Kill Windows process manually with taskkill command

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Sometimes Task manager and registry editor is disabled as a result of Virus effect. Stopping or killing a Windows process during this requires workaround with manual method [alternatively, use free utility to enabled disabled Window features]. You can easily kill any Windows process manually using taskkill command. Here are different ways to use this command.

1. kill a single process by name

Recall the name of the erroneous process, for example firefox.exe, now use the following command in a command prompt in Windows XP (goto Start > Run, type cmd & press OK to see command prompt window. One Windows 7, you can simply run this command in Run dialog box (as in screenshot below).

taskkill /IM firefox.exe

This will cause the program to terminate gracefully, asking for confirmation if there are unsaved changes. To forcefully kill the same process, add the /F option to the command line. Be careful with the /F option as it will terminate all matching processes without confirmation.

2. kill a single instance of a process

To kill a currently running instance of a process specify its process id (PID). For example, if the desired process has a PID of 827, use the following command to kill it:

taskkill /PID 827

3. kill a process using filters

By using filters, a variety of different patterns can be used to specify the processes to kill. For example, the following filter syntax will forcefully kill all processes owned by the user Sekhon:

taskkill /F /FI “USERNAME eq Sekhon”

Using either instance of taskkill command you can terminate (kill) any Windows program without the use of task manager on Windows computer.



By Sekhon on Monday, February 8th, 2010

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