This is a screenshot of the program that helps me overload my computer periodically. In case you don’t know what you are looking for, here is a general break-down:

• Date/time
• CPU0/1 - Processor usage and temperatures, both cores
• Proc - Information about currently-running programs
• Fan - The RPM of the fan cooling the processors
• Disk - How much is being read from/written to the harddrives

There have been days when I have maxed out CPU0, CPU1, Disk, and the network indicators (not shown) while working. This is not a screenshot of that. The load is said to be at “11.9” in this picture. The highest number that I hit today was 12.6, but I couldn’t get a screenshot of that. Why? This load number is an indicator of how responsive the system is. Several of the things that are happening on the computer go into calculating the number and it gives a quick view of how hard it is being pushed. As a general rule, if the system load hits 3 then the system is pretty slow in responding to the user. If it gives any indication, while I have been typing this the number has been going between 0.0 and 0.2 on the side of my screen. 11.9 spells out major problems. So why was the computer so slow? Firefox was taking up 1/3rd of my computer’s memory and I had Windows XP open in VMWare. Once I shut down Windows XP, the system load dropped back down to the normal levels. Funny thing is that the computer was running that way all day yesterday without putting such a strain on the system.