I'd google generally and see what you get but it does seem weird that
the activity wasn't there from the beginning. Do you have Windows hot
fixes/updates or whatever they call 'em enabled? Me, I like to put on a
fix only if I'm convinced it will help me. I follow the "if it ain't
broke don't fix it" philosophy. Seems I recall someone else mentioning
WmiPrv so if you google you may get some hits.

On the 32 bit Vista I'm not sure about the ram usage but one advantage
of running 32 bit is you can use Sandboxie rather than resident shield
type antivirus. Instead of trying to figure out which software is good
and which is evil it takes the simpler approach of redirecting disk
writes of "Sandboxed" programs to a folder.. making it very difficult
for malicious software to do stuff like delete your partition. The
developer won't support 64 bit due to changes in 64 bit Windows that
won't allow kernel modification or whatever that Sandboxie relies on.
Once you get this problem out of the way you might want to check it out.

I think Vista is going to have a tough time reaching critical mass
unless they get away from this syndrome of the system elbowing the user
out of the way to use the hard drive!! It's cart before the horse.


--
MilesAhead

"How come we don't know the I.Q. of the guy who invented the test?"