high disk utilization makes pc almost useless

[clayj13]

I run windows 10 and avast. Disk at 100% most of the time. After a week of trying all the solutions offered in various threads, with short-term results then going back to 100%, I turned on Windows Defender Anti Virus. So far disk is low. Even stressing the cpu results in short-term high disk, but then it goes down. Just FYI for others to try.

Add another item. Avast uses hardware acceleration, disable it and any other hardware acceleration used by any other programs.

Hopefully the last addition 01.05.18: This has cured the problem for the last three hours running a variety of situations that caused 100% disk utilization before the fix. From the command line, I ran the chkdsk.exe /f /r and replied "Y" to the question (worded close to this) do you want to run check disk the next time the PC reboots? Check Disk ran for about an hour and then I had to reboot several times as it was fixing disk errors. Finally it completed a reboot and has been running fine with very low disk utilization.
Hope this helps someone!

As of 01.08.18 no more high disk utilization. On 01.06.18 Rolled back changes made in attempt to fix problem. Re-installed Malwarebytes. Everything is running fine.

update: as of 01/28/18 no issues. Problem solved.

 

[The Paladin]

what all this sounds like is that you had bad sectors on your drive and running "chkdsk.exe /f /r" found them and locked them out. permitting the OS to no longer use those weak areas of your hard drive.

suggestion: run chkdsk.exe /f /r once a month, normally it should only take a few moments to run it on a hard drive that has no issues, but if each month it keeps finding "bad sectors and fix them" you should really get another hard drive and transfer your information over to new drive before your old one seriously generates a fatal problem and you loose everything on it.


PS the High disk usage had nothing to do with software but everything with your hard drive failed sectors. and that is a hardware problem

 

[clayj13]

what all this sounds like is that you had bad sectors on your drive and running "chkdsk.exe /f /r" found them and locked them out. permitting the OS to no longer use those weak areas of your hard drive.

suggestion: run chkdsk.exe /f /r once a month, normally it should only take a few moments to run it on a hard drive that has no issues, but if each month it keeps finding "bad sectors and fix them" you should really get another hard drive and transfer your information over to new drive before your old one seriously generates a fatal problem and you loose everything on it.


PS the High disk usage had nothing to do with software but everything with your hard drive failed sectors. and that is a hardware problem

 

[clayj13]

Thank you Paladin, will do. I have since remembered having run CCleaner about the time this all started. Don't know if that contributed to the issue, but the monthly test is cheap insurance.