Some blogs go over six months between posts, but not this one. No siree Bob.
You probably don’t use Windows’ inbuilt Task Manager all that much, and I reckon it’s because it’s not Sysinternals Process Explorer. I’m right, aren’t I?
There’s a good reason this little beauty comes with the option “Replace Task Manager” and that’s because it really can. No, should; and now that Microsoft have taken it under their wing (/site) maybe one day it will.
My favourite feature, and the one that most people would use if nothing else, is its “Find Handle or DLL” function, which, to the less technical amongst us, translates to “Tell me which program I need to close so I can delete this file that Windows says is in use.” And for the really brave, why close the program when you can just close the handle? Although some handles are best left alone, eg those held by csrss.exe alone, unless you’re particularly fond of the dreaded blue screen of death.
Some other reasons I’ve replaced my task manager include:
- CPU history in Tray Icon: really helpful for keeping an eye on how busy the CPU is, and which process is the culprit (just hover over the icon)
- Tree view: handy for finding out which process launched another process, or for killing a tree of processes
- Command line / image path: shows the full path (rather than just the file name) and any parameters used to start it
- Restart process: great for killing and restarting a process in one fell swoop
- New, deleted colour highlighting: helps you notice what just started or stopped
Isn’t it about time you “Replace[d your] Task Manager”?
