100% Disk Usage with fresh win 10

[Computer Bloke]

But many people here (where electricity costs are nudging 40 cent per KW) prefer not to give AGL et al anymore money than they need to.
Having older desktops running (even though in a low power state) can push up the power bill to unacceptable levels.

OK, let's try this with numbers.

Assuming that a desktop PC consumes about 5W when sleeping (about the same as a TV in standby, or a little less than an ADSL modem) then putting it to sleep for twenty hours a day instead of shutting it down completely* would cost 20 x $0.40 x 5 / 1000 = $0.04 per day, or a little less than $15 per year.

In other words, even at Adelaide prices it's probably cheaper to put a computer to sleep than it would be to get you (or us) even to look at it!


* I'm ignoring the tiny amount of power that's still drawn when the machine is plugged in but switched off - it's usually less than 1W, and applies to both laptop and desktop computers.

 

[TechLady]

Personally I never recommend people use sleep mode--especially for laptops. In my experience it causes nothing but trouble.

Really appreciate all the input, thank you!

 

[GTP]

Most of my clients leave their desktop on all day, so at least 7 to 10 hours.
Laptops are probably left on longer.
A quick search revealed that the general consensus seems to be that Windows computers consume between 5 ~ 25 watts in "Sleep Mode." (Overall with old desktops taken into account)

A very large percentage of my clients are older people, from around 40 ish to 90 ish, on some sort of pension,
so they are very conscious of power costs especially when it starts eating their "pokie money!"
Now, I agree, based on your "sleep" calculations, that it's not much but every little bit saved is helpful, considering they use the device all day.

 

[Computer Bloke]

In my experience it causes nothing but trouble.

I'm curious - this is diametrically opposed to my experience. What kind of trouble do you see, and how do you know it's caused by sleeping?

 

[Porthos]

I'm curious - this is diametrically opposed to my experience. What kind of trouble do you see, and how do you know it's caused by sleeping?

After an update is "partly" installed and user never restarts, Remember with fast start enabled(default) the computer never gets the needed restart and thing start not working correctly.

I cant count how many calls I get resolved by first asking them to restart especially after patch tuesday.

 

[TechLady]

After an update is "partly" installed and user never restarts, Remember with fast start enabled(default) the computer never gets the needed restart and thing start not working correctly. I cant count how many calls I get resolved by first asking them to restart especially after patch tuesday.

That's one problem. And I have lots of clients that kill their systems by never closing Chrome, or leaving 2000 tabs open, so restarts help with that as well. But so many systems just don't seem to come out of the sleep/hibernate things cleanly, in my experience, so I just don't think it's worth whatever benefits are supposed to be granted by the feature. It just causes panic.

 

[Computer Bloke]

I have lots of clients that kill their systems by never closing Chrome, or leaving 2000 tabs open, so restarts help with that as well.

Ah - that makes sense. Either our clients are intrinsically neater or we've trained them differently!

 

[Karl00]

Maybe it has something to do with the Windows disc or ISO. Remember a tech years ago whenever he installed Windows 7, it would have high resource usage and always had issues installing updates. Never ordered 5400RPM HDDs, but I've seen them fine in i5 laptops with 10.

 

[TechLady]

Still seeing this issue on more systems than I would like

 

[hjelpio]

Windows Update is usually the offender when I get computers with good ol' hard drives in for tune-ups. And I get a fair amount of 3-10 year old computers.

 

[mr m]

You should run Process Explorer to see what process is hammering the HDD. Although the last time I had 100% disk usage it turned out to be a faulty HDD. None of my usual tools found it but the onboard Dell HDD diag did.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/process-explorer

 

[Porthos]

Keep in mind that with Win 10 not only are the regular updates it is also updating the Windows store apps so right after install Windows is quite busy.

 

[GTP]

I use and prefer PC Hunter.

 

[HFultzjr]

If HD is fine, my guess is Windows Update.
It seems worse for people that use their computer sparingly.
Every time they turn it on...................updates.

 

[brandonkick]

I "usually" don't see too much trouble as long as a system has an SSD and a "decent" processor.

It's funny that sapphirescales mentioned the "A" series APU's.... we have a pair of laptops at my day job
(that I didn't spec out....) and they were always just such junkers... so much of a pain in the rear to use...
slower than a three week pay (or whatever metaphor you prefer).

Not all that long ago I swapped out the spinner drive for SSD in one of them, and wiped and reloaded. The
thing is still slow to the point that I personally wouldn't want to use it.. but much more usable than it ever was.
Some CPU's are just silly weak, SSD's can't do a lot for those.

EDIT:

Although, at this stage of the game M$ really should address the "windows update" engine. I remember this being a problem for a LONG time now. I'm sure it's quite easily addressed... throttling that beast of a service down a bit so it doesn't bring the average system to it's knees in a hurry....

 

[Porthos]

Not all that long ago I swapped out the spinner drive for SSD in one of them, and wiped and reloaded. The
thing is still slow to the point that I personally wouldn't want to use it.. but much more usable than it ever was.
Some CPU's are just silly weak, SSD's can't do a lot for those.

I won't bother with those anymore. Tried a SSD in a couple and for the most part a waste of money and time. I have jest started to tell clients with those the only way to make those better is to replace them with something with a better processor.

 

[Diggs]

So I killed off OneDrive (that seemed to be part of it), superFetch (same)

These just need their initial long 99% CPU run in the beginning then settle down quite nicely although I also turn off OneDrive on all machines if not being used by the client. No one mentioned MS Click-to-Run which I've seen slow machines down at least temporarily or worse get strange and always consume way too many resources. Really, just cause Office is installed Click-to-Run always has to be there too?