Need a computer savy persone's help....

ok... i just rebuilt my computer... did a major upgrade... the only thing thats left over from the old comp is the vidio and sound cards.. everything else (including the os) Has changed.

On my old system, running windows XP.. i ran SL in windowed mode and it ran fine.. computer ran fine and everything...

Now.. on Vista.. i run SL in windowed mode... and for some reason.. the gadget i have on the right is telling me that BOTH CPU cores are at 100% when SL is 'up' on the screen.. but the instant i minimize it.. the cpu use drops down to normal %'s... Yet the instant i bring up the SL viewer again.. the CPU steadily creeps back up to 100%.. then stays there..

Is this something thats always happend but i never noticed befor... or is something going on thats causing SL to make my cpu run at 100%?

(im asking this cause i dont wanna burn up my cpu with it running at full throttle for hours at a time if im loged into SL for more than a few hours)

As long as you have adequate cooling, I think you'll be okay. Get a utility to monitor the temperature. Your motherboard may come with one.

How much memory does your PC have, and what video card are you using?

8 gigs of ram... and useing a 9600 pro

funny thing is.. the ram never goes above 20%... but th CPU runs constantly at 100% when SL viewer is up... i can run a game called Eve-online in fullscreen mode and cores never get above 50-70 range.

trying to find a program for the temp monitering right now actualy =D.. know of any that work with vista? hehe

There's one called Speedfan that should work for you.

An ATI Radeon 9600 Pro is very underpowered for SL. A newer card can take more of the load off the CPU. I think that may be a big part of your problem.

hmm 'k.. planning to get a evg 295 soon... just gotta pay off a bit of the CC first =D