Expert: Lorry - 11/30/2005

Question
My computer keeps slowing down til I get "out of memory" message. I have 1 gig of memory & am running XP Pro & MS Outlook. It's usually fine til I send an email - when this happens, if I go to Windows Task Manager I find that "explorer.exe" is very busy using a huge amount of memory even though all emails has long since been sent & received - I shut it down. This helps sometimes - if not I go to reboot & get a message "ViPopupHidden" needs to end prog.? Do you know what ViPopupHidden is?

Thanks, JR

Answer
Hi John,

I would suggest downloading Spybot - Search & Destroy 1.4, a program that removes spyware, available from:

http://www.pcworld.com/downloads/file_description/0,fid,22262,00.asp

Once installed, enable Tea Timer. Open the Spybot Search & Destroy, click the "+" sign next to Tools on the left side of the screen, click System Startup, then on the right side of the page check HK_CU Run Spybot Tea Timer.

The Resident TeaTimer is a new tool of Spybot-S&D which perpetually monitors the processes called/initiated. It immediately detects known malicious processes wanting to start and terminates them giving you some options, how to deal with this process in the future.

You might want to check for viruses also. Go to: http://sarc.com/  Scroll down and click on,"Free Online Virus and Security Check" and run the virus check. Write down exactly anything it finds, then return to: http://sarc.com/  and do a search for what was found. Symantec usually has a removal tool and/or directions for removing manually.

Hope this helps!
Lorry