Ram

What programs or processes are running in the background on XP, that don't need to be and can be cancelled to make my computer run more smoothly?

 

With XP, your processor should be idling between 0% and 1% with everything closed and the mouse not moving. If anything is sucking up resources, your infected. "lsass.exe" "svchost.exe" if things like that suck up resources, you are infected.

 

Mines constantly running at 97%....and the bottom of my laptop gets really hot and stays like that for hours until I turn it off. It's awesome I love my laptop for being my own personal lap heater.

 

how much ram u got? and what kinda antivirus are u using... telling us about ur laptop can probably help us help u.

 

Well the whole thing about it running at 97% was a joke, and it getting hot was a joke. It's cool I fixed it all up now.

My laptops a IBM T43, I got it for christmas. It's a refurbished one from ebay.

 

Hey I found this useful. Hope it helps.

http://www.technibble.com/essential-processes-needed-to-run-windows/

System Idle Process
explorer.exe
taskmgr.exe
spoolsv.exe
lsass.exe
csrss.exe
smss.exe
winlogon.exe
svchost.exe - (There will be a few of these)
services.exe

 

That is an acurate list.

 

That is a helpful list. Thank you!

 

this is the ultimate site for huge nerds needing to do window tweaks

http://www.blackviper.com/

 

I dunno, I always stop messenger. In fact I stop messenger properly when playing on line games like MOHAA, etc.

Go to -

START - CONTROL PANEL -ADMINISTRATIVE TOOLS - SERVICES -MESSENGER - DISABLED - STOP - APPLY - OK