How to make Task Manager run automatically when Windows 8 starts?
4 Answers
you must use the task scheduler approach to start the task scheduler. This is required, because the new Taskmgr requires admin rights to start (because of ETW which is used for network and IO data). Create the schtasks.exe shortcut and place this shortcut into the known startup locations.
I usually start the Taskmanager with
start /min taskmgr.exe
In Windows 7 this worked perfectly. Together with the option "hide when minimized" tis resultet in only the tray icon visible after startup.
In Windows 8 however the option "hide when minimized" didn't work anymore and the task manager was also shown in the taskbar.
This can be corrected using NirCmd (http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/nircmd.html) command to start the task manager
nircmd.exe exec hide taskmgr
This command needs administrator privileges to run
Here is the way I automatically start Task Manager in Windows 8.1. Like Christian Meister's answer I want to start it minimized but in addition want Hide when Minimized to work correctly:
My solution is to create a task in Task Scheduler with:
- Trigger on user login
- Run with highest privileges
and then add two actions to it:
nircmd exec show taskmgr
nircmd cmdwait 2000 win min ititle "<taskmgr window title in your language>"
First time you run it you have to set up your desired options and positions and then it should work correctly in the future. The separate minimize command is needed as Task Manager in Win 8.1 seems not to honour Hide when Minimized when started minimized.
It would be possible to create a separate shortcut file to the scheduled task like in magicandre1981's answer but personally I prefer to minimize the number of moving parts (and I haven't found a native way to do what nircmd does in this solution).
First, start Task Manager manually (Start
, taskmgr
, Enter
) and enable Options
-> Hide when minimized
.
Then, in Windows Explorer, open following folder:
C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup
If you want this to be active for all users, open this folder instead:
C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup
Now, right click on empty space, select New
-> Shortcut
.
Type in taskmgr
, click OK
and Finish
.
You are not done yet! Right click on new taskmgr
shortcut, select Properties
. Now, in Shortcut
tab, configure Run
-> Minimized
.
Now, reboot. After you switch to desktop again, make sure you configure
Control Panel
-> Notification Area Icons
such that Windows Task Manager
is set to Show icon and notifications
(default setting is Only show notifications
).
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@RichardEv: how do you know that it did not? Note that Task Manager in this recipe is started minimized. You are not likely to see that it is running if you start in Win8 Start screen. If you launch Desktop, you should see small TaskManager green/yellow icon running in tray bar, next to clock.– mvpAug 16, 2013 at 9:32
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