Hands down, the most important GUI utility for managing your Windows Services is Microsoft’s Services Control Panel Application — nicknamed “Services.msc” because it can be invoked with that command. This useful application (pictured below) lists every service installed on your PC and allows you to easily to start, stop or configure each one. It has been a fixture of Windows since the first release of NT, way back in 1993.

Starting the Services Application

You can launch the Services application in several ways:

• With the Windows Key

  1. Hold down the Windows Key and press R to open the Run window:
     
     
     
  2. Type services.msc in the Open field and hit return. Services should start in a second or two.
     
     
     

• From the Start button (Windows 7 and earlier)

  1. Click the Start button
  2. Type services.msc in the search field and hit return.
     
     
     

• From the Control Panel

  1. Click on the Start button and choose Control Panel. Or, on Windows 8/8.1, press Windows Key + I and select Control Panel from the charms menu on the right.
  2. In the window that comes up, enter the word services in the search box in the upper right to filter the contents, and click on the View local services link to summon the Services window.
     
     
     

Using the Services Application

• Start/stop/restart/pause/resume a service

  Simply highlight the service on the list and click on the appropriate toolbar button. Note that most services don’t support pause & resume, so those buttons will probably be disabled.
  
  
  

  You can also right-click on the service entry and start it from the context menu:
  
  
  

• Modify a service

  Double click a service (or right-click it and select Properties) to bring up the service’s Properties window:
  
  
  

  From there you can start or stop the service, change the account that the service runs in, configure what to do if the service crashes and see what services must be started before this one.

• Manage services on another computer

  Assuming that your account has the necessary permissions to access the remote PC, simply select Connect to another computer… from the Action menu and enter the name (or IP address) of the other computer to see its list of services:
  
  
  

Shortcomings of the Services Application

Unfortunately, Services.msc can not:

• Run a non-service application as a Windows Service (but AlwaysUp does that)
• Change the permissions associated with a service (look to Service Security Editor for help there)
• Manage trigger-start services on Windows 7 and later (but Service Trigger Editor can)
• Keep tabs on an important service’s state from the task tray (so we wrote ServiceTray to do that)
• Change a service’s description (which can be achieved by editing the registry)

Nevertheless, Services is the best GUI tool for managing your Windows Services

Despite its few shortcomings, Services.msc remains an extremely valuable tool. It is easy to use, is available on every version of Windows, and effortlessly handles a wide range of basic tasks on local and remote computers. Look to it first when working with Windows Services!

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