I’m not sure what caused the issue, but what I did know was that I had to stop the installer from creating new Flash installer instances on my computer. With Windows Task Manager out of the picture, I had to find a way to terminate the process.

One of the best Windows Task Manager alternatives is Process Explorer from Sysinternals (which have been part of Microsoft for the past years). You can download the latest version of Process Explorer from here.

I started the process manager with standard rights first only to find out that I could not use it this way to terminate the process. After exiting and restarting it with elevated rights (by right-clicking and selecting run as administrator) I was able to terminate the process on the system.

Other programs, like Process Lasso, Kill Process or the recently reviewed Daphne may have also been able to terminate the rogue process.

I have learned two things this morning: First, that Windows Task Manager is not almighty when it comes to terminating processes on Windows, and second that it is definitely better to download and install Adobe Flash Player offline installers.

Did you ever encounter a process that you could not kill? What did you do to resolve it?

If this sounds like something you want to try out, you can download Daphne for free from this link:

The setup is typical and the parent folder will be found in Windows\Program Files(x86). You can choose to open the application after setup or use the desktop icon to open it later.

You can view %CPU, PID, Process, Path (where specified), Owner, Priority, Class, Memory occupation, Peaks, Swap, Thread, I/O reads and I/O writes. This is all displayed in the main window and the options panel is at the bottom of the window.

The dropdown menu gives you the different actions that you can apply to specific processes. Select the action you want to execute and then drag the icon to the left of the search box and drop it on the process to which you will apply the action.

Windows Task Manager begins to look very limited in comparison to the functions of Daphne. You can use the right-click context menu to choose a variety of options for actions. An interesting feature to demonstrate as an example is the ability to kill a process at an application or process at a particular time, select the process and right-click and choose “Kill at” from the context menu. You may then set the date and time to kill the application. In this example, Yahoo Messenger is selected to be killed at a specific time. This is useful for stopping this application when you don’t want to use it anymore. It is a good application, but the pop-up messages can get annoying after a certain period of time and it is convenient to have it stop automatically.

Use the Settings button in the bottom pane to customize different options such as startup behavior, setting traps, enable Windows Explorer integration, and advanced settings configuration. Highlight the process or application that you want to set options for and click the Settings button to access these options.

Click the Daphne button to see hidden applications, schedule system shutdown, show installed software, etc.

Daphne is quite versatile and easy to learn. It is compatible with Windows XP, Windows 7, and Vista for 32-bit and 64-bit versions. It certainly offers a level of control that exceeds that of Windows Task Manager alone.

The issues with the old task manager was that it was difficulty to compare the cells in the cpu usage history with each other. Microsoft has identified three core limitations with regards to the cpu charts in the Windows 7 task manager.

First the already mentioned lack of effective real-time cpu usage comparisons. Then that the graphs were reduced in size the more cpu processors were displayed in the performance chart, and finally that it was almost impossible to identify a corresponding processor ID.

Microsoft has made significant modifications to the Task Manager performance tab under Windows 8. The new features have been implemented in a development version of the operating system that has been produced after the release of the Windows 8 Developer Preview.

When users open the performance tab in the Windows 8 Task Manager, they will notice that Microsoft has integrated a heatmap into the display.

Microsoft has done away with the graphs and replaced the information with percentage values showing the cpu load.

In addition, hovering over any processor ID on the map displays the logical processor ID in a tooltip right in the task manager. The Task Manager scales well even to large data sets or small windows. A scrollbar is displayed in the latter case to make enough room for displaying up to 640 logical processors.

The heat map is an interesting idea for large scale systems. It in combination with the direct display of processor loads and individual process identifications a great upcoming enhancements for server administrators.

It is however not clear why Microsoft in the same news post mentioned that users could set the cpu affinity of each process in Windows individually, as it is a feature that is has been available for a while. Unless of course the settings are saved over sessions.

You can read the new post over at the Building Windows 8 blog.

A click on More Details in the Task Manager expands the display to make it look more like the Task Manager known from previous Windows versions.

When you look closer though you will notice that there are fundamental differences that may make the Task Manager unusable for system administrators and tech savvy users. Lets take a look at the Task Manager in Windows 8:

And now as a comparison the Task Manager in Windows 7:

Probably the first thing that you will notice is that the Windows 8 Task Manager is dividing processes into groups like Applications, Background Processes or Windows Processes. This may provide a better overview of tasks, but some users may criticize that it is now more difficulty to look at all tasks as they are not sorted alphabetically anymore. You can change the display with a right-click on the status bar and a click on “Group by Type” there.

If you look closer, you will notice that Windows 8 displays service and application names instead of the process executable. Microsoft has removed the option to add or remove columns from the View menu. You now need to right-click on a column in the Task Manager to see the selection of available information that you can display in the window. Among the options is the process name which adds the file executable to the interface again.

Good thing is that Windows will remember the modifications that you have made to the Task Manager. It will launch the task manager in detailed view directly and with the layout changes that you have made in a previous session.

I personally dislike the way the new Task Manager is delivered to the user. The default state is absolutely useless and the detailed view only becomes a working solution once you make the modifications mentioned above. Once you have modified it it resembles the old task manager. Some users on the other hand may feel the need to switch to a task manager replacement like Process Explorer instead.

For some time, the familiar three-finger tactic of Ctrl+Alt+Del would bring you directly to Windows Task Manager. That was the case until Windows Vista was born from the Microsoft womb. Now it simply brings up a Windows Security Screen presenting five options, one of which is Windows Task Manager. As stated previously, malware can block this tried and true tactic, though it is reasonable to try this first.

The easiest method for opening Windows Task Manager is to right-click the taskbar and then select Task Manager. This is a two-click method, but you can also create an Automatic HotKey that will bring up the task manager with a single key click. You can download a free utility for this: AutoHotkey download page.

All information is included to create a HotKey for Windows Task Manager, or any other application. The next option is to use the Run command. At the Start Menu, select All Programs and then under Accessories, click the Run command. Type taskmgr and press Enter. The Task Manager opens.

Ctrl+Shift+Esc will bring up the Task Manager as well, at least on most versions of Windows. This is your next bailout.
If all else fails, you can use the lengthy method of browsing to taskmgr.exe. Navigate to C:\Windows\System32\taskmgr.exe. Double click taskmgr.exe and you are in.

Finally, create a desktop shortcut to access Task Manager. Do this in addition to creating a HotKey. That gives you two quick default access methods. Simply right-click on your desktop and select New and then click Shortcut and a window will open. Follow the same path as above: C:\Windows\System32\taskmgr.exe. Click Next and type a name for the shortcut then click Finish to conclude. This will create a desktop icon allowing you to immediately open Windows Task Manager in the event of malware infection or any other reason. I highly recommend this and the HotKey approach. They are the fastest ways to open Task Manager when it is impaired by malware.

Follow these steps and you can’t fail. You will trick any virus and be able to stop malware processes and effectively remove the malware using your antivirus software.

Martin’s Comment: Please note that there may be malware that blocks the task manager completely, so that not the access method, but the program itself cannot be opened by the user of the operating system. Your best in such a situation is to scan the system with antivirus software like Avast, Microsoft Security Essentials, AVG or one of the commercial solutions like Kaspersky, Symantec or BitDefender.

Process Explorer shows you information about “which handles and DLLs processes have opened or loaded”. If you ever wanted to know what’s launching all those svchost processes, or why a process has been launched then Process Explorer is the tool to reveal those information.

But what’s new in Process Explorer 14? Take a look at this brief paragraph:

This major update to Process Explorer adds a slew of enhancements and new functionality including network and disk monitoring, an improved multi-tab system information dialog, additional memory statistics, a new column that shows aggregate CPU usage for a tree of processes, improved DLL scanning performance and accuracy, command-lines in process tree tooltips, support for more than 64 CPU systems, and more.

A few interesting additions. The tree cpu usage column for instance can be helpful to determine the cpu usage of a program spawning multiple processes, like Google Chrome for instance (last column in the screenshot).

Process Explorer 14 is available for download at the official Windows Sysinternals website. It is also possible to run Process Explorer directly from http://live.sysinternals.com/procexp.exe.

Most users do not know that it is possible to reduce the size of the task manager beyond that point to make it usable for users with specific window size requirements.

The compact mode of the program can be activated by double-clicking the inner border of the task manager, take a look at the screenshot below to see the area.

task manager

A double-click on that border switches to ultra-compact mode which removes the tabs and menu bar in the Windows Task Manager.

windows task manager compact

That alone would not be helpful but the new mode allows to reduce the window size of the task manager further.

windows task manager

The task manager window can be reduced to an absolute minimum this way. It is possible to switch modes again by double-clicking a second time on the border. This however resizes the window to the minimum allowed size of that mode.

Do you have a tip like that? Why not share it with us in the comments?

Many Windows users do not know that it is possible to display additional information in the Windows Task Manager. The following guide gives an overview on how to enable the display of additional information in the Windows Task Manager.

Loading the Windows Task Manager

The keyboard shortcut to load the Windows Task Manager is [Ctrl][Shift][Esc]. The task manager can also be loaded by right-clicking the Windows Taskbar and selecting Start Task Manager from the menu.

Windows Processes

Although it is not the left-most tab, the Processes tab is the default tab activated when opening the Task Manager. The Processes tab provides detailed information on running processes, such as CPU and memory usage, PID and user rights, and in newer Windows versions includes a short human-readable description of the process. By default the display is filtered, a click on the button labelled “Show processes from all users” will display all running processes.

A click on View > Select Columns opens a configuration menu to add columns to the display. Most of the additional information that can be enabled in this menu is intended for developers and administrators, but end users may find it helpful as well. For instance, it is possible to display the path of running processes, which can be very helpful to identify the program that has started the process.

The Memory Peak Working Set column is another interesting column that can be enabled. It displays the maximum amount of computer memory of each process in the task manager. The configuration menu can also be used to remove columns from the display in case they are not needed or used. A recommended setting is to keep all columns that are activated by default and add the Image Path Name and Memory – Peak Working Set columns.

Networking

The Networking tab displays information about each network adapter. Most Windows users will not see much information, if any at all, when they open the tab in the Windows Task Manager. Like the Processes tab, the Networking tab can be configured to display additional information by clicking on View > Select Columns.

In addition to the total amount of data transfer, separate graphs representing Bytes Sent and Bytes Received can be enabled. The network traffic will be monitored and displayed once the selections have been made.

These just two examples of Windows Task Manager tabs that can be configured to display additional information. The rest of the Task Manager can be similarly configured as well. End users will especially benefit from the additional information in the Processes tab. What other Task Manager configuration tips do you have? Let us know in the comments.

The five default tabs that are available in the Windows Task Manager are offered by DTaskManager plus the two additional Ports and Kernel Modules section. The program displays extensive information in each section of its interface, something that can only be partially achieved in the Windows Task Manager. The processes tab lists for example the path of the process and the cpu time by default.

The Ports section displays all network connections of the local computer system offering massive amounts of information that include the process name, local IP and port, remote IP and port, the protocol, path and socket status.

DTaskManager offers some advanced functions on how to deal with processes. It can for example kill processes the usual way, force the process to be closed and initiate an override to close the process which will bypass permissions as well. Another interesting feature is the ability to suspend tasks. This is a feature known from the Linux operating system which can temporarily halt tasks. That’s a handy feature in situations where all system resources are needed by a process as the user can suspend processes and resume them once the resources are not needed anymore for the priority process.

A few minor options are the ability to display the cpu and memory usage in the system tray. This can be displayed as a bar or as numerical values. DTaskManager is a solid and lightweight Windows Task Manager replacement. It is compatible with Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows Vista.

The extended Task Manager can be configured to replace the Windows Task Manager so that the default keyboard shortcut [CTRL ALT DEL] will open its interface instead. It can also be configured to run independently from the default Task Manager.

The extended Task Manager is tab driven like the original Windows Task Manager. It adds a Summary, Services, and Ports tab which can be used to access different kinds of data that are not visible in the Windows Task Manager.

The software program adds a few additional interesting options to the Task Manager. One of them is the ability to display the list of files that are locked by a process. Another option is to initiate a Google search right from the interface to get additional information about a running process.

The Ports tab will display a list of all incoming and outgoing connections including their process name, process ID, local and remote IP as well as local and remote port.

The configuration offers ways to enable additional information in the various tabs. The Port Monitoring configuration can for instance be used to add UDP port monitoring or limit the TCP ports that are monitored by the program.

The Windows Task Manager replacement uses roughly 5 Megabytes in minimized state and approximately 19 when active. The website of the software company does not contain information about the application’s compatibility. The only available information are that a 32-bit and 64-bit edition seem to exist.

Windows xKill is a port of the Linux xKill program to Windows. The application is fully portable and sits in the Windows Taskbar after startup. The global keyboard shortcut [CTRL ALT Backspace] will load the application and display a skull and crossbones that is following the mouse cursor. The next click on a window or application will automatically terminate the instance.

Pressing [ESC] will close the application again which can be useful for testing purposes or when the application terminated in the meantime.

The software program uses a little bit more than 4 Megabyte of computer memory while running and can be useful to terminate frozen applications faster than usual.

The Task Manager software extension changes the Applications and Processes tab in the Windows Task Manager. The Process ID is shown in the Applications tab while the major changes are visible and accessible in the Processes tab.

The default view in the Processes tab remains more or less unchanged. The only two differences are icons for every process listed and Windows system processes are grayed out to increase the visibility of non system processes.

The Task Manager software extension would be mediocre at best if those were the only changes. The majority of changes have been added to the right-click context menu. The two entries Information and Properties which display all kind of information about the selected process. Useful information include the system path, process environment variables and service information if available.

In addition to that users can view information about Files, Modules, Handles, Windows, Threads, Memory Maps and Process Security.

The Task Manager Software Extension added one additional menu to the top menu which provides access to additional information. Users can opt to view the loaded drivers, all handles and search for files and modules.