how to check why hdd is being used.

Thread Starter

praondevou

Joined Jul 9, 2011
2,942
Is there any software that allows me to see what process is using the harddisc? I can see the process that uses CPU ressources and memory but this is not what I need.

Sometimes the hdd led is constantly ON and the computer gets VERY slow. Memory usage and cpu usage are within normal limits in this case. As if it was copying data from one place to another.

Antivirus is not running a check.

(it's a laptop)
 

Thread Starter

praondevou

Joined Jul 9, 2011
2,942
In the task manager select the performance tab then Resource Monitor. Select 'Disk' in Resource Monitor and expand the bars. You can see the name of the program that invoked the processe(s) that are using the disk.
Hi that's XP. Maybe I could find a separate HDD resource monitor. Thanks
 

atferrari

Joined Jan 6, 2004
4,764
In the task manager select the performance tab then Resource Monitor. Select 'Disk' in Resource Monitor and expand the bars. You can see the name of the program that invoked the processe(s) that are using the disk.

I found that Western Digital SmartWare did this building interminable files of something.
http://forum.allaboutcircuits.com/showthread.php?t=72034
In Performance tab I cannot find anything that sounds like a Resource Monitor. Much less anything disk related. Win XP SP3

???
 

JohnInTX

Joined Jun 26, 2012
4,787
As I (sort of) indicated in the heading, I'm using Win7-64 Pro. XP does not seem to have as robust reporting..

Anyway, I got curious and found this for one of my XP-SP3 boxes:
Process Explorer for XP Its like Task Manager on steroids and looks like it might help:

Download and unzip to the desktop.
Run it.
Right-click on the columns bar and click Select Columns.
Click the Process Disk tab and check Disk Read and Disk Write.
Click OK
Click the 'Disk' column headings to sort by Disk Reads/Writes.

On mine, I saw program names as well as processes for disk usage.

Good luck!

PS You might also consider the possibility that the HDD is failing. Also, I've found that most of the 'simple' auto-backup programs like the linked WDD SmartWare (and Segate's stuff too) are pretty disk intensive... I quit using them.
 
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XerxesX24

Joined Sep 13, 2012
14
Common one is that the indexing service has gone apesh*t.

In otherwords disable (check for improvement) and enable once a little while again after.

I've used the SysInternals suite for this in the past.

This was supposed to be fixed in SP3 of XP and wasn't supposed to happen in 7 or Vista.
But i've seen it go mental everywhere.

It also might be false reporting or a coincidence -- i've had both in the past.
 
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THE_RB

Joined Feb 11, 2008
5,438
It's a good idea to disable variable swap file size and set a fixed size in Mg or Gb for your Windows swap file. Don't ever select "Let windows manage swap file size", it's like putting the fat kid in charge of the pies. :eek:
 
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