Taming Spikey



One of your customers is complaining that their Windows 7 computer slows down to a crawl at random times during the day. You’d like to examine the computer when this problem is happening, but you never seem to be around when the slowdown is active. Which of these Windows utilities would be the best to use for gathering long-term operating system metrics when these problems happen again?

A) Task Manager

B) Computer Management

C) Event Viewer

D) Performance Monitor

E) One of those face-recognition webcams that detect when someone is frowning


The answer: D) Performance Monitor

The Windows Performance Monitor is great for watching real-time statistics about many aspects of your operating system, but it can also be used for gathering and storing these metrics over a long period of time. Once the data is captured, you can load the statistics and view the historical performance of your computer.

Want to know more? Watch “Administrative Tools.”

The Windows operating system is a complex environment, and it takes specialized administrative tools to properly maintain all aspects of the OS. In this video, you’ll learn how to monitor activity with the Event Viewer, manage Services, and monitor the operation of the OS with the Performance Monitor.