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CPU usage going crazy

J

jeejeebu

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jun 25, 2007
148
0
Can someone explain why my CPU usage is at nearly 100%? It just started doing this, and it doesn't appear to be caused by any processes that are running. I restarted as soon as I noticed it was happening. Didn't help at all.
 

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Try "All Processes" at the top drop down menu, instead of "My Processes" to get a better idea of what is going on. It could be mdimport (but I think that is is user process), ATSServer, or WindowServer, those are just the ones that have given me trouble before.
 
Change the tab at the top of Activity Monitor to show "All Processes" and then sort by CPU. You're not looking at the whole picture.

Edit: Mernak types faster.
 
What revision of OS X are you on?

The three Intel Macs in our flat have had the issue crop up with 10.5.2. I just turned off Spotlight and it calmed them all down.

The process mdworker controls Spotlight. If that's going mental, you'll know about it.

I decided not to mess around with the config files, and instead just disable it for the drives through system profiler - add your hard drives in to it. It does disable Spotlight, but I never use it anyway. I know where everything is on my computers :p
 
Thanks. It was some print manager thing. No idea why it suddenly started using 99.9% CPU.
 
While we're on the topic, is there any reason why Safari likes to occasionally start using about 50% CPU? It happens completely randomly as far as I can tell, and it just happened and I saw that kernal_task was also using about 50%. As soon as I closed Safari, kernal_task also calmed down. Is this an issue lots of people have that is triggered by something I'm doing? (I know embedded videos like to cause Safari to use a lot of CPU, though not this much, but this only happens when there aren't any embedded videos in any tabs I have open.)
 
jeejeebu said:
While we're on the topic, is there any reason why Safari likes to occasionally start using about 50% CPU? It happens completely randomly as far as I can tell, and it just happened and I saw that kernal_task was also using about 50%. As soon as I closed Safari, kernal_task also calmed down. Is this an issue lots of people have that is triggered by something I'm doing? (I know embedded videos like to cause Safari to use a lot of CPU, though not this much, but this only happens when there aren't any embedded videos in any tabs I have open.)
Click to expand...

I've been having that problem too. Noticed my MBP2.16C2D was running unusually hot and the fans starting up all too often. Sometimes at peak times SMBfancontrol app displayed 85°C and both fans at 6000RPM, it would go up and down couple times a day. Got me a little worried, since the computer had been completely silent for the most part of its life (unless playing games or running Aperture and Photoshop or the likes of those), its been going on for 2 months or so. I'd launch activity monitor to find Safari using upto 80% CPU. Once it was closed things cooled down quickly.

Never heard of this issue before now.. I was quite happy to see you mention it :eek:

Come to think of it this might have started after 10.5.1 update or soon there abouts.

Otherwise a completely smooth ride :D
 
TraustiB said:
I've been having that problem too. Noticed my MBP2.16C2D was running unusually hot and the fans starting up all too often. Sometimes at peak times SMBfancontrol app displayed 85°C and both fans at 6000RPM, it would go up and down couple times a day. Got me a little worried, since the computer had been completely silent for the most part of its life (unless playing games or running Aperture and Photoshop or the likes of those), its been going on for 2 months or so. I'd launch activity monitor to find Safari using upto 80% CPU. Once it was closed things cooled down quickly.

Never heard of this issue before now.. I was quite happy to see you mention it :eek:

Come to think of it this might have started after 10.5.1 update or soon there abouts.

Otherwise a completely smooth ride :D
Click to expand...
You know, it may have started shortly after 10.5.1 for me, too. I only started paying attention to CPU usage after I had problems with my fans, and was told to keep an eye on what was causing them to spin too fast (and then break). So I've only noticed this problem for the past couple of months as well.
 
I've been having a similar problem under 10.5.2 with my MBP 2.2 2gb.
Recently it's been running ridiculously slow (15-20 seconds to start itunes) but my cpu/ram usage aren't very high.

There is a kernal_task (process id: 0) that has shown up and takes a consistent 10% cpu at all times. Does anyone know what this is? I don't recall seeing it before a few days ago, or at least seeing it use this much cpu for no apparent reason.
Does anyone know what this process is and what I might be able to do?

I'm not running a lot of programs typically but i've had a very noticeable drop in speed recently. Right now I have Finder, Adium, Firefox, Itunes, PandoraBoy, Transmission, Word 2004 (Yes i know it's ppc and I expect things to be slow when word's open, but i generally don't use it), preview and activity monitor.

Thoughts?
 
crazy cpu and Flip4mac

hi.
two things.
one, my printserver thingy was going whacko too. thanks for the tip to see all processes.

two, flip4mac. if you are in safari and watch a windows media file that runs inside a safari window(aka flip4mac), safari will then hog your cpu until it quits, even after you have moved on to a different page or even closed all the windows. the flip4mac version i have is 2.2.0.49, according to their forums they know this...

c.
 
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