Windows PC issue - CPU 100% after switching user

[StewartR]

So I bought a new desktop PC from PC Specialist last week. It has an annoying issue that I can't troubleshoot. I'd be grateful for any advice with regard to diagnosing and/or fixing it.

The symptom is that, immediately after switching from one user to another, CPU usage goes to 100% and stays there. In addition the amount of memory in use starts to climb steadily, from say 2-3GB up to the full 8GB within a couple of minutes. I can't find any way of righting things other than by doing a hard reset (holding power switch in for 5 seconds etc).

I've used Windows Task Manager to look at what's going on. It says that the process hogging the CPU is "System" but it doesn't show which process is hogging all the RAM. I've downloaded and installed Sysinternals Process Explorer to see whether that would give me any more detailed insight, but unfortunately it just gives the same answers: the CPU usage is by the "System" process and the memory usage is unexplained.

It doesn't happen every time I switch from one user to another. But I haven't yet noticed a pattern. It can happen with no application software running. For example: boot PC > log on as user 1 > start Task Manager > switch to user 2 > start Task Manager > switch to user 1 > CPU=100%. I've tried booting Windows in Safe mode and I don't seem to get the error then - but the problem doesn't happen every time I switch users so that's not really conclusive.

The PC spec is:
* Asus H87M-E motherboard
* Intel Core i5-4570 (3.2GHz) processor
* 8GB RAM
* Nvidia GeForce 210 1GB graphics card
* Kingston 120GB SSD
* WD 1TB HDD transplanted from my old PC
* Windows 7 Professional 64-bit

I've created two users, one for me and one for my wife. I haven't installed much software at all yet - Chrome browser, Office 2010, Lightroom 5.4, drivers and software for our Epson WF-3520 all-in-one printer, and I think that's all.

Any ideas / suggestions?

 

[neil_g]

first off, im not a huge fan of user switching it wastes a huge amount of resource if one user leaves something chunky open.

a quick dig around suggests some device drives can cause issues with user switching, specifically display drivers and the aero theme. might be worth checking that is up to date as a starter for 10.

 

[robbino]

Could also be a task, service or program running that is not releasing memory and maybe stuck in a loop.

There was an issue with W7 and corrupt .wav files causing something like you are seeing:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/976417/en-us

 

[StewartR]

first off, im not a huge fan of user switching it wastes a huge amount of resource if one user leaves something chunky open.

Unavoidable in the current context, unfortunately. I specced the machine with plenty of RAM and an SSD, to make user switching easy.

a quick dig around suggests some device drives can cause issues with user switching, specifically display drivers and the aero theme. might be worth checking that is up to date as a starter for 10.

Hmm. It's a brand new PC. What could be out of date?

 

[StewartR]

Could also be a task, service or program running that is not releasing memory and maybe stuck in a loop.

I think that's exactly what it is. The questions are (a) which task, service or program? and (b) why?

There was an issue with W7 and corrupt .wav files causing something like you are seeing:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/976417/en-us

Thanks for the suggestion. That's not it though, because I've been able to trigger the error without running any programs (other than Task Manager).

 

[robbino]

Takes awhile to sort, but you could try msconfig and select what loads to try to eliminate the problem. You can also use msconfig to compare what loads between the good user profile and the one you are having an issue with.

 

[StewartR]

Takes awhile to sort, but you could try msconfig and select what loads to try to eliminate the problem.

I wasn't aware of MSCONFIG before, but it does look useful. Thanks.

You can also use msconfig to compare what loads between the good user profile and the one you are having an issue with.

Unfortunately I can't, because (a) I haven't got one good profile and one bad one: the error can happen switching from user 1 to user 2 or vice versa; and (b) they're both exactly the same anyway.

 

[neil_g]

Hmm. It's a brand new PC. What could be out of date?

depends when it was built and if it used the stock OEM driver on the graphics card CD rather than the latest from web etc

 

[simonblue]

Yes its worth checking if all the drivers are up to date,even on a new build

 

[StewartR]

depends when it was built and if it used the stock OEM driver on the graphics card CD rather than the latest from web etc

Yes its worth checking if all the drivers are up to date,even on a new build

OK, that makes sense. Which components in the system would have drivers which wouldn't be updated as part of a routine Windows update? (I did one of those the other day.) Graphics card, obviously. Any others I should be looking for? Is there somewhere I can get a list of all the device drivers so that I can check them all systematically?

 

[simonblue]

Go into control panel, then into device manger then you will see a list of all your devices click on each one, then click update drivers to see if their any newer ones

 

[StewartR]

Go into control panel, then into device manger then you will see a list of all your devices click on each one, then click update drivers to see if their any newer ones

OK, will do. Ta.

 

[surfg1mp]

Can't offer any advise.....but if its a new PC, can't you get the shop you bought it to sort it.......seems the logical step to take.

 

[StewartR]

Can't offer any advise.....but if its a new PC, can't you get the shop you bought it to sort it.......seems the logical step to take.

Yeah, I could, but I'd have to send it off to them, and I'd be without a PC for potentially several days. If I can find a solution myself that would be more convenient, if not easier.

 

[trencheel303]

If it's the system process that's doing it you're probably looking at a driver or something else kernel related that's leaking memory. If you bought it from the shop and haven't done a reinstall of Windows it could also be some of the factory bloatware doing it. Leaking memory until failure is pretty serious though, I personally would boot into safe mode and try and reproduce the problem, if it doesn't you've found the cause (driver) if it does you're pretty much looking at wiping and starting again.

 

[StewartR]

An update of sorts.

The PC sent 9 hours today running Memtest and it generated no errors. Looks like all the RAM is good.
I've checked every single device driver (84 of them by my count) and they're all up to date.

Hmmm. Not sure what to do next.

Incidentally I was amazed at how many drivers there are. I can't imagine what half of these do!

Computer
ACPI x64-based PC
Disk drives
ATA KINGSTON SV300S3 SCSI Disk Device
ATA WDC WD10EZRX-00A SCSI Disk Device
Generic - Compact Flash USB Device
Generic - MS/MS-Pro USB Device
Generic - SD/MMC USB Device
Generic - SM/xD-Picture USB Device
Display adapters
NVIDIA GeForce 210
DVD/CD-ROM drives
TSST corp CDDVDW SH-224DB SCSI CdRom Device
Human Interface Devices
HID-compliant device
HID-compliant device
HID-compliant device
USB Input Device
USB Input Device
USB Input Device
USB Input Device
USB Input Device
IDE ATA/ATAPI Devices
Intel(R) 8 Series/C220 Chipset Family SATA AHCI Controller
Keyboards
HID Keyboard Device
Mice and other pointing devices
HID-compliant mouse
Monitors
Dell S2309W(Analog)
Network adapters
Realtek PCIe GBE Family Controller
Portable devices
H:\ [WPD FileSystem Volume Driver]
I:\ [WPD FileSystem Volume Driver]
J:\ [WPD FileSystem Volume Driver]
K:\ [WPD FileSystem Volume Driver]
Ports (COM & LPT)
Communications Port (COM1)
Processors
Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-4570 CPU @ 3.20 GHz
Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-4570 CPU @ 3.20 GHz
Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-4570 CPU @ 3.20 GHz
Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-4570 CPU @ 3.20 GHz
Sound, video and game controllers
NVIDIA High Definition Audio
NVIDIA High Definition Audio
NVIDIA High Definition Audio
NVIDIA High Definition Audio
NVIDIA Virtual Audio Device (Wave Extensible) (WDM)
Realtek High Definition Audio
System devices
4th Gen Core processor DRAM Controller - 0C00
ACPI Fan
ACPI Fan
ACPI Fan
ACPI Fan
ACPI Fan
ACPI Fixed Feature Button
ACPI Thermal Zone
ACPI Thermal Zone
AMDA00 Interface
Composite Bus Enumerator
Direct memory access controller
High Definition Audio controller
High Definition Audio controller
High precision event timer
Intel(R) 8 Series/C220 Series PCI Express Root Port #1 - 8C10
Intel(R) 8 Series/C220 Series PCI Express Root Port #3 - 8C14
Intel(R) 8 Series/C220 Series SMBus Controller - 8C22
Intel(R) 82802 Firmware Hub Device
Intel(R) H87 LPC Controller - 8C4A
Intel(R) Management Engine Interface
Microsoft ACPI-Compliant System
Microsoft System Management BIOS Driver
Microsoft Virtual Drive Enumerator Driver
Microsoft Windows Management Interface for ACPI
Numeric data processor
PCI bus
Plug and Play Software Device Enumerator
Programmable interrupt controller
Remote Desktop Device Redirector Bus
System CMOS/real time clock
System timer
UMBus Enumerator
UMBus Enumerator
UMBus Root Bus Enumerator
Xeon(R) processor E3-1200 v3/4th Gen Core processor PCI Express x16 Controller - 0C01
Universal Serial Bus Controllers
Generic USB Hub
Generic USB Hub
Generic USB Hub
Intel(R) 8 Series/C220 Series USB Enhanced Host Controller #1 - 8C26
Intel(R) 8 Series/C220 Series USB Enhanced Host Controller #2 - 8C2D
Intel(R) USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller
Intel(R) USB 3.0 Root Hub
USB Composite Device
USB Composite Device
USB Mass Storage Device
USB Root Hub
USB Root Hub

 

[trencheel303]

Have you tried booting into safe mode and going through the routine that invokes the problem?

 

[Box Brownie]

Hi Stewart

Probably a long shot but I have read in the past that Windows Indexing service can be real resource hog. The fact that it happens upon user switching and is not every time makes me wonder/think that this could be a (the) cause???

Having said that this link mentions another potential cause ~ http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/...formance/b5c79a15-781b-455a-9003-6d305695fce0

HTH and that you can get it sorted

 

[StewartR]

Probably a long shot but ... this link mentions another potential cause ...

Thanks for the thoughts.

Unfortunately my issue is neither of those. Both the Windows Search Indexer and the Windows Media Player Network Sharing Service show up in Task Manager as separate, identifiable services (SearchIndexer.exe and wmpnetwk.exe respectively) which can be killed if they start to misbehave. My problem seems to be more deeply rooted.

 

[StewartR]

Have you tried booting into safe mode and going through the routine that invokes the problem?

Yes. The problem doesn't seem to occur.

Having said that, it doesn't occur every time I switch users and I haven't spotted a pattern to when it occurs and when it doesn't. So the fact that I haven't seen it occur in Safe Mode might be a coincidence. (But I don't think it is.)

 

[StewartR]

Takes awhile to sort, but you could try msconfig and select what loads to try to eliminate the problem.

Well, I've trawled through msconfig and removed quite a lot of junk that I don't think I really need to have running on startup:

• Intel Rapid Storage Technology
• NVIDIA Geforce Experience
• NVIDIA GeForce Control Panel
• Intel USB 3.0 Monitor
• Epson PC-Fax Software
• Epson Event Manager Application

Let's see whether that makes a difference...

 

[freelanderuk]

if you only bought last week get in touch with the shop who sold it as anything you do may invalidate the warranty, presuming it has one

 

[neil_g]

Well, I've trawled through msconfig and removed quite a lot of junk that I don't think I really need to have running on startup:

• Intel Rapid Storage Technology
• NVIDIA Geforce Experience
• NVIDIA GeForce Control Panel
• Intel USB 3.0 Monitor
• Epson PC-Fax Software
• Epson Event Manager Application

Let's see whether that makes a difference...

You could probably bin the Epson stuff but I'd leave the rest.

On a serious note though if you're not sure what you're doing you may end up with a really broken system.

I'd suggest calling the vendor now and they might be able to suggest something or remote access in.

 

[Bowz]

Have you tried looking in the event viewer to see if there are any errors (gives more details than task manager)? control panel>administrative tools>Event Viewer>Windows logs>
I would look at both the system & application logs, but bear in mind you will always get some errors, its the constant ones when the CPU is at 100% you want to be looking for.

 

[wave01]

hi can i ask what type of users you have set up. i.e. standard or admin

 

[Keith W]

As has been said if you only bought it in the last week or so take it back and get it replaced

I had a new system do a similar things to me, things would just slow down and then grind to a halt, only a hard re-boot seemed to give it a kick back into life - after 3 days of this it was evident the system was knackered, took it back to the shop and they tried to do a restore and the thing just gave up the ghost on them

 

[StewartR]

You could probably bin the Epson stuff but I'd leave the rest.
On a serious note though if you're not sure what you're doing you may end up with a really broken system.

Noted, thanks. I did do quite a lot of reading before deciding that these were safe to remove, and in general if i really don;'t know what I'm doing then I won't do it.

The Epson stuff is obviously related to the printer and I've uninstalled that for now, so clearly it was safe to remove. The Intel RST and NVIDIA things are just services which give me handy-access icons in my system tray, so that I can tinker with my RAID settings or 3D stereo vision settings without the massive inconvenience of having to go via Windows Control Panel. (The underlying functionalty isn't disabled or removed - just the system tray icons.) They're no loss. The USB 3.0 monitor is a little more interesting in that nobody seems to know exactly what it does, but there are plenty of reports that USB 3.0 seems to work fine without it, and I don't have any USB 3.0 devices anyway, so that felt pretty safe.

I'd suggest calling the vendor now and they might be able to suggest something or remote access in.

Actually that was the first thing I tried, before I opted for the self-help route. They were about as useful as a chocolate teapot.

 

[StewartR]

Have you tried looking in the event viewer to see if there are any errors (gives more details than task manager)? control panel>administrative tools>Event Viewer>Windows logs>
I would look at both the system & application logs, but bear in mind you will always get some errors, its the constant ones when the CPU is at 100% you want to be looking for.

Mmm. Interesting. Another component of Windows which I hadn't seen before.

It's hard to make any sense of this. I can see the "Critical" events which correspond to when I did hard resets. They're easy to spot. But immediately before them there aren't huge swathes of error messages. The only thing which looks like a pattern is a cluster of about 4 or 5 error messages generated by the Windows Media Player Network Sharing Service, but I can see that process running in Task Manager and it's not responsible for the CPU hogging.

I think I'll try leaving this open in the background, so that when I next get the 100% CPU error I can look at it in real time.

 

[StewartR]

hi can i ask what type of users you have set up. i.e. standard or admin

Both set up as admin users.

 

[StewartR]

As has been said if you only bought it in the last week or so take it back and get it replaced

I'm beginning to think I might have to. It would be a real pain to be without a PC for an indefinite period though, which is why I'm trying to diagnose it myself. But I'm not as optimistic as I was yesterday.

 

[wave01]

what i would do is set up one admin and and one standard user and see if that makes a difference could be that the os is try tot share resources thats it doesn't need

 

[robbino]

as you mentioned WMP network sharing this is known to cause high CPU usage according to some Google searches, also found this if it will help to disable it:

http://www.passionateaboutit.net/Kn...-exe-and-why-is-it-using-high-cpu-memory.aspx

 

[Ozei]

I've downloaded and installed Sysinternals Process Explorer to see whether that would give me any more detailed insight, but unfortunately it just gives the same answers: the CPU usage is by the "System" process and the memory usage is unexplained.

Have you got 'show lower pane' turned on in Process Explorer? (5th icon from left under the menu bar) - that gives much more info on each process in the top pane.

The USB 3.0 monitor is a little more interesting in that nobody seems to know exactly what it does.....

http://superuser.com/questions/561139/what-usb-3-0-functionality-does-intels-iusb3mon-monitor

http://www.file.info/windows/iusb3mon_exe.html

 

[stryvya]

So I bought a new desktop PC from PC Specialist last week. It has an annoying issue that I can't troubleshoot. I'd be grateful for any advice with regard to diagnosing and/or fixing it.

Silly suggestion, if you think about it, why no go back to the Supplier, after all its only a week old

 

[StewartR]

Silly suggestion, if you think about it, why no go back to the Supplier, after all its only a week old

I've already answered this three times.

One:

Can't offer any advise.....but if its a new PC, can't you get the shop you bought it to sort it.......seems the logical step to take.

Yeah, I could, but I'd have to send it off to them, and I'd be without a PC for potentially several days. If I can find a solution myself that would be more convenient, if not easier.

Two:

As has been said if you only bought it in the last week or so take it back and get it replaced

I'm beginning to think I might have to. It would be a real pain to be without a PC for an indefinite period though, which is why I'm trying to diagnose it myself.

Three:

I'd suggest calling the vendor now and they might be able to suggest something or remote access in.

Actually that was the first thing I tried, before I opted for the self-help route. They were about as useful as a chocolate teapot.

 

[freelanderuk]

I have had this on a couple of PC's that I have worked on ,and it was due to a dodgy update from Microsoft, have a look in add remove programs and remove any of the updates that you can , reboot the PC and see if that cures it if so then reload the updates one at a time till you possibly come across the one that causes the problems. You could even try a system restore to when you bought the PC to see if that would work

 

[StewartR]

An update of sorts...

I haven't seen the error occur for 3 days now - since I removed all that stuff from the Startup configuration by using msconfig. (I haven't done anything else since then. I wanted to wait and see whether this had any effect first.)

So the problem seems to be fixed and it seems to have been caused by one of these:

• Intel Rapid Storage Technology
• NVIDIA GeForce Experience
• NVIDIA GeForce Control Panel
• Intel USB 3.0 Monitor
• Epson PC-Fax Software
• Epson Event Manager Application

I think now I need to reinstall the driver for my Epson printer and see what happens...

 

[arad85]

Cool! Let us know how you get on (my money is on the Epson s/w but....)

 

[Ozei]

.....my money is on the Epson s/w but....

Mine's on one of the Intels.

I wouldn't have thought Epson PC-Fax could hog the CPU/RAM even if it wasn't working properly - ditto for Epson Event Manager. (All Event Manager does is enable the buttons on an Epson peripheral to launch the software, instead of doing it by mouse. It works fine on my Win7 Pro machine using the buttons on a V500).