• Welcome to TechPowerUp Forums, Guest! Please check out our forum guidelines for info related to our community.

[Help!] HDD usage stuck at 100%

C

CaTunez

Joined
Jan 21, 2022
Messages
36 (0.03/day)
Just randomly after starting a steam download yeaterday my computer became extremely sluggish, after shutting down the pc for hours at a time still the same 100% I’ve tried unplugging the hard drive for a good 2+ hours and same 100% usage, ill include usage of the task manager and and performance
 

Attachments

  • image.jpg
    image.jpg
    5.7 MB · Views: 251
  • image.jpg
    image.jpg
    6.1 MB · Views: 290
Services.Msc, and expand the task manager out, look at task scheduler as well, and msconfig

Could be auto defragging being a HDD
 
disabling wsearch may help, but isnt a permanent fix. Go ahead and shut off windows search/wsearch in services.msc and disable in startup and in recovery modes as well as stop the service. Im on win 11 now and cant do the rundown myself on win7/10. services.msc was one location, but theres also another somewhere else to completely stop the process when its already running.
wsearch.png
 
oinkypig said:
disabling wsearch may help, but isnt a permanent fix. Go ahead and shut off windows search/wsearch in services.msc and disable in startup and in recovery modes as well as stop the service. Im on win 11 now and cant do the rundown myself on win7/10. services.msc was one location, but theres also another somewhere else to completely stop the process when its already running.View attachment 256509
Click to expand...
Alright ill try
 
CaTunez said:
What exactly am i looking for in services.msc?
Click to expand...
he showed you in the screenshots, the windows search service


This could be the sign of a dying drive, or a drive being heavily used in a poor way.
It is your C: drive, so a lot of applications could be using the disk - antivirus, defraggers, etc.


Most options get ruled out of it was working normally without any changes - With the PC off, have you tried unplugging and replugging the power and SATA cables to ensure they're simply not loose or damaged?

Can you run HWinfo64 in 'sensors only' and screenshot either everything at once (arrows in the bottom left let you spread it out horizontally), or just the sections relating to your HDD

These are my drives, showing they're not overheating, their history and expected lifespan
1659249987600.png

and the second section showing 'what its doing right now'
1659250061229.png


We can see that my C: drive hit "100%" usage at just 143MB/s, which would be something to investigate further since the drive can do faster (In this case, I simply havent done enough for the drive to reach its full speed)
 
Last edited:
Just wanted to add my system does this occasionally too, it stops on its own after a bit so just let it do its thing, as pointed out already it's probably either defragging or indexing, usually defragging runs when computer is idle and stops when you move the mouse, indexing will run until it has completed its quota or whatever even after waking the machine.
 
Mussels said:
Most options get ruled out of it was working normally without any changes - With the PC off, have you tried unplugging and replugging the power and SATA cables to ensure they're simply not loose or damaged?
Click to expand...
i have checked this.
Mussels said:
Can you run HWinfo64 in 'sensors only' and screenshot either everything at once (arrows in the bottom left let you spread it out horizontally), or just the sections relating to your HDD
Click to expand...
im doing this rn
 
Why not get like a 250GB SATA SSD and use the 1TB HDD as a storage/Game library?

In general it's just faster and you don't have to struggle with Windows Search or another thing trying something to the HDD.
 
Mussels said:
Can you run HWinfo64 in 'sensors only' and screenshot either everything at once (arrows in the bottom left let you spread it out horizontally), or just the sections relating to your HDD
Click to expand...
here ya go

puma99dk| said:
Why not get like a 250GB SATA SSD and use the 1TB HDD as a storage/Game library?

In general it's just faster and you don't have to struggle with Windows Search or another thing trying something to the HDD.
Click to expand...
cause i had no other pc parts and i got this pc for free off craigslist and just took a 1tb laptop hard drive and put it in this machine lmao
 

Attachments

  • 1659256535120.png
    1659256535120.png
    31 KB · Views: 139
CaTunez said:
cause i had no other pc parts and i got this pc for free off craigslist and just took a 1tb laptop hard drive and put it in this machine lmao
Click to expand...
Okay, well they are between 20-30USD for a brand new 240-250GB SATA SSD and I am sure you can find better deal locally or on Cragslist.

Just saying that HDD's as fine as they might run it's not a Windows OS drive anymore and I suggest a SSD any day.
 
puma99dk| said:
Okay, well they are between 20-30USD for a brand new 240-250GB SATA SSD and I am sure you can find better deal locally or on Cragslist.

Just saying that HDD's as fine as they might run it's not a Windows OS drive anymore and I suggest a SSD any day.
Click to expand...
Im buildin a new tower in the next week or two so yeah but on the new tower its gonna have a 1tb ssd and 2 tb HDD
 
CaTunez said:
here ya go


cause i had no other pc parts and i got this pc for free off craigslist and just took a 1tb laptop hard drive and put it in this machine lmao
Click to expand...
That's showing the drive has had almost no use, with 25GB of data read and written - its basically new
and that it thinks 1.75MB/s is 100%, which it shouldnt unless its doing something that maxes the drive while not writing much - like defragging, indexing, etc.


It's a laptop hard drive and you 'put it in' - where did the OS come from? Did you clone it, fresh install? UEFI or MBR?

Can you check any and all programs running in the tray, and see if any could be using the disk... is something antivirus scanning, is a defrag running, etc
 
That an easy fix you have to disable sysmain, wsearch and add folder excluded in window defender to stop it searching in the hard drive you choose as I had a similar issue like that with multi hard drives in my system. No more issue since I did the fix
 
CaTunez said:
Im buildin a new tower in the next week or two so yeah but on the new tower its gonna have a 1tb ssd and 2 tb HDD
Click to expand...

Just get a 256-512 for the OS Only
 
The operating system win7/10/11 is tied to the laptop using a hardware code. If you install an ssd into your laptop, you dont need a software code to activate the new operating system. get a usb to sata data cable off amazon
1. Manaul way - FRESH install of Operating system-what id do
format usb drive for win10/11. Backup all your data off old hdd - then take out of laptop, install new ssd into latop, and install new OS using usb drive with win X. THEN manually Reinstall backup data - photos ect and install any and all programs you may need.​
A really good paid backup program to use "AOMEI BACKUPPER". backup programs are more complicated than backing up manually most of the time for me unless you know exactly what you are doing it can still save you the headache..
2.Automatic way -RETAIN the operating system and existing profile data to keep all your OS and profile data intact without all the manual install hassle
Use backup program, if you dont have one AOMEI is a good one to make an entire partition backup of all the partitions on the existing "bad" hdd first. (you need to transfer these partitions to the new ssd)
Your old hdd is slow AF so transferring ALL that data to the new ssd via usb is gonna take forever. (Thats why you should do a fresh install.)
if you get this far you have to PM me the details.
basically, transfer the partitions from old hdd to new ssd. install new ssd. Now ALL your data is the same but now you are running the laptop on a SSD.
You will need a USB to SATA cable to complete this process, UNLESS you have an external backup device.(PICK the fastest one you got)

​
 
Last edited:
oinkypig said:
The operating system win7/10/11 is tied to the laptop using a hardware code. If you install an ssd into your laptop, you dont need a software code to activate the new operating system.
1. Manaul way - FRESH install of Operating system-what id do
Backup all your data, install new ssd, format usb drive for win10/11 and install new OS. THEN manually Reinstall backup data - photos ect.​
A really good paid backup program use AOMEI BACKUPPER. backup programs to me are more complicated than backing up manually unless you know exactly what you are doing.
2.Autmatic way -RETAIN the operating system and profile data to keep all your OS and profile data intact without needing a fresh install
Use backup program, if you dont have one AOMEI is a good one to macke a entire partition backup of all the partitions on the existing "bad" hdd
get a usb to sata data cable off amazon
install the new ssd.
now theres 2 ways you can transfer data. but if you get this far you have to PM me the details.
basically transfer the partitions from old hdd to new ssd. install new ssd. Now ALL your data is the same but now you are running the laptop off of a ssd.

​
Click to expand...
Only way you get the windows activation to pop up is when you changed hardware like motherboard not changing the hard drive from HDD to SSD it unclear the way you said it
 
CaTunez said:
Just randomly after starting a steam download yeaterday my computer became extremely sluggish, after shutting down the pc for hours at a time still the same 100% I’ve tried unplugging the hard drive for a good 2+ hours and same 100% usage, ill include usage of the task manager and and performance
Click to expand...

Don't unplug it, don't turn it off; let the task complete.
 
Mussels said:
It's a laptop hard drive and you 'put it in' - where did the OS come from? Did you clone it, fresh install? UEFI or MBR?
Click to expand...
Os came from microsoft, i didn’t clone it, it was a fresh install, and its mbr

Edwired said:
That an easy fix you have to disable sysmain, wsearch and add folder excluded in window defender to stop it searching in the hard drive you choose as I had a similar issue like that with multi hard drives in my system. No more issue since I did the fix
Click to expand...
Yeah i did that and i believe it might have fixed

oinkypig said:
Manaul way - FRESH install of Operating system-what id do
format usb drive for win10/11. Backup all your data off old hdd - then take out of laptop, install new ssd into latop, and install new OS using usb drive with win X. THEN manually Reinstall backup data - photos ect and install any and all programs you may need.
Click to expand...
Yeah i did this but not the backing up part because i was coming from mac to pc
 
CaTunez said:
Os came from microsoft, i didn’t clone it, it was a fresh install, and its mbr


Yeah i did that and i believe it might have fixed


Yeah i did this but not the backing up part because i was coming from mac to pc
Click to expand...
While your on a fresh OS make sure you convert from MBR to GPT while in the operating system as commands is available to convert it
 
Use RUFUS and make a UEFI/GPT install USB, theres no need for MBR in this decade
 
Mussels said:
Use RUFUS and make a UEFI/GPT install USB, theres no need for MBR in this decade
Click to expand...
It running MBR according catunez so it needs to be converted using mbr2gpt command without having to fresh install as it don't give that option to select gpt during the installation

docs.microsoft.com

MBR2GPT

Use MBR2GPT.EXE to convert a disk from the Master Boot Record (MBR) to the GUID Partition Table (GPT) partition style without modifying or deleting data on the disk.
docs.microsoft.com
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top