At first you might wonder about a site called Black Viper’s Web Site. I suppose it’s better than Black Viper’s Home Page or Welcome to Black Viper’s Home Page on the World Wide Web!!!, but I digress.

The biggest problem I have with my Dell Inspiron 600 is that it tends to run hot (check out I8kfanGUI if you have a Dell laptop). Under load, the CPU can often reach up to 50 degrees Celsius before the fan kicks in. Heat can hamper performance and even damage your computer. I got myself a little laptop stand that has two built in fans, and that helps a bit–mostly by drawing heat away from the hard drive and memory compartments.

But I still had problems with the CPU experiencing high loads and thus generating heat. I noticed that there were times when I wasn’t doing anything and yet 85-95% of the CPU would be used by a process called cisvc.exe. According to several sites, this was a Windows service, not Spyware or anything malicious. Of course, that doesn’t mean you necessarily want it running.

That’s where Black Viper comes in. Black Viper’s Service Configurations essentially lists the various Windows processes and services, explains what they do, and makes recommendations on whether you want them disabled or not. I suspected cisvc.exe was a completely useless process, but this confirmed that I could safely turn it off. Go ahead and take a peek at the list; you’d be surprised at the number of stupid things that are running at any given time.

Disclaimer: Using I8kfanGUI to override the automatic controls on your fans or Black Viper’s Service Configurations to muck around with Windows carries with it a small element of risk. Personally I think it’s negligible, but don’t come crying to me if you break something.