System:4 ???? Anyone know what this process is?

[skytop]

My computer is bogging down terribly causing keystroke screen appearance delays, input hesitation and delay, and lags in moving anything on screen with the mouse. Many virus and registry scans did nothing to help.

Using the Task Manager CPU usage monitor, I saw that the lagging and screen input delays occured when CPU load was up above 80%.

I have tried to track down what process is hogging resources.
Using the File Monitor program (of real time processes), I saw a recurring process called "System:4" with a Request IRP_MJ request and a path of C:\$Mft. I do not have any such directory or path. I cannot identify this hogging process. Very strange.

Does anyone know what this "System:4" process is????
I have searched but find no mention of it.

Thank you very much.

[Vampiel]

Did you scan for spyware?

[skytop]

Sure did, as I stated.

I used Norton, Spysweeper, Adaware, PestPatrol and Spybot.
Also ran three different registry cleaners.

This is not an easy fix. I have done most every clean up operation and nothing helped in the least.

[Direct1]

Skytop, please do not double-post, thank you.

You could and disable it from starting up using MSConfig.

Good luck!

[Vampiel]

What OS are you running?

C:\$Mft could be a hidden folder that means

Master File Table

http://linux-ntfs.sourceforge.net/ntfs/files/mft.html

[Vampiel]

http://www.sysopt.com/forum/showthre...s&pagenumber=2

[mrrobotto]

Have you d/l'ed any wall paper or screen saver's for the desk top from the Internet lately? or have you installed anything lately? PCI cards or anything related to audio maybe.

Its usually a function call in a driver. It stands for input/output request packett (IRP)

[skytop]

Vampiel:
Thanks for the link. Interesting to know.
I just rolled back my Nvidia driver to an earlier version that I know worked.
Still have the hesitation/ lag problem though. Still running scans and clearing out registry.

One interesting thing I found while viewing Win Task Manager process, were FIVE instances of a program called SVCHOST.exe running at the same time.
I looked this svchost up and find it to allegedly be the result of different virus infections. When I run my PestPatrol active processes virus scan, they don't even show up! They are invisible to the anti virus program yet are seen by Task Manager.
Now that's strange!

Any suggestions? Thanks.

[fishybawb]

I haven't got anything to add that may help, but I can say that svchost.exe running multiple times is normal, and probably not related to your problem. They're ignored by the programs you mentioned because they're just Windows services.

[Direct1]

SCVHOST.EXE is not a virus and needs to be there. Yes, ther eusually will be several instances of it running.

svchost - svchost.exe - Process Information

Process File: svchost or svchost.exe
Process Name: Service Host Process
Description: Application that works as a host process for services that run from dynamic link libraries.
Company: Microsoft Corp.
System Process: Yes
Security Risk ( Virus/Trojan/Worm/Adware/Spyware ): No
Common Errors: N/A

http://www.liutilities.com/products/...brary/svchost/

Good luck!

[dajogejr]

As mentioned, a lot of things "hide" behind svchost.exe.

DNS, DHCP just to name a few.

If you really want to see the goods, go to a command prompt.
Type:

tasklist /svc

This will identify your processes running as svchost.exe.

Cheers...

[skytop]

Dajogejr:
Wow! That's really helpful!

Coming from the old DOS days, I like that versitility.

Best/

[dajogejr]

[Vampiel]

Nice command dajogejr.

There apparently is a service that is loading that is hogging your system resources, try what scottblue2003 did and noted on his last thread here to fix a simular problem.

http://www.sysopt.com/forum/showthre...s&pagenumber=2

[skytop]

One thing I have not mentioned is that right now, via Windows Task Mngr, I see I have a whopping 54 processes running. Is that about normal? I

When I just tried to click to minimize the Task Mngr window, it took 5 clicks before it finally minimized. That's the kind of stuff I am dealing with. It feels like I am running a 386 15 Mhz machine that is overloaded. Really! Everything is bogged down. I have the CPU gauge on the task bar. It is showing very light load now (10%) yet the keystrokes are still randomly lagging / hesitating for seconds before they appear on the screen. This is really frustrating. It is difficult to type cause you don't see what your typing appearing on the monitor.

Thanks for all your help.