Hi, as in the topic, my computer is running slow recently so i checked task manager, i noticed explorer.exe is taking up alot of memory, and it's increasing. My OS is XP Home. I scanned with antivir and am clean.

Thanks.

explorer.exe is a windows process that basically runs your desktop if i remember correctly. Its a normal process. Mine is running now at 7,924K.

mine will goes up to 300mb

Im no expert but that does sound like alot Have you tried running spybot s&d and AVG anti-spyware?

I ran antivir, spybot and adaware. soemtimes it's fine sometimes it's worst...

Kitten you are right-not normal for explorer to use that much of the system's resourses, unless...
Do you have an animated Desktop wallpaper? Do you hold lots(and lots) of minimized windows open in the background? Do you have a search running as a constantly scheduled task? Do you have a graphics intensive game open in the background? All these things could account for high explorer numbers. Please check msconfig (just type that in "Run") to see if explorer.exe is listed under the Startup Tab. It should not be there. There is an unusually sneaky bit of spyware that disguises itself as explorer.exe. If you find it there go directly to the Malware Removal section of the forum and begin the cleaning process with an initial post describing the problem. Follow all the directions.

If not malware, something is causing the explorer spike. Let me suggest that you trim down your background processes- stuff like java update scheduler and auto starting processes. An excellent startup control program is the free WinPatrol http://www.majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=3380
Does alot more as well, and the little dog barks to get your attention when needed. Try to get your startup down to the 4 or 5 things you really need. Since you are already using Taskmanager I think you'll really like Sysinternal's free Process Explorer: http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sysintern...ssExplorer.mspx It's what Taskmanager wants to be when it grows up.
A mouse over the process pops up a small tooltip box with information. This will show you what is being controlled by each scvhost instance. Before you to to Services (under Administrative tools) and start turning things off, please read the information here: http://www.theeldergeek.com/services_guide.htm When making changes to Services, I suggest one-at-a-time, so that you'll know what "broke it."

I suspect that some of the background processes are using explorer for their own purposes.
Once you trim things down post back with the results. If it is malware take care of that first!

Good luck

i've checked with the processes and they look normal to me. would burning alot of disc using nero triggered that?

thanks 1101doc

Couldn't answer that one. I burn so few discs that I have no third party burning software installed-just use Windows. Smells right though, especially if the explorer spike is running at the same time as Nero. Over all, are you making progress?

Sometimes the system still locks up, may have to do a reformat and see. Thanks for helping