Process Hacker ( Figure D) is a free utility for exploring the processes that are running on your system.

Process Lasso sells for $32.95, but a free 30-day trial is available for download. There is even a game mode that gives preferential treatment to designated processes. Process Lasso offers some really cool features, such as the ability to balance processes, park CPU cores, limit process instance counts, and configure anti-sleep processes. In addition to displaying running processes, the software plots processor use, memory load, responsiveness, and memory restraint on a graph. It maintains lists of all processes and active processes. Process Lasso ( Figure C) is another tool for gaining insight into the processes that are running on your PC. However, Process Explorer goes beyond Task Manager in that it displays processes in a hierarchical tree and includes tools for finding handles and DLLs. It also allows you to terminate processes on an as-needed basis. Like Task Manager, it displays all the running processes and their current levels of resource consumption. Process Explorer has been described as an advanced version of Task Manager. There is some overlap in capabilities between Process Monitor and Process Explorer, but the tools were created for different purposes. Microsoft Process Explorer ( Figure B) is another free component of the Sysinternals collection. This makes Process Monitor an excellent tool for gaining insight into what is going on with Windows. For instance, it will tell you if a process attempts to read a file or query a registry value. But Process Monitor doesn’t just display the running processes–it also shows you what those processes are doing. Even Windows itself can display this information through the Task Manager. Plenty of tools can display the processes that are running on your system. Microsoft Process Monitor ( Figure A) is part of the Windows Sysinternals collection, which encompasses numerous tools for monitoring, configuring, or securing Windows. Note: This article is also available as an image gallery and a video hosted by TechRepublic columnist Tom Merritt. This article lists five tools for monitoring your system processes. But as helpful as the Task Manager can be for tracking down the offending process, a number of other tools are available that can provide even more insight into what’s going on. When a Windows system becomes unresponsive, the Task Manager is often the go-to tool for figuring out the problem. Here are five diagnostic tools to help you out. Tracking down the cause of a problematic system goes a lot quicker with the right apps. Five process monitors that go beyond Task Manager

Process monitor software free