   C# idle time
  hiI'm using C# (VS 2008), I'm calling a function which converts some images, I want to display a progress bar meanwhile, but when the converting function starts its execution, my system is virtually halted, i.e. it is not possible to do anything more (showing progress bar or any tips to the user), how can I tell my system not to fully use the CPU power, so that I can perform other actions too.thanks   
  Run the conversion in a separate thread. This way, your UI can still respond to the user while the work is being done. You can even lower the thread priority if you want. Also, you can sleep in the thread to yield processor time to other threads that need it.Note that the operating system does automatic load balancing on process level by analyzing how much time each process needs. Therefore, you should not have to worry about other apps, only your own. The exception is if you have a very time-critical application such as one that does high-speed serial connections to a device which has undersized buffers (been there, done that).   ;BackgroundWorker