source : http://www.techsupportalert.com
PrcView has long been my personal choice but Process Explorer [1] has pushed it aside. The reason? A better display setup coupled with more features and even more information. Process Explorer uses two vertical panes. The top contains all active processes while the second shows either all the handles opened by a selected process or, optimally, a list of DLLs and memory mapped files. A very handy search feature allows you to work backwards from named DLLs or handles to the owning process. The feature list is almost endless though only a few will ever be used but average users. The latest V10 release adds even more features including a faster refresh rate. Quite simply Process Explorer is an astonishing product and a freeware gem.
Another option is What's Running [2] , a new comer that has number of features that could make it the best choice for a lot of users. First, processes are shown in a tree rather than a list, a representation that makes the parent and child relationship crystal clear. Second, What's Running doesn't only show processes; it also displays, in separate tabs, running services, dlls, drivers, IP connections, startup programs and system information. The startup tabs and IP tabs are of particular interest as they are of sufficient quality that you don't need separate dedicated applications to provide this information.
So is What's Running better than Process Explorer? For expert users no, but all other users will benefit from the clear, non-confusing display and the fact they get a first class startup manager and IP enumerator in a single product.
[1] http://www.sysinternals.com/Utilities/ProcessExplorer.html Freeware, Windows 9x and later, 640KB.
[2] http://www.whatsrunning.net/whatsrunning/main.aspx Free beta, Windows 2000 and later, 1.09MB
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