sluggish PC

0patience

So my old PC was getting a little sluggish and I decided to check what was running in the task manager.
There were 2 programs that seemed to be using resources when they shouldn't have.
One was some sentinel program and the other was akamai netsession.

It seems both of these are add-ons to games or some downloaded programs.
After some researching, I discovered it was safe to uninstall these, mostly because if they are necessary to a program, it will notify me when I launch that program and I can either reinstall it or uninstall the offending program.

Anyways, after uninstalling them and restarting my PC, what a difference.
It runs like it did when it was fairly new.

Anyways, my point is, if your PC is getting sluggish, you might want to see what all is running.
There might be some programs that are running that you don't even know are there.

jlmarta

PM to ya, my boy..... ??

0patience

Back at ya bud.

Rain

Malwarebytes and ccleaner once a week

0patience

Rain:

Malwarebytes and ccleaner once a week

Only problem is that some of these programs running aren't considered malware, as they are "updaters" or programs that are added on to some games or software to update them.
RealNetworks for RealPlayer is one that I hate. It's scheduler runs all the time.
Same with Java's update scheduler.
Both of them can be resource hogs and neither of them will show on either of those programs.

Both the sentinel program and the other aren't considered malware, just resource hogs as they continue to run and access the internet.

I had tried blocking them a while back in the firewall program, but all that did was block their access to the internet. But they still continued to run pulling CPU resources.
Uninstalling them didn't hurt anything.

I'd uninstall the Realplayer updater, if I didn't use Realplayer, but I prefer it over Window Media Player.
And I have to have Java for a lot of the automotive diagnostic programs I use.

Sometimes you have to get old fashioned and see exactly what is going on. LOL!

Martel

Virus scan, too.

ExpendableYouth

That's why I never use computers, cellphones, or typewriters.

SecretSquirrel

a solid state drive is the single most effective upgrade you can use to increase the speed of your computer. chances are, your current hard drive is the culprit. anti-spyware stuff is a waste of time and probably contains spyware. randomly uninstalling programs that are running in the background can cause major issues, and I would not recommend it unless you know exactly what it is.

jd50ae

I will mention WiseCare 365 again. It clears a lot of trash and is totally safe to use. The free version at least should be on everyone's PC.

The other thing I found is even when you find an "upstart" and remove it there is still bits on your PC. "REVO" uninstaller is the best deep looking program I have found and it gives you 3 levels of search after it removes the main body.

The other thing I do is run the built in search (magnifying glass) from MS after "REVO". It finds a lot and you can delete every bit of it.