The taskhost.exe application consumes 50-60% of the average cpu usage

Anonymous
2010-02-10T09:05:52+00:00

The taskhost.exe application(C:\Windows\System 32) consumes 50-60% of the average cpu usage even when the system is idle  and no processes are being run.

Will deleting this application make my computer unstable?

How can  i permanently stop the process ?

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Windows update

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Anonymous
2010-02-11T04:26:39+00:00

Hey Abhishek,

The taskhost.exe is a Task Host which is a generic Host Process for Windows 7 32-bit Services. The full path to this file should be shown in TUT as **C:\Windows\System32\Taskhost.exe.**TASKHOST is a generic process which acts as a host for processes that run from DLLs rather than EXEs. At startup TASKHOST checks the Services portion of the Registry to construct a list of DLL-based services that it needs to load, and then loads them. There can be many instances of TASKHOST running, as there will be one instance of TASKHOST for every DLL-based service or grouping of services (the grouping of services is determined by the programmers who wrote the services in question).

Since this is an integral part of the operating system, I wouldn’t suggest you to delete it.

However, for the high CPU consumption issue, please use Performance Monitor to view performance data either in real time or from a log file.

The new Resource Monitor lets you view detailed real-time information about hardware resources (CPU, disk, network, and memory) and system resources (including handles and modules) in use by the operating system, services, and running applications. In addition, you can use Resource Monitor to stop processes, start and stop services, analyze process deadlocks, view thread wait chains, and identify processes locking files.

A closer look:

View CPU utilization and other performance information**http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/View-CPU-utilization-and-other-performance-information**

See details about your computer's performance using Task Manager**http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/See-details-about-your-computers-performance-using-Task-Manager**

Last but not the least, perform virus scan to remove any trace of infection on your computer. If your antivirus database is not updated, please update the same and then run the scan. If you don't have antivirus installed, you may opt to download Microsoft Security Essentials on your computer and run it.

**http://www.microsoft.com/Security\_Essentials/**

Hope this helps!

Regards,

Shinmila H - Microsoft Support

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  1. Anonymous
    2011-06-28T20:47:24+00:00

    yes i have the exact problem also coming from xp and going to windows 7 but this is a pentium 4 and uses 100% of it i just found and used a way to kind of get rid of it but have only just done so i dont know if it works. let ya know asap if it does or not because i know how annoying it is. sends the cpu fan mad!

    Go to the Task Scheduler (may be found under Administrative Tools from the Programs Menu) 

    Find the entry Task Scheduler Library/Microsoft/Windows/RAC and delete or disable the task in the right pane.

    mark

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  2. Anonymous
    2011-02-02T18:53:23+00:00

    I am seeing this issue regularly on my Core i5 laptop where 1 core is pegged at 25% CPU.

    Using Process Explorer I open up the offending TaskHost to find that one thread is eating 25% of the CPU:

    RacEngn.dll!RacSysprepSpecialize+0x428f4

    Opening up this thread's stack shows that the thread appears to be stuck here:

    ntoskrnl.exe!SeAccessCheckWithHint+0xb4a

    ntoskrnl.exe!KeAcquireSpinLockAtDpcLevel+0x7d2

    ntoskrnl.exe!KeWaitForMutexObject+0x19f

    ntoskrnl.exe!PsIsSystemProcess+0x94

    ntoskrnl.exe!KeStackAttachProcess+0x11c1

    ntoskrnl.exe!ObReferenceObjectByPointerWithTag+0x233

    RacEngn.dll+0x12230

    RacEngn.dll+0x1217d

    RacEngn.dll+0x120dd

    RacEngn.dll+0x19052

    RacEngn.dll+0x19e1b

    RacEngn.dll+0x191da

    RacEngn.dll+0x1cafb

    RacEngn.dll+0x118bc

    RacEngn.dll+0x117d3

    RacEngn.dll!RacSysprepSpecialize+0x42a52

    kernel32.dll!BaseThreadInitThunk+0xd

    ntdll.dll!RtlUserThreadStart+0x21

    Is anyone looking into this because it's causing a major perf and battery-life issue on my (and others') machines?

    [Update: 2/2/2011 @ 12:20 PST]

    I've posted a more detailed diagnosis of this issue on my blog where I'll also crosspost any answers to this issue.

    http://www.bitcrazed.com/post/2011/02/02/Windows’-(RACENGN)-Reliability-Analysis-Calculation-Engine-eating-my-laptop!.aspx

    Rich Turner

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  3. Anonymous
    2011-01-14T12:12:14+00:00

    Thanks @ Travis and J.Mac

    Taskhost was taking up 13%. Seen in process monitor (not task list, it is not listed there). I used SysInternals Process Explorer (Bless those guys, without these tools, a lot of problems were hard to solve!). As suggested on some other forum, indeed RACengine was hogging one core completely. Specifically: RacEngn.dll!RacSysprepSpecialize+0x42a52

    What is Micro$oft going to do about this problem? I'm concerned about the people that cannot see they have this issue (as it is so hidden).

    P.S. f*cking security warnings about encryption when signing in on this forum

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  4. Anonymous
    2010-03-18T04:24:56+00:00

    Hey Mark,

    Just to make sure that a third party application isn’t causing this intensive CPU consumption, boot to safe mode with Networking and see how the computer behaves.

    Refer:

    Start your computer in safe mode**http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/Start-your-computer-in-safe-mode**

    Advanced startup options (including safe mode)**http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/Advanced-startup-options-including-safe-mode**

    If the CPU consumption is normal as supposed to be, ideally it would be third party applications interring with Windows services.

    Clean boot configuration would be the best option here as this doesn’t load any of the non Microsoft services or other startup items.

    Refer this article for help.

    How to troubleshoot a problem by performing a clean boot in Windows Vista or in Windows 7**http://support.microsoft.com/kb/929135**

    If this doesn’t help, I would suggest Bernie to create a new post so that we can assist with the exact issue.

    Regards,

    Shinmila H - Microsoft Support

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