Windows 10 Fixing Taskhostw.exe High CPU Usage Issues on a Gaming PC

[Asiankwok]

Specs:

• i7 8700k
• GTX 1080
• 32GB DDR4 RAM

Details:
A couple of weeks back I noticed my PC slowing down, lots of lag whilst editing in Premiere Pro and games became unplayable, giving me less than 50 frames, I don't have a fps monitor but I'd say near to 10-20 fps.

I did a bit of digging and found what I thought was the cause, Taskhostw.exe, which using Run > 'perfmon /report' was giving me a warning that this was using 99.8% CPU. Whilst the task monitor said otherwise (overall use was at about 10% CPU)

I tried a standard reset and the games and editing was still slow. So eventually went through some malware removal processes, no luck, after fresh install but stilll no luck. I gave it to a repair shop and they said they'd fixed it, but here I am still with this issue however, so far Premiere Pro and games seem to run fine whilst it's still flagging in Performance Monitor.

Steps taken (In Order):

1. Run Rkill
2. Run Malware Bytes (Rootkit scan)
3. Run ADWCleaner
4. Run HitmanPro
5. Format all HDDs and reinstall windows
6. Repeat of step 5
7. Take to shop where they once again wiped everything and reinstalled (Don't know if they did anything else - will follow up)

Any ideas, is this just something false being flagged by Performance Monitor?

PS. I've talked to a couple of friends - 3/5 have the same taskhostw.exe error in performance monitor.

 

[Neemobeer]

What is the actual error for taskhostw?

 

[Asiankwok]

What is the actual error for taskhostw?

Severity: Link RemovedError Warning: Process taskhostw.exe [ProcessId: 10176] has a high CPU consumption of 88.5%.

This used to warn 99.8% but atm this is what I'm getting. However on Task Manager I get 15% use, the moment I open TM it says 56% and instantly drops to show 15%

 

[Neemobeer]

Taskhostw is part of the task scheduling system. Most likely you have a run away scheduled task you may be able to find it with procexp. Process Explorer - Windows Sysinternals