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So I've finally updated my Dell E6400 to Windows 10. After a while of not using it I had to take it out of mothballs while my other machine is being repaired.

And the expected annoyance happened: System is running constantly 90+% CPU usage, with 80+% used by Windows Update alone, preventing from doing anything more than reading text in browser... And it's now 18 hours straight of that (left it on overnight in hope the WU churn what it needs to do). Since I'm using SSD (Evo 850 250 GB), it's definitely not a straightforward update issue... Previously issues like that I had on Win7 right after fresh install. It took then 4+ hours on same hardware as now with W10.

I'm doing a lot of dev work, so I have full WS2015 community installed with all the trimmings (including SQL Server, IIS server and so on), other stuff from Windows Web Platform Installer, Teamviewer and of course AV (Bitdefender Free) and drivers. System is otherwise free from free-, share-, bloat- and mal-ware (at least I hope).

Windows 8/8.1 is not the same as Windows 10 in regards to Windows Update settings, so the most of the solutions I see are not for me. Also, they often involve "hacking" services and setting update to manual. Again, not a solution for me as I need the stuff to be up to date. So anyone found a solution to the problem?

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  • Had you take a look at the Task Manager checking what process uses your CPU?
    – NoNameProvided
    Jul 25, 2016 at 10:32
  • Oh, right. It was Windows Update (don't remember which specific service). That's why I'm asking in last paraghraph about it. But Will edit question accordingly.
    – AcePL
    Jul 25, 2016 at 13:45
  • Open a cmd.exe s admin and run this while you have a high CPU usage: "C:\Windows\System32\wpr.exe" -start CPU && timeout -1 "C:\Windows\System32\wpr.exe" -stop C:\HighCPUUsage.etl Capture 30-60s of the cpu usage, now press a key in the cmd to stop logging. compress the ETL + NGENPDB folder as 7z/RAR and shre the compressed file.
    – magicandre1981
    Jul 26, 2016 at 4:19

2 Answers 2

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Normally when I see high CPU usage after a windows update, it's the .NET assembly optimiser, re-compiling all the updated .NET assemblies.

It normally doesn't go on for more than about 30 minutes for me, but it would depend on how many .NET software applications you have installed, and the speed of your computer.

Reviews of the Dell E6400 in 2008 listed it as having "average" performance, so your .NET optimizer will take a fair bit longer.

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  • agreed, I've seen devenv.exe sit there churning away for ages after some updates.
    – cjb110
    Jul 25, 2016 at 10:30
  • the optimizer runs with idle priority, it shouldn't be "preventing from doing anything".
    – ths
    Jul 25, 2016 at 10:35
  • @ths that hasn't been my experience. I've found it to be very disruptive, even on a relatively high-end CPU like a i7-3930K o/c to 4.3GHz
    – Adrien
    Jul 25, 2016 at 10:38
  • Normally I would agree. And the laptop is not a speed demon. However, it's beefed up - it's on 8GB RAM and rather quick, if only SATA II, SSD (controller limited, not device). But that was Windows 7, not Windows 10, and it was updated to W10 around 3 months ago, not yesterday. And it took usually around 3-4 hours, not 18. SO something else is a problem.
    – AcePL
    Jul 25, 2016 at 13:30
  • Yeah a Centrino 2 wasn't too bad for Windows 7, but Windows 10 is much more CPU hungry, and compilation is a highly CPU-intensive task, so SSD and RAM probably won't help as much for this as they do for a lot of other workloads. But you should be able to see in task manager what is chewing CPU. Also an upgrade may not go through the .NET optimization phase, or have so much of it to do as a major .NET windows update later on.
    – Adrien
    Jul 25, 2016 at 13:32
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Going over and over both Adrien's answer and Windows Update settings I think I've came up with an possible solution...

I've changed the setting from automatic to manual restart and disabled - which, I think, really did the trick - sending updates and partial updates to other computers.

Maybe it was coincidence, but within 15 seconds from closing down "Settings" the CPU load dropped and computer is quiet as a thief since.

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  • cool. Yes, that's the other main difference in Windows 10 windows update - it tries to copy / query parts of updates from other machines on the LAN. If it happens again, .be sure to get the process name.
    – Adrien
    Jul 25, 2016 at 23:45

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