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
    2009-08-29T03:49:07+00:00

    did anyone get a definitive answer for this?  i too started to have this problem.  i noticed my computer running really hard.  so i checked all processes and there was the NT kernel system running at very high levels and the CPU running at 100%.

    Windows 7 RC1 x64 version (64-bit).  I have an AMD X2 6000+ with ATI 4670 graphics card.  8 GB of RAM.  motherboard is Nvidia nVIDIA nForce 520LE single chip (ECS NFORCE6M-A (V2.0)).

    I thought it was a virus or malware so I ran scans to no avail.  I decided to wipe the system to an older image that was clean of software.  But I still had the problem after some updates.  So I believe it's some update from Microsoft that's causing it but I'm not sure.  I tried disabling various hardware devices.

    I even did a completely fresh installation from a legitimate Windows 7 RC1 ISO I d/led from Microsoft.

    So if anyone gets an answer, can you share it with the rest of us?  Thanks.

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  3. Anonymous
    2009-05-13T22:52:50+00:00

    Completed. Only thing found with Maleware bytes.

    Registry Data Items Infected:

    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer\NoActiveDesktopChanges (Hijack.DisplayProperties) -> Bad: (1) Good: (0) -> Quarantined and deleted successfully.

    System Program is still there but not doing much at the moment.

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