Help me trace a system process please? fresh Win8, high CPU usage @ idle.

[collegeboy69us]

So I have a fresh install of Win8.1 LEGAL copy (it's about 2 weeks old)

I noticed yesterday abnormally high CPU usage. ~40% in task manager when the computer is doing nothing.

After some investigation, most google searches are telling me it's a driver issue, run a trace this or that. It looks like the process is simply "SYSTEM".

Okay -- so a few more details. When I do a fresh reboot, the issue doesn't exist. Super low CPU usage 1 to 3%. Wifi works, everything is working as it should. If I don't do anything, i.e just let it sit for 5 to 10 minutes, CPU usage will spike to 70%, soon as I move the mouse it will fall down to 50% then to 40's. Another byproduct of this problem, is when I do a restart or shutdown, it will go to the restart screen with the rotating circle thing and sit there, not a hard crash, but will just sit there spinning forever. (I'm forced to do a hard reboot). This issue does NOT happen if I reboot in the first few minutes of starting windows, before this unknown process/thread takes root. Did a full virus scan, and malwear scan, even uninstalled Acronis.

I've disabled my wifi adapter, all the normal programs I use (dropbox, evernote, afterburner). Just reinstalled the latest video drivers.

Still confused as to why this is going on. I've used process explorer to poke around but still can't get to the root of what's causing it. There doesn't seem to be detailed instructions I could find that shows you step by step how to identify the driver or the program that's causing this.

Any and all help is appreciated.

 

[collegeboy69us]

oh and to add - I went into task scheduler and disabled the "on idle" maintenance entries, just to be sure.

 

[CrimsonKnight13]

Try using the Sysinternals Process Explorer to start off. It can dig into service & system processes with more info.

 

[collegeboy69us]

will give it a try -- ive used the process explorer that's on microsoft's website, but not the sysinternals one.

 

[CrimsonKnight13]

Pretty much the same thing since the creator sold his goods to MS & became an employee.

 

[blinx]

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/

 

[collegeboy69us]

cool -- will check out the site this afternoon when I get off work

 

[Snowknight26]

xperf might by worth looking into, also.

http://blogs.technet.com/b/askpfepl...me-to-learn-windows-performance-analyzer.aspx

It should be perfect (albeit difficult to learn) to help pinpoint the issue.

 

[Ur_Mom]

Pretty much the same thing since the creator sold his goods to MS & became an employee.

Also writes some excellent cyber thriller books. Trojan Horse and Zero Day. Excellent reads.

Zero Day was scary when it was first released. Fairly accurate when it comes to the technical stuff, but it was shortly after that Stuxnet was revealed and what it was doing.... Mirrored what happened in the book.....


Sidetrack over - Sysinternals Process Explorer does what you want for tracing the processes to find out exactly which one is causing the CPU spike.