svchost.exe ...wtf?

W

Windy

Airship Passenger
Adventurer
Joined
Jul 23, 2006
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174
I'll be playing XI and all of the sudden it's like having 12 XI's open in 6 different Dynamis zones with a train on each screen. I mean -lag-. It takes me 10-15 seconds to TURN. S and R never move from whatever they were (generally about 200-400) and I check Task Manager and PC is stressed to 100%... PoL is pushed to SECOND (5-15%) and this Svchost.exe is pulling 85-95% of my PC's resources. I -cannot- end the process I don't know -what- it is or how to stop it. It goes on for 15-45min then just.... stops.

What gives? x.x
 
svchost.exe is a Windows program that controls all sorts of various functions, including Windows Firewall, internet access control, settings, etc etc etc. Unfortunately, thanks to Microsoft's wonderful programming, it tends to start using up TOO much system memory after running your computer for so long.
To prevent this, I have my Virtual Memory set to 1524 MB initial and 3048 MB maximum (I have a 100 GB HDD). I also have 1024 MB RAM, and I've gone through all of my Windows settings and made everything set to "Best Performance" and such, rather than "Let Windows decide...". Anytime I play a game on my computer, I restart it then start up the game after all of the programs that are on automatic start-up finish.
Try increasing your virtual RAM manually (custom setting), and setting all of your system settings to best performance. Also, run defrag, disk clean-up, and scandisk regularly to keep your computer running smoother than normal.

Edit: In regards to Swishiee's post... yes, it tends to become a major target of viruses, but svchost.exe itself is not a virus. Though, as I said, it tends to become the top prize of most Windows viruses therefore becoming a virus itself (in a manner of speaking). There is a virus called svchost.exe out (to make people think they have the virus when they see svchost.exe over and over in Task Manager), but the actual exe is not one.
 
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If there's several SVCHOST.EXE entries in your running programs list, it IS a virus. One of them will read "System" (the real one, if it's unaffected), and the duplicate(s) will read "youraccountnamehere", which IS a virus.

Chances are the real one is affected badly. Either find a good anti-virus suite or two for safety, or wipe your computer. :(
 
Poor trippy grasping at straws.. It seems leaving my PC on for 3-4 weeks at a time has detrimental effects. Rebooted and nothing so far, did virus checks and nadda.
 
do not use an anit virus, one of my PCs is online 24/7 only had 1 trojen in 2 yrs
i bet anti virus software has something in it that virus can scan over the net to pick them up, heck bulldog sent a virus out once to beat its own anti software as not enough where buying it.
 
Reishu said:
If there's several SVCHOST.EXE entries in your running programs list, it IS a virus. One of them will read "System" (the real one, if it's unaffected), and the duplicate(s) will read "youraccountnamehere", which IS a virus.

Chances are the real one is affected badly. Either find a good anti-virus suite or two for safety, or wipe your computer. :(
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System, Local Service, and Network Service are safe instances. I wouldn't say "If there are several running", as it's pretty common to have 3-5 instances.
 
7 svchost running for me right now and I I'm virus/crapware free for sure.

Are automatic updates on, maybe it's updating or one of the latest updates broke something. My PC got crazy retarded choppy when the newst updates were installing in the background.

Try the Trend Micro free online virus scanner too, might be worth a few hours of your time to have a double check. A single one doesn't catch 100% of em and some are very sophisticated at hiding from certain antivirus products. Do you have AdAware and SpyBot and whatever else is good these days? Update and scan if you haven't, especially if you ever use Internet Explorer.

Look at some of the tools over on sysinternals.com , they can show you things like which files a process has open and that can give you a better idea of what it's doing (legit or shady stuff, which directory it's using/reading). Check it out, they're pretty neat and you can't do too much harm with them.

I'm leaning towards malware/virus or updates gone bad. Take some time to think about what's changed in the past couple days, what sites you visited, what you downloaded and what you've installed. Ask yourself what changed a few hours or days before this started happening.
 
Hmm, now that I think about it, I've been having the occasional near-lock up choppiness as well. Thought maybe something was up with my PC, but it's clean.

It caused me to lose Pulling The Strings last week. =/ First time it happened was then, doesn't happen much. Maybe 4 or 5 times in the last 6 days.
 
Everlasting said:
7 svchost running for me right now and I I'm virus/crapware free for sure.

Are automatic updates on, maybe it's updating or one of the latest updates broke something. My PC got crazy retarded choppy when the newst updates were installing in the background.

Try the Trend Micro free online virus scanner too, might be worth a few hours of your time to have a double check. A single one doesn't catch 100% of em and some are very sophisticated at hiding from certain antivirus products. Do you have AdAware and SpyBot and whatever else is good these days? Update and scan if you haven't, especially if you ever use Internet Explorer.

Look at some of the tools over on sysinternals.com , they can show you things like which files a process has open and that can give you a better idea of what it's doing (legit or shady stuff, which directory it's using/reading). Check it out, they're pretty neat and you can't do too much harm with them.

I'm leaning towards malware/virus or updates gone bad. Take some time to think about what's changed in the past couple days, what sites you visited, what you downloaded and what you've installed. Ask yourself what changed a few hours or days before this started happening.
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Bolded! I totally forgot I've had this stupid Windows Update for the past 2 weeks sitting there >< I sorta learned to tune out anythingbut MSN, AVG-Anti Virus, and FFXI windows >.>; I updated and rebooted updated and rebooted and its smooth atm.
 
Windy said:
Bolded! I totally forgot I've had this stupid Windows Update for the past 2 weeks sitting there >< I sorta learned to tune out anythingbut MSN, AVG-Anti Virus, and FFXI windows >.>; I updated and rebooted updated and rebooted and its smooth atm.
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Try changing when it updates, set it to auto-update when you know you're not going to be on it. For example, I have my computer auto-update every Thursday at 3 AM. This will allow your computer to get all the stuff it needs, without bothering you.
 
dedalius said:
Try changing when it updates, set it to auto-update when you know you're not going to be on it. For example, I have my computer auto-update every Thursday at 3 AM. This will allow your computer to get all the stuff it needs, without bothering you.
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Hmm I wish I could turn it OFF >< I am up on variable times all 24 hours. One day it's work from 5am-10am, sleep either 12am-4am of it OR 11am-3pm then fill.. then next day I may work 10pm-2am... x.x

I'll prolly end up putting it at like 1pm since no one does anything at that time anyhow XD

thanks for all the help guys^^
 
Windy said:
Hmm I wish I could turn it OFF >< I am up on variable times all 24 hours. One day it's work from 5am-10am, sleep either 12am-4am of it OR 11am-3pm then fill.. then next day I may work 10pm-2am... x.x

I'll prolly end up putting it at like 1pm since no one does anything at that time anyhow XD

thanks for all the help guys^^
Click to expand...

You don't want to turn it off as Msoft fixes all kinds of bugs with automatice updates. You could leave your computer wide open to new holes. You can set it to just go once a week, at a static time.
 
Skaw said:
Hmm, now that I think about it, I've been having the occasional near-lock up choppiness as well. Thought maybe something was up with my PC, but it's clean.

It caused me to lose Pulling The Strings last week. =/ First time it happened was then, doesn't happen much. Maybe 4 or 5 times in the last 6 days.
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I've had the same problem on occasion, for nearly 70 seconds, unbelievably choppy and laggy, something horribly affecting the game. The rest of the PC is fine, but FFXI will lag like bloody hell randomly, maybe once a day when I am on. At first I was wondering if it was my computer, but then realizing that it wasn't physically possible for my computer to lag like bloody hell when just FFXI is open like that, I figured it had to be something software side. Glad to see I'm not the only one this was happening too. Any bets it's this windower version?
 
i have 5 SVCHOST.EXE running, and i always have. Even on fresh installs on me and my wifes PC.
Two Read SYSTEM
Two read NETWORK SERVICE
one reads LOCAL SERVICE.
all common depending on your set up. They have never caused any problems

http://www.neuber.com/taskmanager/process/svchost.exe.html
 
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I have auto update turned off. Every time i reformat turning that, and messenger, off is one of the first things i do. I also run on service pack one though and never update anything. If you want to turn it off goto start > run and type in services.msc and then right click on Auto updae, think its the third or fourth down and goto properties. Then hit stop and there you go. I do it, its upto you though im not saying you should but if you want to thats how.

On a side note, How much ram do you have windy? I have 2 gigs and can run winamp my torrents and play ffxi and my comp doesnt go above 10% used tops. That could be one of the problems also.
 
Elpon said:
lol that software found 460 errors.
The trial version only can repair 15.
That's how they gettcha!
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Why look at dis now, I dont see crap in 'dere. I seen dis before. Dis is how dey gettcha.

On-topic

I have seven svchost.exe running right now, most of them for different things. And my lousy auto-updater is still downloading updates -_-. I'm sorry you had such horrid lag issues, but am glad you got them resolved.
 
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