CPU at 100% just sitting there

My wife's computer, a Dimension 3000, shows the CPU at 100% usage when
looking at the task manager. There are 53 or so processes running and
I cannot tell if any are really hogging anything. But this is when
the browser and all other apps are shutdown (except of course the ones
in the background). The one thing I suspect is the little yellow
shield in the taskbar which shows "Downloading updates 0%" and this
never changes. I do not know how to zap this one to check if it's the
culprit.
Any suggestions are appreciated. Needless to say everything is S L O O
O W W W.
.

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