DirectoryService grinding system to a halt

[Diatribe]

DirectoryService has been using 193% of my cpu a couple of times now pretty much shutting down the entire computer in the process. Does anyone know what this process does or why it is doing this?

 

[Fleetwood Mac]

I have this problem too and we're not alone:
https://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=4613969
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1211429&tstart=0 (a few potential solutions in here)

 

[Diatribe]

Thanks for the heads up. I read the Apple support discussion and if it is really an app trying to connect to the internet that is causing that I'll try uninstalling Perian and see if that helps, because that always seems to try to grab the version info and fails. Who knows if it is that though.