Who else using my computer?

[Lasergunner]

At times my desktop rev's up as if it is being taxed by too many applications. The problem is that it does this while just doing minimal thing like web browsing. I know that there are volluntary applications where you can let an organization, like SETI for example, use home computers' unused computing power to enable low cost computations for science research.

If something like this were running with out my knowledge and permission, how can it be identified and how can it's author be identified? Would it show up in the Task Manager? What are these kinds of applications called?

[strmrdr]

Re: Who else using my computer?

There are several legit applications that can cause this:
1: anti-virus software
2: windows update
3: windows indexing service
and a few others.

Check tack manager and click on the cpu column to sort by cpu usage to see what is doing it.

[strmrdr]

Re: Who else using my computer?

process explorer will give more information than task manager.
After extracting it Right click it and select run as administrator for best results.