Kill Process (for a runaway program)?

Has anyone found any app that will reliably and definitively kill an errant
and stubborn process?

I've tried the Sysinternals stuff, and "Kill Process" (software) and similar
programs without success in these few instances.

Sometimes a program will hang, and unless I kill the "svchost" process
(forcing a reboot, or sometimes even a power off hangup), nothing works.

Here's a specific example:

I might be running Sound Forge with a DX plug-in, and it may hang up
sometimes, while just starting to run.

When it's a serious hang, nothing can get me out of it (killing the Sound
Forge process, etc, doesn't work, but killing "svchost" (which forces a
reboot (if I'm lucky - otherwise it locks up) sorta works.

NO Kill Process program I've tried yet works in these cases. It's almost
like the svhost runs awry, and the ONLY way out is a reboot or power off.

Surely there must be some app that can do this without forcing a reboot or
powering off the computer. Yes, I realize that multiple processes are
happening when this happens, but still, isn't there anything out there that
can work in these instances (without forcing a reboot). Afterall, this is
using WindowsXP, not Windows98, and the processes are supposed to be more
isolated.

Bill in Co wrote:
Has anyone found any app that will reliably and definitively kill an errant
and stubborn process?

I've tried the Sysinternals stuff, and "Kill Process" (software) and similar
programs without success in these few instances.

Sometimes a program will hang, and unless I kill the "svchost" process
(forcing a reboot, or sometimes even a power off hangup), nothing works.

Here's a specific example:

I might be running Sound Forge with a DX plug-in, and it may hang up
sometimes, while just starting to run.

When it's a serious hang, nothing can get me out of it (killing the Sound
Forge process, etc, doesn't work, but killing "svchost" (which forces a
reboot (if I'm lucky - otherwise it locks up) sorta works.

NO Kill Process program I've tried yet works in these cases. It's almost
like the svhost runs awry, and the ONLY way out is a reboot or power off.

Surely there must be some app that can do this without forcing a reboot or
powering off the computer. Yes, I realize that multiple processes are
happening when this happens, but still, isn't there anything out there that
can work in these instances (without forcing a reboot). Afterall, this is
using WindowsXP, not Windows98, and the processes are supposed to be more
isolated.



Not a direct answer to your question, but you can separate the fifteen things
under a SVCHOST, such that each runs within its own private one. That makes
managing them, for debugging purposes, easier. And if one single thing inside
a SVCHOST is crazy, you can then hammer just that SVCHOST. And, hopefully,
avoid rebooting the machine. And if the thing in that SVCHOST has a
name, you can work on narrowing down why it is happening.

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/spatdsg/arch...-services.aspx

You can split it out into its own service by running:

"sc config service type= own"

And revert it via

"sc config service type= share"

To empty out a SVCHOST with fifteen things inside, would take
fifteen invocations of the first command (a lot of typing).

The "tasklist /svc" mentioned in the article, is available in WinXP Pro
but not in WinXP Home. Implying, Home users don't have problems :-)
Only a Pro has a tipsy OS :-)

Maybe something like Sysinterals Process Explorer could be used, if you
need a list of SVCHOST contents.

Historically, process killing involved a number of "states".
Some of the states may be associated with gathering resources,
or releasing resources. For example, on Unix boxes, I could have
"zombie" processes, that I could not get rid of. These were
suppose to transition on their own, to being non-existent, but
they would hang around. So every OS will have some things, that
hang in such a way, they can't be killed. Probably deadlocked
somewhere.

But in this case, the SVCHOST thing just complicates matters. By using
the above technique, you give each thing a private place to live,
making it easier to police them when they misbehave. And it's always
the SVCHOST with the fifteen things inside, that goes loopy. Never
the SVCHOST that only has one item inside it. That would be too easy.

Paul

From: "Bill in Co"

Has anyone found any app that will reliably and definitively kill an
errant and stubborn process?

I've tried the Sysinternals stuff, and "Kill Process" (software) and
similar programs without success in these few instances.

Sometimes a program will hang, and unless I kill the "svchost" process
(forcing a reboot, or sometimes even a power off hangup), nothing works.

Here's a specific example:

I might be running Sound Forge with a DX plug-in, and it may hang up
sometimes, while just starting to run.

When it's a serious hang, nothing can get me out of it (killing the Sound
Forge process, etc, doesn't work, but killing "svchost" (which forces a
reboot (if I'm lucky - otherwise it locks up) sorta works.

NO Kill Process program I've tried yet works in these cases. It's almost
like the svhost runs awry, and the ONLY way out is a reboot or power off.

Surely there must be some app that can do this without forcing a reboot or
powering off the computer. Yes, I realize that multiple processes are
happening when this happens, but still, isn't there anything out there
that can work in these instances (without forcing a reboot). Afterall,
this is using WindowsXP, not Windows98, and the processes are supposed to
be more isolated.

Process Explorer works.

--
Dave
Multi-AV Scanning Tool - http://multi-av.thespykiller.co.uk
http://www.pctipp.ch/downloads/dl/35905.asp

David H. Lipman wrote:
From: "Bill in Co"

Has anyone found any app that will reliably and definitively kill an
errant and stubborn process?

I've tried the Sysinternals stuff, and "Kill Process" (software) and
similar programs without success in these few instances.

Sometimes a program will hang, and unless I kill the "svchost" process
(forcing a reboot, or sometimes even a power off hangup), nothing works.

Here's a specific example:

I might be running Sound Forge with a DX plug-in, and it may hang up
sometimes, while just starting to run.

When it's a serious hang, nothing can get me out of it (killing the Sound
Forge process, etc, doesn't work, but killing "svchost" (which forces a
reboot (if I'm lucky - otherwise it locks up) sorta works.

NO Kill Process program I've tried yet works in these cases. It's almost
like the svhost runs awry, and the ONLY way out is a reboot or power off.

Surely there must be some app that can do this without forcing a reboot
or
powering off the computer. Yes, I realize that multiple processes are
happening when this happens, but still, isn't there anything out there
that can work in these instances (without forcing a reboot). Afterall,
this is using WindowsXP, not Windows98, and the processes are supposed to
be more isolated.

Process Explorer works.

Not for the cases I mentioned (it does the same thing).
But I'm still absorbing Paul's comments. :-)

Paul wrote:
Bill in Co wrote:
Has anyone found any app that will reliably and definitively kill an
errant
and stubborn process?

I've tried the Sysinternals stuff, and "Kill Process" (software) and
similar
programs without success in these few instances.

Sometimes a program will hang, and unless I kill the "svchost" process
(forcing a reboot, or sometimes even a power off hangup), nothing works.

Here's a specific example:

I might be running Sound Forge with a DX plug-in, and it may hang up
sometimes, while just starting to run.

When it's a serious hang, nothing can get me out of it (killing the Sound
Forge process, etc, doesn't work, but killing "svchost" (which forces a
reboot (if I'm lucky - otherwise it locks up) sorta works.

NO Kill Process program I've tried yet works in these cases. It's almost
like the svhost runs awry, and the ONLY way out is a reboot or power off.

Surely there must be some app that can do this without forcing a reboot
or
powering off the computer. Yes, I realize that multiple processes are
happening when this happens, but still, isn't there anything out there
that
can work in these instances (without forcing a reboot). Afterall, this
is
using WindowsXP, not Windows98, and the processes are supposed to be more
isolated.



Not a direct answer to your question, but you can separate the fifteen
things
under a SVCHOST, such that each runs within its own private one. That
makes
managing them, for debugging purposes, easier. And if one single thing
inside
a SVCHOST is crazy, you can then hammer just that SVCHOST. And, hopefully,
avoid rebooting the machine. And if the thing in that SVCHOST has a
name, you can work on narrowing down why it is happening.

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/spatdsg/arch...-services.aspx

You can split it out into its own service by running:

"sc config service type= own"

And revert it via

"sc config service type= share"

To empty out a SVCHOST with fifteen things inside, would take
fifteen invocations of the first command (a lot of typing).

The "tasklist /svc" mentioned in the article, is available in WinXP Pro
but not in WinXP Home. Implying, Home users don't have problems :-)
Only a Pro has a tipsy OS :-)

Maybe something like Sysinterals Process Explorer could be used, if you
need a list of SVCHOST contents.

Historically, process killing involved a number of "states".
Some of the states may be associated with gathering resources,
or releasing resources. For example, on Unix boxes, I could have
"zombie" processes, that I could not get rid of. These were
suppose to transition on their own, to being non-existent, but
they would hang around. So every OS will have some things, that
hang in such a way, they can't be killed. Probably deadlocked
somewhere.

But in this case, the SVCHOST thing just complicates matters. By using
the above technique, you give each thing a private place to live,
making it easier to police them when they misbehave. And it's always
the SVCHOST with the fifteen things inside, that goes loopy. Never
the SVCHOST that only has one item inside it. That would be too easy.

Paul

Well, why it might be "fun" to try and debug these svchost processes (UGH!),
what I really need is some simple utility program that will know which ones
are awry and just kill them - AND without forcing a reboot or lockup.

But I guess that's too much to ask. :-) Fortunately, it doesn't happen
all that often, but I kinda know what a royal PIA it can be to try and debug
this kind of stuff! Thanks Paul. I just thought there might be some
outstanding software utility out there that could do this for these rare
tough cases, but I've already tried a bunch of them (process explorer, task
killer, etc, etc), to no avail.

Bill in Co explained on 6/22/2013 :
Has anyone found any app that will reliably and definitively kill an errant
and stubborn process?

I've tried the Sysinternals stuff, and "Kill Process" (software) and similar
programs without success in these few instances.

Sometimes a program will hang, and unless I kill the "svchost" process
(forcing a reboot, or sometimes even a power off hangup), nothing works.

Here's a specific example:

I might be running Sound Forge with a DX plug-in, and it may hang up
sometimes, while just starting to run.

When it's a serious hang, nothing can get me out of it (killing the Sound
Forge process, etc, doesn't work, but killing "svchost" (which forces a
reboot (if I'm lucky - otherwise it locks up) sorta works.

NO Kill Process program I've tried yet works in these cases. It's almost
like the svhost runs awry, and the ONLY way out is a reboot or power off.

Surely there must be some app that can do this without forcing a reboot or
powering off the computer. Yes, I realize that multiple processes are
happening when this happens, but still, isn't there anything out there that
can work in these instances (without forcing a reboot). Afterall, this is
using WindowsXP, not Windows98, and the processes are supposed to be more
isolated.

How about one of the "unlock" apps. Unlocker, WhoLockedMe...? By the
way these two work fairly well on those stubborn usb drives that never
want to close properly.

--
Zo

UNFAIR: If life is unfair, why can't it be unfair in my favor?