plugins-extra VS systeminformer

Or Process Hacker (https://processhacker.sourceforge.io/) which IMO is even better.

I can use Process Hacker and run "Reduce working set" on it, which makes explorer.exe instantly go down to ~100MB. However, it just starts leaking RAM again and it's a matter of hours until it grows back to several GB.

I can't have a task manager style tool installed? It's completely safe and does NOTHING in terms of cheating, no other game has ever flagged it as false positive. Is this AC so bad that it sees the word "h4Ck3R" and thinks it needs to be removed? What else is this thing needlessly scanning my computer for?

you need Process Hacker

You mean this? https://processhacker.sourceforge.io/

http://www.lucashale.com/timer-resolution/ set to maximum https://processhacker.sourceforge.io/ Set valheim.exe priority to high and save it.

If you are on the latest BIOS, the next thing I'd be looking at is something that's hitting I/O, either use Process Hacker: https://processhacker.sourceforge.io/ or task manager to try and catch the process causing the problem.

Please use a decent task manager like Process hacker or Task manager deluxe, the Windows one is kinda lacking functionality.

System Informer is a versatile system management tool designed to seamlessly monitor and analyze system resources, troubleshoot software issues, and identify potential malware threats. Offers system activity overviews, intuitive graphs, real-time statistics, active network connection monitoring, detailed disk access information, intricate stack trace analysis, and much more. evily2k describes it "like process explorer on steroids. Allows me to kill process that task manager would say access denied."

(VAC use to prevent you from playing with the below method, however it has since been removed from the support, but you should still use -insecure for the below method) You can also try using process hacker/system informer (github link) it's similar to task manager however right click on csgo.exe click properties and click on the the windows tab. From there you can view which library or process created a window.

This is not a false positive, there are security exploits in Process Hacker that are exploited by some cheats. I would suggest upgrading to the new version which is now called System Informer, where these issues are fixed. https://github.com/winsiderss/systeminformer

I've had it for well over a year and haven't noticed any ill effects. I find it handy for reporting when something has been added to startup or context menu etc, but I've never ran it "full time" as a task manager replacement. (Though for that purpose, I recently came across an app called System Informer that I like - https://systeminformer.sourceforge.io/)

Install system informer: https://systeminformer.sourceforge.io/

System Informer (formerly Process Hacker) might also have what you're looking for

https://systeminformer.sourceforge.io/