Much like the tasklist command, PsList also allows you to specify different credentials on the command line if you need to authenticate to the remote computer with a different username and password. And one of my favorite features of PsList is the -t option to show you the process tree structure. PsList can also target a specific PID or process name (or name pattern). PsList is very similar to tasklist, but it gives you much more detailed information on threads (counts, states, context switches, etc.), CPU usage (user time, kernel time, etc.), and memory usage (private byes, working set, virtual memory, page faults, etc.). The PsList utility is another part of the PsTools suite.

Once again, if you’ve followed our articles for awhile, you know we’re big fans of the SysInternals PsTools suite. In a command prompt run “tasklist /?” for more information about its usage. Just remember if you specify the password on the command line it will be visible to other administrators on the local computer who look at the local computer’s process list details. The tasklist command also allows you to specify different credentials on the command line if you need to authenticate to the remote computer with a different username and password. By running the command “tasklist /s hostname” where “hostname” is the remote computer you want to query, it will return a list of processes on the remote machine and some basic details about each process (PID, session number, memory usage, etc.). Since Windows XP there is a built-in command line utility named “ tasklist“. Without interactively connecting to a remote Windows computer you can easily query its current list of processes with a variety of tools. We’ve already touched on ways you can start processes remotely using tools like PsExec, but with a little bit of scripting effort, you can also use tools like PowerShell’s Invoke-Command cmdlet or even a WMI query.

Keep in mind pretty much all of these tools and techniques here assume you have appropriate permissions on the remote computer. By manage we mean start, query, and kill a remote Windows process. Today, we’ll show you seven ways you can “manage” Windows processes remotely in general. A while back we talked about ways you can manage Windows services remotely.

Task manager remote desktop