CPU at 100% and extremely confused

I'm going to echo the N&P on this one, given the troubleshooting completed I'm assuming this Windows install has fallen victim to either malware, stupid user performance tool "optimization", or what I refer to as "upgrade creep." Windows 10 feature updates are great, but on some long lived systems we still get ye old Windows is done issues, and you can troubleshoot for a month, or just nuke it and be done with it. Some people used to refer to this as "winrot" or something similar in the XP days. It doesn't happen nearly as often with Win10, but it does still happen.

Though I must admit reapplying 20H2 over the top would be worth a run.
 
Sky-Knight said:
Though I must admit reapplying 20H2 over the top would be worth a run.
Click to expand...

I will always, always, always try this over a N&P when there is a ton of configuration/reinstallation that would be required afterward with a N&P.

I've had perhaps two actual needs for a complete N&P when this technique has failed, and I've used it way more than two times. The repair install by running setup.exe from the ISO for the same version you've already got running is, for me, one of the very greatest blessings of Windows 10. It often cures multiple issues in one fell swoop that you could spend hours to months chasing otherwise (and probably never fix).
 
But "winrot" can, in my experience, be cured in almost all cases with a repair install (and the cure sticks) rather than an N&P.

Note well, "almost all." But you can generally tell, instantly, those situations where the recalcitrant system isn't a part of the "almost all" demographic.
 
britechguy said:
But "winrot" can, in my experience, be cured in almost all cases with a repair install (and the cure sticks) rather than an N&P.

Note well, "almost all." But you can generally tell, instantly, those situations where the recalcitrant system isn't a part of the "almost all" demographic.
Click to expand...
It won't be cured if the problem is caused by a driver. Which means some malware too.

The feature edition update process cures a TON of stuff, so you're right to rely on it. But it doesn't get all of it, and I give pause to the idea that the CPU drivers being screwed up, which is the only thing I can think of to cause the Task Manager to behave as above... well those don't get replaced ever during a feature update. So I don't think in this specific case the repair will help...

But I could very much be wrong, and it's a quick and painless procedure to attempt, so why not run it and see?
 
Sky-Knight said:
So I don't think in this specific case the repair will help...

But I could very much be wrong, and it's a quick and painless procedure to attempt, so why not run it and see?
Click to expand...

Precisely. You can't know if you don't try it, which is all I'm saying.

I just don't ever think that jumping directly to a N&P is the way to go. Others are free to differ on that, but I'll always suggest trying, in order:

1. SFC and DISM [then, if that doesn't work]
2. A repair install (or, possibly, Feature Update if the ISO is for a newer version) using the ISO file to perform it. [then, if that doesn't work]
3. A completely clean reinstall of Windows 10, the proverbial N&P

I have at times skipped over #1, but never straight to #3 as the first course of action.
 
britechguy said:
1. SFC and DISM [then, if that doesn't work]
2. A repair install (or, possibly, Feature Update if the ISO is for a newer version) using the ISO file to perform it. [then, if that doesn't work]
3. A completely clean reinstall of Windows 10, the proverbial N&P

I have at times skipped over #1, but never straight to #3 as the first course of action.
Click to expand...
Same for me the only exception is someone in a hurry or the computer has no software over and above a printer. Fabs and a remote printer reinstall is quicker and more thorough.
 
Porthos said:
Same for me the only exception is someone in a hurry or the computer has no software over and above a printer.
Click to expand...

Oh, I absolutely agree if you have a machine that's in "barely more than out-of-the-box" state. I just very seldom encounter that circumstance, and being that it's the rare exception I kinda brush it aside when discussing what I do (and propose others might do) generally.

I've even done the occasional N&P as "step one" when I have a brand new machine, as it gets the cleanest install of Windows 10 you can get on any hardware. And over the last several years I've had very few driver-related issues that used to come of doing this.
 
It's baaack! (I never did feel right about this one.) It's throwing kmode exception errors and BSODs. No doubt is having driver issues. I did a fresh Win10 Pro install on a fresh Samsung SSD and it is doing the same thing. I threw all of the SDI drivers at it that were listed. Still doing it. I tracked down the MB maker (it's a BCM RX67Q with an unbelievable comprehensive AMI BIOS). I used their drivers (2013?) and the BSODs persist. The only BIOS upgrade they have is stated for a different part number (71315, I have 71311). Hmmm.......
 
If you're on a fresh install with those problems, you've got defective RAM or a damaged RAM Controller (CPU).

We're into the realm where mainboard, CPU or RAM can be bad individually or all of the above. Defective PSU is also possible but less likely... yet an unstable 3v rail will do this too.
 
Sky-Knight said:
If you're on a fresh install with those problems, you've got defective RAM or a damaged RAM Controller (CPU).

We're into the realm where mainboard, CPU or RAM can be bad individually or all of the above. Defective PSU is also possible but less likely... yet an unstable 3v rail will do this too.
Click to expand...

You think so? Hmm.... I was leaning towards driver/BIOS issues considering the MB is a bit offbeat. I had re-seated the RAM early on but let me drop it to one stick and rotate them (4 x 2 GB)

...but I still doesn't explain the astronomical CPU speeds be reported as I posted with a screenshot early on. Those numbers are still there along with the scrambled Task Manager even on the new install and rotated RAM.
 
Last edited:
Did you try different ram? I always kept various good ram around for testing. Quick and easy test. I also tried to keep a motherboard/cpu of various sockets/generations for testing as well.

If this was my customer with the age of the computer and the problems I would be pushing them to a refurbished or new computer.
 
mikeroq said:
If this was my customer with the age of the computer and the problems I would be pushing them to a refurbished or new computer.
Click to expand...
That's where this is headed. The geek in me is just trying to understand the WTFs that I keep encountering.
 
I did a search and it looks like the Nuvoton® NCT6776F is not a popular IO chip and tends to behave wacky. It often reports wrong temp values among other things. I'm not sure how common that chip is but it seems to be linked to systems where stability is an issue.

Not every board maker makes good boards, especially if there are no firmware updates to fix things. Time to move on.
 
Put in a test SSD and fresh OS. See what happens...

If it's not doing it on a fresh OS, something may just be fuky on OS level. If you need to retain everything, do an in-place install as suggested.
 
@Diggs Save this as a .cmd file, run it as "admin" and see if it helps.

Code: 
@echo off
:: BatchGotAdmin (Run as Admin code starts)

REM --> Check for permissions
>nul 2>&1 "%SYSTEMROOT%\system32\cacls.exe" "%SYSTEMROOT%\system32\config\system"

REM --> If error flag set, we do not have admin.
if '%errorlevel%' NEQ '0' (
echo Requesting administrative privileges...
goto UACPrompt
) else ( goto gotAdmin )

:UACPrompt
echo Set UAC = CreateObject^("Shell.Application"^) > "%temp%\getadmin.vbs"
echo UAC.ShellExecute "%~s0", "", "", "runas", 1 >> "%temp%\getadmin.vbs"

"%temp%\getadmin.vbs"
exit /B

:gotAdmin
if exist "%temp%\getadmin.vbs" ( del "%temp%\getadmin.vbs" )
pushd "%CD%"
CD /D "%~dp0"

:: BatchGotAdmin (Run as Admin code ends)
:: Your codes should start from the following line


net stop superfetch
REG add "HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\SysMain" /v Start /t REG_DWORD /d 4 /f

net stop "Windows search"
REG add "HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\WSearch" /v Start /t REG_DWORD /d 4 /f

REG ADD "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Search" /v "SearchboxTaskbarMode" /t REG_DWORD /d "0" /f

REG ADD "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced" /v "ShowTaskViewButton" /t REG_DWORD /d "0" /f

REG ADD "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Windows Search" /v "AllowCortana" /t REG_DWORD /d "0" /f

taskkill /f /im OneDrive.exe
%SystemRoot%\SysWOW64\OneDriveSetup.exe /uninstall

tzutil /s "(UTC -5.00) Wisconsin"



taskkill /f /im explorer.exe
start explorer.exe
 
Last edited:
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