Very neat & useful program. Kudos!

After having installed this, I noticed significant CPU activity on one of the cores of this multi-core system whenever nothing else was going on. I've found a post or two re. idle CPU usage by DeskTask here, so first I want to confirm that this is what is going on.

If so, my next question is why so much activity? This pretty much pegs one core to almost 100% utilization, with the associated power consumption (and heat generation) for ... what exactly? The program isn't doing anything in between times when it synchronizes. If I recall, one reply indicated that a (hidden) instance of Outlook runs in the background. I'll accept that, but a visible instance of Outlook running fully and minimized to the task bar doesn't consume this much in resources, why does DeskTask need to do so? I know, activity drops to zero (or nearly so) as soon as any other process starts up so it's not as if this creates a problem for any other program, but it seems to be a waste of energy and an unnecessary heat strain on the system.

Thinking about an alternative gets to my next question. Since I'm okay with manually synchronizing DeskTask if I make changes to my calendar or task list -- for me at least, it's not as if I'm juggling dozens of appointments -- would it be possible to have DeskTask simply display the results of the last synch without having to run a thread in the background?

Of course, the ideal would be if the CPU usage under normal conditions wasn't there in the first place -- I'm curious to find out the answer to "why so high?" -- but barring that, would the alternative be possible? And if not, does anyone know of a program that would do something similar in as elegant a fashion as DeskTask?

Kudos, again, for this program and thanks in advance for your reply.

VictorZ

fyi ... I'm running on Windows7 x64 with an Intel Quad-Core if that makes any difference to answers.

Hi,

Thanks for your comments.

However I cannot reproduce the behavior you describe.

When idle (not reading data from Outlook, or having the mouse cursor over) DesTtask does not take any CPU time\load (tested on several computers with different specifications, although on Windows 7 X64 has NOT been tested)

This must be something related to your system, maybe an anti-virus or something else, I can't really say.

At this time I don't have the resources to test on Windows 7 X64, sorry.

Thanks,

André Santos
Carthago Software Support
http://www.carthagosoft.net

Andre,

Thank you for your prompt response. Please refer to this previous thread ... it is where I saw the comment re. high usage when desktop is in focus. Perhaps there's more there that you can remember from before?

http://www.carthagosoft.net/forums/index.php?action=vthread&forum=6&to pic=479&page=0#12

I'm attaching a screen capture from resource manager ...



You can see that DeskTask is maxing out CPU2. You can also see that there's really nothing else using much of anything processor-wise.

This behavior occurs ONLY when DeskTask is running, and only when the DESKTOP has focus. In other words, it doesn't matter if other programs are active, if I click on the desktop (as noted in the other thread linked above) then CPU usage on one core (it's always CPU2) spikes to the ceiling. As soon as ANY other program window is given focus, the usage immediately drops to zero.

While I obviously can't rule out some interaction between DeskTask and some other program, this situation only occurs when DeskTask is running. Without it, idle processor usage is just that ... idle ... on all cores.

For what it's worth, I run Eset antivirus ... only the AV, not the security suite ... version 4.0.474.0 for x64 systems. As noted in that other thread, if Aero is an issue, it's definitely running here ... Win7 Pro X64. If it IS Aero, that's a real shame! But I'm confident you'll sort that out somehow.

As it stands, I'm not comfortable leaving DeskTask running under these conditions. A pity, truly, as this is the first program I've encountered that does just what is necessary for bringing Outlook data to the desktop and does so in such a wonderfully elegant way.

If you have ANY suggestions as to how I might test something out for you in trying to troubleshoot and/or trace this issue, just let me know and I'll be happy to oblige. I'm pleased to run a beta for you, a debug version, whatever you feel might help pin this down.

Again, thanks for your response and your efforts. I hope a solution to this issue can be identified.

Regards,

Victor

Hi Victor,

I'm sorry, indeed I did not remember this particular issue, with CPU load when the desktop has the focus and with Aero (vista/7 only) enabled. It is a DeskTask issue. Nothing wrong with your computer and or Windows instillation.

This is a side-effect from the new effects of Vista and 7 and which there is no fix\workaround. I still feel DeskTask is quite usable with AERO, since most of the time the desktop will not have the focus.

However I can understand your position of not feeling comfortable with this problem, but I'm a afraid this will be a difficult one to resolve.

Thanks

André Santos
Carthago Software Support
http://www.carthagosoft.net

André,

I take from your reply, then, that it does not involve anything to do with how DeskTask makes a connection to Outlook, but rather, it's the way the information is displayed on the desktop and how that process interacts with Aero. Truly a pity that there's no immediately obvious fix or workaround -- short of disabling Aero of course, but that is not a viable solution.

This is a pity, really, as this is a nice piece of programming that presents a simple and elegant solution to keeping tabs on appointments and tasks. I agree that, for the most part, the software is quite usable, even given this issue. I suppose one workaround would be to always keep something else open when leaving the computer to idle ... inconvenient and inelegant, but it would work.

I remain hopeful and confident that a fix to this will be found and look forward to that day. In the meantime, I'll keep an eye on the announcements RSS feed and look for the next version to succeed!

Once again, thanks for your reply, for your work in creating this unique and useful piece of software, and ... <wink wink> ... for your continuing efforts in making it work cleanly on all Windows platforms. :)

Kudos, best regards, and best of luck!

Victor