Some Common Processes in Windows

Sometimes we open the Task Manager and wonder what is this process? is it required? Here are some of those..

svchost.exe
According to Microsoft: “svchost.exe is a generic host process name for services that run from dynamic-link libraries”. Could we have that in english please?
Some time ago, Microsoft started moving all of the functionality from internal Windows services into .dll files instead of .exe files. From a programming perspective this makes more sense for reusability… but the problem is that you can’t launch a .dll file directly from Windows, it has to be loaded up from a running executable (.exe). Thus the svchost.exe process was born. If you notice you can see somany svchost are running at the same time. We know there are somany services running in windows. If every service ran under a single svchost instance, a failure in one might bring down all of windows. So they are seperted out...
We can check this by using command:
C:\>tasklist /svc
See what service is running and if it is an unwanted service stop or disable it. We can also use command:
C:\>sc config ServiceName start= disabled

jusched.exe
Don't get panic this one is less dangerous than we think.. This is Java Update SCHEDuler, which is a process that wastes memory all the time just to check once a month whether there are new updates to Java. To get rid of this:
* Goto Control Panel
* Click on Java Icon (Inside Additional Options in Vista)
* Open java control panel
* Select Update tab
* Uncheck the box for "Check for Updates Automatically”
Now create 1 scheduled task for checking java update once in a month.
Browse and select “C:\Program Files\Java\jre1.6.0_01\bin\jucheck.exe”

ctfmon.exe
Ctfmon is the Microsoft process that controls Alternative User Input and the Office Language bar. It’s how you can control the computer via speech or a pen tablet, or using the onscreen keyboard inputs for asian languages. If you are using any of the above leave it..
Do the following to disable it

Win XP
* Control Panel
* Regional and Language options
* Languages Tab
* Details
* Advanced Tab
* “Turn off advanced text services”

Win Vista
· Control Panel
· Regional and Language options
· Change keyboards or other input methods
· Change keyboards
· Follow the steps as in windows xp

After that open msconfig and find ctfmon in startup tab and unchek it

You want to get rid of this thing from your system..?
Run this :
Regsvr32.exe /u msimtf.dll
Regsvr32.exe /u msctf.dll

Then Reboot

rundll32.exe
This is also a windows file to launch shared dll files. Normally this is a not harmful but some spyware uses the same file name. To check this look in the original file location which is \windows\system32\rundll32.exe. Delete other files. Open msconfig and remove it from the startup.

dwm.exe
Desktop Window Manager
Its used on windows vista and windows 7 to display the pretty effects -Transparent windows, Live taskbar thumbnails, Flip 3d switch, etc -which are microsoft's masterpiece as they say. Simply switching to the vista basic theme will no turn off dwn but it will reduce the memory usage a lot. It is not recommended to turn it off unless playing game in full screen mode.To disable it

• Control Panel


• Services


• Desktop Window Manager Session Manager


• Stop or take properties and disable it permenently

wmpnscfg.exe and wmpnetwk.exe

Windows media player can share media between different computers in a network. Both of these files are part of the sharing system. To disable this

• Control Panel


• Administrative tools


• Services


• Windows Media Player Network Sharing Service


• Properties


• Disable

Alternative Method using regedit
Reach here
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\MediaPlayer\Preferences\HME
DisableDiscovery DWORD value; set the value to 2 (1 also should work)
then got here
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
Delete entries for the above files.