Task manager shows high disk usage above 95%

Anonymous
2012-10-29T09:18:27+00:00

Just updated to windows 8 from windows 7, my task manager shows high disk usage.

I have 150 Gb free HD space

4 Gb ram

Intel Core i5 -2520M CPU @ 2.50GHZ

Please advice

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

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Anonymous
2014-04-01T14:22:34+00:00

Hi

See the post http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_8-performance/windows-8-keeps-slows-down-to-100-disk-usage-and/cd787f8d-e7b4-4872-aecb-6f0cd15ad942

Towards the end there are couple of posts by Jeremy on how this can be solved by cloning the HDD and formatting it and recloning. I too have this problem on windows 8 / 8.1 machine since more than one year but have not tried the solution suggested by Jeremy yet. I have tried several other tricks.

At least of couple of persons have confirmed that this works

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Anonymous
2012-10-30T05:54:58+00:00

Hi,

Thank you for posting the question in Microsoft Community! As I understand, you are facing performance issues on the computer**.** I understand that it must be frustrating, but rest assured, we are here to help fix the issue and guide you in the right direction.

Method 1:

I would suggest you to restart the computer in clean boot and check if the issue persists.

Follow these steps to start the computer in clean boot:

Step 1:

a) Press the ‘Windows + R’ key on the keyboard.

b) In the ‘Run’ windows type ’MSCONFIG’ and click ‘Ok’.

c) Click the ‘Boot’ tab and uncheck ‘Safe Boot’ option.

d) On the ‘General’ tab, click to select the option ‘Selective startup’, and then click to clear the option Load startup items check box.

e) On the ‘Services’ tab, click to select the ‘Hide all Microsoft services’ check box, and then click ‘Disable all’.

f) On the ‘Startup’ tab, click ‘Open Task Manager’. In the Task Manager windowunder startup tab, right click on each startup item which are enabled and select ‘Disable’.

g) Click ‘OK’, and then click Restart.


Step 2: Enable half of the servicesa. Follow steps 1a and 1b to start the System Configuration utility.

b. Click the Services tab, and then click to select the Hide all Microsoft services check box.

c. Click to select half of the check boxes in the Service list.

d. Click OK, and then click Restart.


Step 3: Determine whether the problem returnsIf the problem still occurs, repeat step 1 and step 2. In step 2, click to clear half of the check boxes that you originally selected in the Service list.

If the problem does not occur, repeat step 1 and step 2. In step 2, select only half of the remaining check boxes that are cleared in the Service list. Repeat these steps until you have selected all the check boxes.

If only one service is selected in the Service list, and you still experience the problem, the selected service causes the problem. Go to step 6. If no service causes this problem, go to step 4.


Step 4: Enable half of the Startup itemsIf no startup item causes this problem, a Microsoft service most likely causes the problem. To determine which Microsoft service may be causing the problem, repeat step 1 and step 2 without selecting the Hide all Microsoft services check box in either step.


Step 5: Determine whether the problem returnsIf the problem still occurs, repeat step 1 and step 4. In step 4, click to clear half of the check boxes that you originally selected in the Startup Item list.

If the problem does not occur, repeat step 1 and step 4. In step 4, select only half of the remaining check boxes that are cleared in the Startup Item list. Repeat these steps until you have selected all the check boxes.

If only one startup item is selected in the Startup Item list, and you still experience the problem, the startup item that is selected in the list is the service that is causing the problem. Go to step 6.

If no startup item causes this problem, a Microsoft service most likely causes the problem. To determine which Microsoft service may be causing the problem, repeat step 1 and step 2 without selecting the Hide all Microsoft services check box in either step.


Step 6: Resolve the problemAfter you determine the startup item or the service that causes the problem, contact the program manufacturer to determine whether the problem can be resolved. Or, run the System Configuration utility, and then click to clear the check box for the problem item.


Step 7:

Note: After you have finished troubleshooting, follow these steps to boot to normal startup.

a) Press the ‘Windows + R’ key on the keyboard.

b) In the ‘Run’ windows type ’MSCONFIG’ and click ‘Ok’.

c) On the ‘General’ tab, click the ‘Normal Startup’ option, and then click ‘OK’.

d) When you are prompted to restart the computer, click ‘Restart’.

Method 2:

I would suggest you to refer to the link and check if it helps:

Ways to improve your PC's performance

Improve performance by optimizing your hard drive

Note:

a.     If the drive is being used by another program, or is formatted using a file system other than NTFS, FAT, or FAT32, it can't be optimized.

b.    Network drives can't be optimized.

c.     If a drive isn't appearing in Optimize Drives, it might be because it contains an error. Try to repair the drive first, and then return to Optimize Drives to try again. For more info, see "To repair a drive" at the end of this article.

Method 3:

Perform SFC (System File Checker) and see if it helps.

a. Right Click at the bottom left hand side corner of desktop (on Start screen).

b. Select Command Prompt (Admin).

c. Type “SFC /scannow” and press Enter.

If you are still facing the issue, please reply and we will be glad to help you.

Thanks.

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  1. Anonymous
    2013-05-22T12:36:57+00:00

    Hi ccurts, thanks for the response, but i am not using any Norton product. I have Avast Internet Security installed. I'll have a look on their support/forums and see if there is any known issue. Though I was running the same setup on Win7 Ultimate with no issue.

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  2. Anonymous
    2013-05-24T13:59:26+00:00

    Ya i checked it in the task manager under processes tab, and a system task named SERVICES and sometimes SYSTEM.EXE consumes high disk usage..!!! And I wont be able to kill these processes !!

    As the system has very high config. , other programs that I installed are impactless to it.

    Also I am using tuneup utilities 2013 which provides program disability function. I already disabled higher startup programs.

    Isn't there another way to fix it??

    I used windows 8 CP and RP both On my Desktop, everything is alright but dont know what's going on in my laptop??

    Exactly the problem I had.  I even had Microsoft remotely working on my system for hours and they didn't have a clue so I gave up on them.  They did all the easy solutions I already eliminated from the  list of possibilities - A virus or maleware, too many or a bad start up process, running too many things , etc. - all of which where BS since I have a LOADED system High end I7, 16 GB of fast RAM, SSD hard drive, high end motherboard, Blu-Ray, etc.

    And for me, like you it was SYSTEM.EXE  - a MICROSOFT process at fault....  I have at least in my case partially solved the problem - need to spend more time since my system is 1/2 together because of it. I also noticed my boot up times where extremely long

    • like 5 minutes along with the disk active time maxing out and the system just locking up until it cleared. 

    I was about to go back to Windows 7, and reverse the mistake of Windows 8 off my system but decided to try one last ditch thing.  I too off all the other hard drives off the system - only drive I have is the boot OS drive and the Optical - and the problem went completely away of the drive being maxed out with active time in the performance tab of the Task manager.   Also noticed my boot time dropped to like 20 seconds!!!! I have no reason to believe the other drives are bad or the mother board is either - they are all brand new or nearly new.

    My motherboard is up to date with it's bios (MSI Mpower Z77) - the drive interfaces in the bios are set legancy which means it supports a mix of UEFI/GPT partitioning. I don't believe any of the drives are failing but I think the problem is with the mix... Particularly I think Windows 8 should be on a UEFI/GPT partitioned drive with a UEFI motherboard. Of course the details from Microsoft s*ck on this issue - I seen pieces in their tech info that points me that way but  it is not very clear.  But I think I want to re-partition that primary disk as a UEFI/GPT and see what happens - but that is a big job - especially since I did the windows 8 upgrade and I don't have an install disk.  Want to see if I can back up the C drive, create the partitions and then restore and have it work - really don't want to do a clean install if I have to.

    Also unclear is I seen windows recommends the following UEFI/GPT drive partitioning in their documents but it is unclear if I manually build the partitions and restore my current C drive if windows 8 will use them properly or if windows 8 has be create the paritions as part of clean install to use them.

    MS recommends the following partitions for you Disk 0 -  Windows RE Tools, System, MSR, Windows, and Recovery Image.  I have the tools to do that - but again  the details to me are unclear if I restore my current OS image to that new windows partition will the OS use the other partitions properly or do I have to clean install?

    Here is one link on the issue - http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/hardware/gg463525.aspx -  Again I do not have anything that directly points to this being the cause but the debug so far leads me to believe it is worth trying.

    Either way - very disappointed with Microsofts support on this issue - I had to figure things out this far on my own.  Right now the system works well the way it is - but it is crippled since I really need those extra drives back. Of course they will probably blame the MB or drives - since that is the easy answer. But if it turns out it is the partitioning I will not be happy that MS didn't flag the issue during the upgrade.  If UEFI/GPT is the recommended set up I would have much rather bit the bullet and repartitioned and did the clean install then vs now when I have Windows 8 working pretty well and all my Apps installed and configured.

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  3. Anonymous
    2013-05-25T17:52:45+00:00

    I have installed windows 8 Pro 32 bit version on my desktop and the problem did not happened for a single time even i gave the processor many heavier tasks to run simultaneously but the disk usage jumps only upto 30-40% only. When only 2-3 programs are running the disk usage shows only 0-2%.

    As its a 32 bit OS and the problem is occurring in my laptop which is running on 64 bit version, I did a trick to resolve the problem.

    I copied the files ntoskrnl.exe which is actually SYSTEM.EXE and svchost.exe which is services.exe from my 32 bit desktop machine to pendrive. I wanted to replace the file to my 64bit machine but It is not possible to run windows OS and replaced those files as they are running all the time.

    So I installed ubuntu in my pen drive and booted my laptop and replaced both the files but before that i copied the 64 bit files to another location.

    I switched on my laptop, it booted very fast but the problem was still there. This means that there are some services which the system loads at the time of booting and encounters the problem.

    After that I again replaced the Original 64 bit files to their Original state.

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