Microsoft Windows works best when there are only a few programs running at once. Unfortunately, many applications and websites are aggressive in installing unwanted extra software that runs continually in the background in Windows, sucking up processing time and making the whole system sluggish. In this lesson, you'll learn to remove such performance leeches.

Where's the Background?

When an application or service is running in the background, it's running on your computer, and using a share of the available system resources (like memory), but there's no window for it displayed on-screen. In other words, its operation is hidden from view.

Lots of programs run in the background and serve important and legitimate functions there, such as virus checking and internet connectivity. You might be surprised to know what all is running!

Try this experiment:

1. Press Ctrl + Alt + Delete, and then click Task Manager. This opens the Task Manager window.
2. Click the Applications tab. The items listed here are the programs that have visible windows open, as shown in Figure 2-1.

Figure 2-1: Windows Task Manager Applications tab.

3. Now click the Processes tab. These are all the things that are running in the background. Some of them are pieces of the applications from the Applications tab, but most of them are background processes and utilities, as shown in Figure 2-2.

Figure 2-2: Windows Task Manager Processes tab.

4. Close the Task Manager window when you're done looking at it.

So, what you see is not exactly what you get, is it? You don't have to understand what all those items on the Processes tab are for, so relax. There won't be a quiz on any of that! You just need to know that there's a lot going on in the background.