the services go, I've never messed with those.

Good Luck with your puter,
Dave

This is for Larry N. re: booting up your computer. Mine use to take, what seemed like, forever.........UNTIL I downloaded WinPatrol. It manages the startup menu and now boot up time is about 15 seconds.

Try it...........great little program

Why do you have all those items opening at start up? My pc only has only anti-spyware,anti virus, my isp anti-virus filter. My webpage is permanently set to " blank : so that I can choose which webpage to use each session - I change very often!
Once everything is open I check my non-web email programme. I don't like webmail like Yahoo, far too many advertisements for my liking. Also with Outlook Express I can send any amount of music and pictures with my email as attachments.
I suggest that you delete most of your programs. I delete daily all my cookies and temporary folders, and I find it no trouble to use my favourites webpage search daily. What's the big deal to save everything?
Others on this forum can most likely give you more technical answers. Nevertheless, my computer opens very quickly - ready for business, and it is always so.

sounds like a spyware or virus`s on your system.

try googling HITMANPRO, it uses several programs to seasrch for spyware and if you go into settings you can set it for virus checking.

i fully trust the program but if you have anything like bearshare, kazaa then it will probably remove most of the program!

The best source I've used is the web site located at www.blackviper.com.

He has explanations for all the services running under Windows Vista, XP, and 2000 and whether they are really required (automatic) or can be turned off (disabled) or set to manual.

He also has suggested configurations such as "safe Pro," "Internet Gateway", "Gaming", and "Super Tweak."

He also includes a list of 13 "must" tweaks everyone should apply to reduce the amount of RAM being used at startup.

Go to :

www.blackviper.com

He does a wonderfully detailed job in explaining what each and every windows service does, or doesn't dom and which you can safely "kill" without compromising your individual system

I have a short answer for you. You will likely get exactly the same answer from others.

The easy way to find out what those strange sounding processes are doing is to just go to your favorite search engine and type in the name of the process. Just be absolutely sure you spell it exactly the same. Some malicious programs put in startup items with names that are very similar to those necessary for your computer to function properly. Write down all of the names, and check them out one at a time. This is a good exercise because you will know your computer better when you are done.

Also, there are sites that will tell you about many of these startup entries. Here is one to try:

http://www.answersthatwork.com/Tasklist_pages/tasklist.htm

There are others, of course, but that one is consistently recommended. Just type the name in the search window, just as you would on a search engine. Sometimes they don't know what something is, but they can identify and describe the common ones and let you know if you need them or not.

Be cautious when shutting down anything you don't want. For maximum safety back up your computer right before experimenting. Don't be afraid, but do pay attention and take reasonable precautions.

4Denise

I know what you mean. I have alot of running processes too,not quite 49.For starters,Windows Task Manager is not good at telling you what these programs are and who is the developer. For instance svchost.exe appears several times and that is normal. There is a program I use called Process Explorer,which is similar to the task manager,but more detailed. It tells you who the company is that developed that product.There is another product called Autoruns,which tells you everything that is on your computer,such as programs that run at startup,winsock providers,etc..., and it gives you the option to either delete the entry or disable it. Both Process Explorer and Autoruns are made by Sysinternals. Also,some malware will hide itself in your task manager,such as scvhost.exe,hoping you would overlook it.For starters,what I would do is,research those processes you see in task manager,go to google search,type in the entry and see what you can come up with. As always never delete or disable anything you are unsure what it is.You can create more problems.Usually,most of the process you see in task manager are necessary for windows to operate normally. I would also recommend Win Patrol, it runs in realtime and alerts you of any new programs trying to start up. In conclusion,be careful when messing with processes tied to your OS,if you don't know what it is,leave it alone,and don't be afraid to do research on the internet.

Although it will be time consuming, I would eliminate each process, one at a time, and reboot your system. If your PC starts without the dropped one, I would drop an additional one, and so on. Obviously, there are the basic processes that must be included in order for any PC to start, so that should cut down the time it takes ( by a little bit) to complete the trial and error approach. If by chance you drop a needed component, you can always restart in safe mode.
Good luck.
Flashspeed

PS you could also try Run and SFC to see what that turns up.

I found this web site very helpful in determining which running program module (like UdaterUI.exe) corresponds to what program you have installed:

http://www.fileresearchcenter.com/

If you wish to streamline your start-up this web site above will help you determine whether the program should be running in memory or not.

Also, check the Services that your PC is running by clicking on:

Start -> Run -> type in "msconfig" -> Services tab

You may be able to eliminate unneeded services and speed up your boot process. If this is not successful, the Microsoft boot acceleration utility called BootVis may be in order. I found with this product, over 80% of the PCs I've worked on boot Windows XP in less than 2 minutes.

Hopefully this solves your problem.

Larry,

It's fairly simple to figure out exactly what those mystery processes are. There are sites dedicated to explaining exactly what those mystery executables are doing.

Google (and other search engines, for that matter) are your friend. Simply type the name of the process and search it out. As a for instance, Google returns about 105,000 hits for SHSTAT.EXE and the first hit for a site called liutilities.com says the file is part of McAfee's antivirus suite and should NOT be messed with.

The second file you specified - UDATERUI.EXE - only resulted in 644 hits and likewise is the common user interface of McAfee's AV suite and probably shouldn't be disabled.

WMIPRVSE.EXE is a much more popular search item resulting in 231,000 hits and liutilities.com reports this file as being a part of MS Windows Mangment Interface (hence the WMI).

ISSCH.EXE is a component of the InstallShield installer package. It updates InstallShield software to make sure it's up to date. It shouldn't be turned off unless you suspect it might be causing problems elsewhere.

The SVCHOST.EXE service host is a Windows component that runs various services - like the all important Windows Log on Service. Without those services, Windows won't ever be able to run anything.

There are articles on the web you can find about which Windows services are essential to keeping your system chugging happily along and which ones can be terminated without causing major problems.

You'll want to access those services from the Windows Managment Console (Right-click on MY Computer and select "Manage") or the Services control panel applet. Do not try killing services from Task Manager. Chances are those services will restart themselves again on their own or will cause BIG problems.

Some services can be disabled with prejudice and won't affect the way your system works - like the Messenger service. This is NOT the Window Messenger IM client - but is a bit of a throwback to command line era networking where you could type in something like:

Send /all "Hello World"

And you would see the text "Hello World" pop up on your screen. The modern day equivalent to this confines the text output into a pop-up window. While in a large, corporate setting, this could be very useful - a network admin could send out a message telling all users that the server was about to be "bounced" (shut down and restarted), saving the guy a lot of running around; in the case of single computers or even small networks, this service is quite useless, not to mention annoying. It can be safely disabled.

In some cases, there's even a dark side to the Messenger service. Spammers have caught on to this service. While they can't pass any nasty malware onto your system using this, they can annoy you to no end. You're sitting there, writing a note and up pops an ad for some fake pharmacy selling viagra, low cost re-fi's on your non-existant mortgage and the usual plethora of spam topics. This service is best turned off unless you've got an actual need for it.

Other services that can be safely disabled include things like Fast User Switching - so long as you're the only user on the system. The Smart Card service is kind of useless - especially if your computer is not equipped with a smart card reader and can be turned off. The Terminal Services and Uninteruptable Power Supply Services can likewise be disabled if you're not using them.

The bottom line with services - a lot of it depends on services you need and want to keep up and running.

It is completily normal that you've "so much" processes running. I take for example the svchost.exe. It/they is/are important windows process(es). That process takes care over the .dll files that are located in your windows directory. Without this process, your windows won't work. It are all services to keep your PC running. Something like the UdaterUI.exe seems to me an automated update for security software. You can try this program for looking up the function of the processes: http://www.download.com/Process-Explorer/3000-2094_4-10223605.html?tag=nl.e415 It's a kind of an upgraded version of the task-manager.

Hi. Larry.! If you download ProcessExplorer, Sorry but can't remember where i found it. When you run the program it shows all. If there is one you don't know or want info Highlight the process and right click to find on web, With all the info for it. Hope this helps Terry08.

Dear Larry,

The easiest way to find out which programs are necessary on your system and to find out what they do is to use Google. Most of the time if you put in the name of the program into a search engine like Google some kind person or business has put exactly what that program is for and what package it belongs to.

The one's you've mentioned I've listed below

UDATERUI.EXE - This is part of McAfee Anti-Virus, it is used to update your anti-virus software and so really should be left alone unless you want to get a virus.

SHSTAT.EXE - Again this is part of McAfee Anti-Virus and like the above should not be terminated.

WMIPRVSE.EXE - This is part of Microsoft Windows and deals with WMI operations. Again this one should not be terminated.

ISSCH.EXE - This program is part of InstallShield, it keeps the InstallShield programs up to date. It isn't essential and can be terminated quite safely.

SVCHOST - This should not be terminated at all. SVCHOST is a very important part of the operating system that works with the DLL files, the reason you have quite a few of them is that each program will run SVCHOST to access a DLL file so even though it looks like you have several copies of one thing running each program is doing a different thing.

One other thing that I did find a few years ago was that McAfee Anti-Virus was what I'd define as Bloatware. It has a lot of software in there that doesn't actually do anything apart from slow your system down. I tried McAfee in about 2004 and got so fed up of my system running really slowly I switched back to Norton, although Norton seem to have started McAfee's trick too. At the moment the anti-virus I use is NOD32 along with PeerGuardian 2 for a firewall. Both do exactly what they say on the tin and don't add thousands of extra programs to my system that I don't really use (although sometimes Peer Guardian 2 can be a little bit over-protective and I need to turn the HTTP block off)

Amazing! You could change Larry N. to George M: I have been doing some in-computer research on this very subject. My laptop takes 30 minutes to load everything. In TASK Manager the CPU Usage was showing 100% busy almost 100% of the time during the 30 minutes after boot.

I attempted to turn things off within Task Manager. This didn't work well. Some things didn't work at all. Microsoft.com's website has a Task Manager Overview, but no explanation of what all these Tasks are and which ones can be turned off.

I was working on my daughter's laptop and a message popped-up about a change in System Configuration Utility. (Go to START/Run and type in MSCONFIG.) On the GENERAL tab it was on Selective Startup. Her computer loads in about a minute!

I decided to experiment in MSCONFIG on my laptop. First I chose Selective Startup and unchecked both Load System Services and Load Startup Items. Booted just fine, but a lot of programs would not open, and the mini icons on the task bar were missing.

I rechecked Load System Services. Better, but not great. I rechecked Load Startup Items and on the Startup Tab unselected as many programs (items) that I thought I didn't need. I had to experiment with different checked and unchecked programs / software. I now boot in about 2 - 3 minutes. The unchecked programs load when I open them.

You can always recheck Normal Startup and be back at square one; but don't be afraid to experiment. MSCONFIG is an interesting place to at least look at Larry N. Perhaps you will also experiment.

I am far from a computer expert. Perhaps someone can shed some more light on Task Manager and / or MSCONFIG.

THE PROLEM OF STATUP MR LERRY IS A PROBLEM I WENT THROUGH UNTIL I STARTED USING THE SORFTWARE LIKE SYSTEM REGISTRY CLEANUP OR SYSTEM MECHANICS SOFTWARE DOWNLOADED FROM CNET FORUMS AND I RECOMEND YUO TRY ONE OF THESE TO CLEAN UP YUOR STATUP MENU.

Hi Larry
In order to assist you, I would need more data from you regarding the configuration of your system -
Specifically, what operating system are you running, hard disk size, what processor powers your system, how much ram is installed? And do you have a separate video card or a graphics chip on your motherboard?

Black Viper's website, Sysinternals Autoruns and Process Explorer are great tools to help you figure out what exactly is running (services, processes) on your pc, as others have suggested in this forum. My suggestion to you, after you figure out processes, is to buy more ram for your pc. I have 1024mb of pretty fast ram in my 2.6 GHz p4 homebuilt pc. As I type this, I have task manager open, with 49 processes running in the background. CPU usage is 4% and Page File usage is at 448mb - my pc is still pretty snappy in its operation. Will probably add another gig of ram to make me and my pc feel a tad better - you should too, especially if you are running Vista or thinking about upgrading to Vista.

Lastly, if you have a graphics processor on your motherboard, and not a dedicated video card, that could be sucking some vital resources - you are sharing system memory to process video on your pc if that is your configuration. Upgrading to a separate video card will also offload work done by your cpu to the gpu (graphics processing unit) on the video card. Please repost your system config so this community can further assist you. Good luck!