100% CPU sucked up by the ntvdm.exe (solution)...

[Rogers]

I had this problem with several programs that had to be used in Windows NT /
Windows XP originally written for DOS. The vendor does not have the time or
the money ($10,000's) to convert them to a new OS, so I went in search of a
solution and found out that the problem is usually related to a "wait for
key press event". This is in an infinite loop that sucks up all of the CPU
resources.

There is a small program called "dpakbd.com" available from
http://thethin.net/dpakbd.zip that solves this problem by handing back the
CPU cycles to the OS for other programs to use. To get it to work with the
software that I was running I had to create a .pif (or use the "Cmd line:"
in the Program tab of the shortcut window, can't take very long arguments
though) and add this little program in front of the program that I wanted to
start. To do this I had to enter the following:

%systemroot%\system32\cmd.exe /k"dpakbd.com & myprog.exe arg1 arg2 & exit"

This will run the dpakbd program (put it in the same folder as myprog.exe)
then run myprog with the 2 arguments and then exit from the dos prompt
window when done.

If this doesn't help for some reason or you just don't want to do it, you
can also increase the "Idle sensitivity" to High which can help reduce the
load on the CPU greatly but not to zero like this program does.

Not only does this work for a single program on a desktop but also one
running through a multi-user environment server, where a piece of the server
is dished out to each user. Citrix comes to mind.

I hope that this helps someone out there as I've seen this posted many times
with no solution.

Jeremy Pemberton-Pigott
fuzzychaosAThotmailDOTcom

[Jaap de Koning]

Jeremy,

Thanks for the hint, it solved all my legacy program troubles in 10 minutes!

Regards,

Jaap de Koning

"Rogers" <fuzzy...@hotmail.DOTcom> wrote in message news:<eynnb.99836$h61....@news01.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com>...