Posted on 10/23/2014 7:40:39 AM PDT by Sherman Logan
I have a Dell notebook that's about 5 years old. Windows 7.
It works fine most of the time, but every few hours it goes into a mode where the CPU goes straight to 100% usage and stays there, making it unusable.
Sometimes it self corrects after 15 minutes or an hour, or sometimes I have to do a hard reboot.
Then it works fine again for a while.
Any suggestions?
virus?
What would this forum be like without FReeper sarcasm?
I’ll say it...
“Comments”/sarc.
Have you tried Ctrl+Alt+Del>Task Manager>Processes tab? Check which process is reporting near 100% usage and report back.
What Anti-Virus package are you using, I’ve notice sometimes they will max out CPU usage.
CTL-ALT-DEL and click on Task Manager.
What is the process that is using the CPU?
Can you do a Ctrl+Alt+Del when it does this, start Task Manager, and see what process is getting greedy?
Virus or malware. Find out what program is hogging the CPU and google it to see if you have a virus.
1. Do a disk clean-up.
2. I assume you have a virus-checker, but is it checking for updates? If you haven’t run it in several months, I’d be suspicious.
3. Did this just recently start up...like you loaded another package or software recently onto this? What was the software?
Can you bring up the windows program Mgr (Ctl/Alt/Del) and see what process is spiking?
aim, fire, RELOAD
When the cpu is at full bore, open task manager, click processes, click “show processes from all users”, and check to see what programs are running in the background and how much cpu time is being used.
It could be a virus but could also be a background program. Would have to know what programs you have loaded. It could be a program running updates or repair in background. I’ve had that problem with Norton AV and some background repair programs that would start when the keyboard/mouse were inactive for a few minutes, then would not quit when I started using computer again, locking up the machine.
Try Ctrl+Alt+Delete and look at processes in the Task Manager. You may be able to see one program that is hogging resources in the list.
Did you backup everything, wipe the drive, and reinstall? After five years, it may be time.
Could be a virus, but I would think that virus would be more constant.
Right click on your taskbar and select “Task Manager” from the pop-up menu.
In TaskManager, select the Processes tab.
At the bottom of that dialog, there should be a checkbox for “All Processes”. Check it.
Click on the CPU column twice, so you can see which process is consuming CPU.
Go about your business with the Task Manager in view. When the system bogs down, have a look at the Task Manager and identify which process is consuming all the CPU time.
Do a web search on that process name and see if it turns up as malware of some sort.
If it’s not malware, then try to identify the application that uses that process and either kill it or disable it from automatically loading at boot time.
my bet is on Virus, or more likely an anti-virus program. Both Norton and MacAfee should just ES&D IMO.
yep, sounds like you’ve been hijacked by a bot and somebody else is using your processor
Windows machines rarely last more than 14-18 months with me before I reload them. I’ve got the backup/replace/restore process down to a fine science.
Those who suggest that you dig into the processes and/or event viewer are absolutely correct - but I bet you could poke around in there for hours and not find anything readily apparent.
You may want to think (and plan for) a refresh.
I have a netbook that did the same thing. I’d start it up, then be unable to open anything. Turns out it was a combination of the anti-virus program running a scan and the fact that the little netbook only had 1GB RAM. After adding another 1GB RAM, everything ran fine.
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