NT Kernel & System using 100% of CPU

Anonymous
2009-04-02T00:19:32+00:00

Hi,

I just bought a new laptop with Window Vista Basic. The laptop has 3 Gb ram. I was just reading an article on line and then I start to hear the laptop fan running like crazy. then I went to the Resource Monitor and there was an image/program that was using 95% of my cpu and it was my system with description of "NT Kernel & System". It has been going on for over 30mins. Other than restarting the computer, what can I do about this "NT Kernel & System" eating up 95% of my CPU?

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Performance and system failures

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Anonymous
2009-07-06T17:17:59+00:00

I've been having the same problem on my HP desktop running Vista home for a couple weeks. I read that someone fixed the same problem by updating some hardware firmware, so I opened Resource Monitor and started unplugging all my hardware one at a time. The instant I unplugged my Belkin USB network adapter, NT Kernel & System dropped down to 0% and my computer unfroze entirely. The same adapter has been causing me a lot of grief for months- it wouldn't respond every time my computer came out of standby. I'll be updating the driver and firmware to see if that helps - otherwise that garbage is going in the trash. I recommend disabling/unplugging hardware (especially if you have any with odd behavior) until the problem stops, then replacing or updating that hardware.

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Anonymous
2009-04-02T10:03:09+00:00

Hello Dtsai,

Thank you for posting.  What you just described seems to be some form of mal-ware trying to mascuerade as a legitimate windows service.  Windows does have NT Kernel and also System, but they never show up together as one service, program, or file. 

I highly recommend that you use your favorite anti-virus and anti-spyware program and do a full scan of your PC. 

Please try the scan and let me know if this helps you

Zack

Microsoft Answers Support Engineer

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  1. Anonymous
    2017-09-10T21:05:11+00:00

    I guess I get to bump it once more.  :)  Some comments:

    1. No disrespect to the the Microsoft comments, but the suggestion about malware is a wild shot in the dark.  It's the kernel running away with the CPU, not an application.  It's also occurring on new laptops, and it's highly unlikely all of these would be associated with malware.
    2. When playing around with the task manager, do not stop or otherwise screw around with anything labeled system or kernel.  You will crash your system, because you're not supposed to do that :)
    3. I found some links regarding the use of xperf.  If you are technically inclined and curious, see:

    http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/140263-how-to-get-the-cause-of-high-cpu-usage-by-dpc-interrupt/

    Following this procedure, I was able to localize the issue to a specific set of drivers related to my disk I/O.  Specifically, the Intel Rapid Storage Technology ACPCI drivers. 4. Windows 10 introduces weird stuff (not the word I am thinking) regarding power profiles.  USB devices get turned off by default, etc.  When I saw the ACPCI reference in the xperf data, I immediately checked these Intel drivers - a few versions out of date.  Updated them, rebooted.

    Boom - problem solved.

    Note that even though Microsoft indicated that I was up to date with everything, some of my drivers were out of date.  The fact that the kernel is sucking up CPU is a smoking gun to a driver issue.

    I hope this helps someone.  FWIW, my laptop is a core i7, 7th gen, 32GB ram, Windows 7 Pro 64 bit, 3 SSDs and a NVidea 1070.  I highly recommend reading the link in item 3 (if you're into that geek stuff).

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  2. Anonymous
    2017-03-01T20:14:55+00:00

    the guy just said that the computer was brand new and i have this problem some times also. it isn't that a second "System" is running, it is that some how, through all of microsofts stupid API commands, other programs are able to get "SYSTEM", the actual legitimate process, to write to your disk or use your cpu so that you cannot find what actually is responsible in task manager.

    what WOULD be helpful is if there was a way to isolate the processes responsible for getting "SYSTEM" to do stuff which really shouldn't be possible at all.

    since there is no solution to these types of programs, i am just going to have to make my own anti malware program.

    when i do, it is going to put a lot of big guys out of business because of how it will work :p

    don't really care if i get money for it either, i just want this type of **** to stop once and for all

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  3. Anonymous
    2015-08-22T15:07:36+00:00

    I had a problem with my brand new computer that had a 12 gb ram and a core i5 processor. often it would spike to 100% and sometimes crash. I franticly started searching and trying all sorts of things to remedy the problem and eventually found out that one of my ram sticks had died. I would recommend removing any of those "cleaners" because there are some dangerous scams out there and simply check if any of the hardware is broken.

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