a process called System is taking up all my cpu

im using winxp pro upgraded to sp2 and on a powerful computer. everything was fine until this morning. when i turned it on it went sluggish took it a long time to load and had hard time loading the tinyest stuff.

when i checked the processes list i noticed there is the system process and its taking 90-100% of the cpu time constantly.
it is obviously a cruccial process for winxp so i cant shut it down. what do i do to fix it?

thanks in advance.. im a new user here and its a realy cool site!

 

If it's taking that much CPU on a constant basis, it's probably not a legit or system process. Kill it. If it's a process that's vital to Windows, it won't let you. If it's not (which it's likely not), then you'll be fine. As to a long-term fix, you might want to do a quick sweep of the registry to see if you can find an entry with the filename of the process you had to kill.

Osiris

 

it is a system process according to wintasks its the process that stores the data regarding the local hardware settings ( the registry ) and is represented in regedit by : HOTKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE.

anyway i dont know why or how it happened but its fine all of a sudden.
plus with the previous information in mind it could b that i have registry issues which i can probably find a decent program to fix them.

anyway if u have a good maintenance program to recommend i'd appreciate it.

thanks for everything
pontufle