CPU in use?

[Pofoo]

I have a Lenovo laptop with Windows 7 that is about 1 1/2yrs old. It started acting funny so I started the task manager to see if I could figure it out. The performance graphs showed that the cpu usage was running between 20% and 100% for hours on end, even after just a normal start up and sitting idle.
I've been getting a lot of notices about installing Windows 10, so I went to the Windows update site and saw that it failed to install 2 times. Evidently, I have auto update enabled, and they tried. So I stopped everything and restarted. Even now, the task manager shows between 3% and 25% cpu usage when sitting idle. When I checked the processes column it only shows 1-2 processing using 1-4%

So, is something going on? I'm assuming that when not being used, the cpu usage should be very low to nothing (it is on my desk top)?

[2shotjoe]

sounds like melware, backup what you need and to a fresh install.

[artb]

My Lenovo desktop was hanging recently so I opened task manager and looked at the background processes.
There were about 10 google processes and when one of them exceeds 10% CPU it locks the computer.
I have stopped using google and haven't had the problem.
I have noticed that all the browsers use a lot of CPU but google was excessive.

[afteractionreport]

+1 on fresh install...just get an externalHDD or large USB drive and copy all your important info...

Do not upgrade to windows 10 stay at w7 and turn off update notifcations for the W10 upgrade. Its just annoying...

I

[stilly]

I have a Lenovo laptop with Windows 7 that is about 1 1/2yrs old. It started acting funny so I started the task manager to see if I could figure it out. The performance graphs showed that the cpu usage was running between 20% and 100% for hours on end, even after just a normal start up and sitting idle.
I've been getting a lot of notices about installing Windows 10, so I went to the Windows update site and saw that it failed to install 2 times. Evidently, I have auto update enabled, and they tried. So I stopped everything and restarted. Even now, the task manager shows between 3% and 25% cpu usage when sitting idle. When I checked the processes column it only shows 1-2 processing using 1-4%

So, is something going on? I'm assuming that when not being used, the cpu usage should be very low to nothing (it is on my desk top)?

I would do this:

1. Run Autoruns and remove all STARTUP entries and WINLOGON entries that run that you do not recognize, maybe one at a time and reboot to see what happens. If you are kinda familiar, then remove a few of them.
2. Make sure to keep your AUTOUPDATE in check by turning Windows UPDATES OFF
3. If you go to task manager and info does not jive, are you showing processes from ALL users? to me 4-25% is kinda almost normal for a resource hog like Windows 7
4. Install Malware bytes and Spybot S&D from NINITE.COM
5. Reevaluate

If your processes are jacking your resources, look at SVCHost and kill that process that is eating it up. See what happens. I do not know how to see what is eating up each SVCHost but it is host services and it runs for various other programs it seems.

I do not buy into the just reinstall notion. Sorry. I had over 150 programs installed and then I lost them all when I bumped from Windows XP to windows 7 last July. I have been pissed that I forgot to note the version of this and that... >:(