Windows 10 -- high CPU usage is a real issue

Yesterday, I upgraded from Win 7 pro x64 to Win 10 pro x64. I have a "clean machine" without any traces of viruses or malware. My Win 7 PC ran flawlessly.

My Win 7 PC used little or no CPU when it was not running programs.

The new Win 10 is running 30 to 50% CPU when no programs are running! I have an Intel i5 CPU, 750 running at 2.67 GHz. I have 4 GB of RAM. When the Win 10 CPU is running at 45-50%, the heat in the CPU cores elevates to ~50 deg C. With the Win 7 PC, when the CPU was idle, the CPU core temps were 30 deg C.

Checking the TASK MANAGER, the culprit appears to be the svchost.exe. That program/app alone is using ~25% of the CPU. Microsoft claims that this program is legitimate. Svchost.exe consists of about 15 applications that have different functions.

One of the posters on this this forum (in the performance sub-forum) stated that he disabled svchost.exe and his CPU usage return to normal levels. I don't want to disable the entire svchosts.exe IF I can disable the specific offending components.

I need some expert help on what is safe to disable. Win 10 is a 2.87 GIGABYTE program that takes a half day to download. I don't want to screw this up.

I'd appreciate some expert help.

Thanks,

Louis

Could Windows be re-indexing your libraries. Give it a few days and I would image the high CPU usage will settle down.

The specific service that is using 25% of the CPU is the Windows update services "wuauser". It is part of the svchost.exe. I hope you can zoom in and see what's going on. Thanks for your comments.

It is updating, let it update. Just give it some time, it will settle down. This is a usual occurrence when installing an OS.

GREAT! I'll let her run....

How long will this take?

I always leave my PC on for several days and nights after an install so Windows can do all it's stuff and settle down

Fascinating. I will let this puppy run for a few days and monitor the CPU usage and CPU temperatures. There seems to be a direct correlation. I would think that as I downloaded from the Microsoft site and the Win 10 pro file was 2.87 GIGABYTES all of the downloading had been done!

Thanks for the reassurance. Much appreciated.

Louis

Well now... I found the following in a Softpedia post and gave it a try. Guess what?! It worked perfectly. My CPU usage went from a constant 30 to a constant TWO (2). My CPU temp went from 50+ deg C, to ~30 deg C. Here is the fix:
----------------------------------------------------------
How to fix the high CPU usage
Method 1

Launch the Registry Editor by typing regedit.exe in the Start menu and navigate to the following path:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\TimeBroker

Look for the Start entry and change its value from dword:00000003 to dword:00000004 (simply replace the 3 at the end of the value with 4).


Changing this value could have an impact on Cortana’s performance, but it appears to be closely connected to the high CPU usage in Windows 10. In case you’re not using Cortana at all, you’re on the good side. Otherwise, setting reminders won’t work.

------------------------------------
And, here is the proof:

Louisaz said:

Fascinating. I will let this puppy run for a few days and monitor the CPU usage and CPU temperatures. There seems to be a direct correlation. I would think that as I downloaded from the Microsoft site and the Win 10 pro file was 2.87 GIGABYTES all of the downloading had been done!

Thanks for the reassurance. Much appreciated.

Louis

This may be a case of "chicken little". ie, you did something, and the problem stopped, so you assume what you did stopped it. Try re-enabling it to its original setting and see if the problem returns.

Here is the article: Windows 10 High CPU Usage Fixes - Softpedia
The first method described worked -- perfectly and immediately. No coincidence.