When a server feels slow, the first job is to find which resource is busy: CPU, memory (RAM), disk or network. Windows has everything you need built in.
Task Manager: the quick look
Inside your Remote Desktop session, right-click the taskbar and choose Task Manager (or run taskmgr). Click More details if you see the small view.
- Processes tab: click the CPU, Memory or Disk column header to sort and see which program uses the most.
- Performance tab: live graphs for CPU, memory, disk and network. A CPU line pinned near 100% or memory above about 90% for long periods points to the bottleneck.
- Users tab: shows who is signed in or disconnected, and what each session is using.
Resource Monitor: more detail
Run resmon. The Disk tab shows which files are being read and written; the Network tab shows which programs talk to which addresses. This is how you find, for example, a backup job hammering the disk.
PowerShell checks
Top 10 processes by CPU time and by memory:
Get-Process | Sort-Object CPU -Descending | Select-Object -First 10 Name, CPU, @{n='RAM (MB)';e={[int]($_.WorkingSet64/1MB)}}
Get-Process | Sort-Object WorkingSet64 -Descending | Select-Object -First 10 Name, @{n='RAM (MB)';e={[int]($_.WorkingSet64/1MB)}}Current CPU load and free memory:
Get-Counter '\Processor(_Total)\% Processor Time', '\Memory\Available MBytes'Free disk space on each drive:
Get-PSDrive -PSProvider FileSystem | Select-Object Name, @{n='Free (GB)';e={[math]::Round($_.Free/1GB,1)}}, @{n='Used (GB)';e={[math]::Round($_.Used/1GB,1)}}Tip: Keep at least 10–15% of the system drive free. Windows Update, the page file and many programs fail in confusing ways on a full disk.
What to do with the result
- One program uses all the CPU: check its settings, restart it, or update it. For trading terminals see Run several MetaTrader terminals.
- Disk is full: run Disk Cleanup (
cleanmgr), empty old downloads and logs, or add space and extend the disk.