Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

interslicer

macrumors member
Original poster
Oct 14, 2010
75
0
theres a process i cant see in activity monitor but i can see in istat sucking my cpu and i dont know how to get rid of it.
screenshot20101014at312.png
 
What makes you think there's an "invisible process"? There is no such thing. It's visible, or you wouldn't know it existed.
 
What makes you think there's an "invisible process"? There is no such thing.

i posted a screenshot. theres a process that istat can see taking up 100% cpu that doesnt appear in activity monitor. thats all i meant by invisible.
 
i posted a screenshot. theres a process that istat can see taking up 100% cpu that doesnt appear in activity monitor. thats all i meant by invisible.

You need to expand the window to show the entire process name. Then you need to sort Activity Monitor by process name, not process ID. That would make it easier to find.
 
You need to expand the window to show the entire process name. Then you need to sort Activity Monitor by process name, not process ID. That would make it easier to find.

the screenshot doesnt show it, but there is no process by that name in the list. and none with a remotely high enough cpu%. also i dont think theres a way to expand that section of istat enough to get the full name.
EDIT: new pic:
screenshot20101014at333.png
 
the screenshot doesnt show it, but there is no process by that name in the list. and none with a remotely high enough cpu%. also i dont think theres a way to expand that section of istat enough to get the full name.
You can double-click on the name in iStat to highlight it, then Command-C to copy. Then paste here or in TextEdit to get the full name.
 
I must be missing something, because double clicking doesnt do anything.

on a side note, i downloaded istat menus and the process has another name there "mdns". but that name isnt in activity monitor either.
 
I must be missing something, because double clicking doesnt do anything.

on a side note, i downloaded istat menus and the process has another name there "mdns". but that name isnt in activity monitor either.
One of these, perhaps?
ScreenCap 1.PNG
 
Hey, I have exactly the same issue.

iStat nano shows a process called "ADE31741-ADE3-174..." taking up 100% of CPU on an iMac i7

No process by that name in Activity Monitor

Activity Monitor>Window>CPU Usage shows one core pegged at 100%

Restarted, reset PRAM, logged in as a guest account, rebuilt permission, checked HD, etc. Still there.

Oh and by the way, my fans are running faster than normal so I think it is a real issue
 
Also make sure Spotlight isn't indexing, which may be evidenced by the mds process. That can peg CPU utilization.
You can also determine if it's indexing by the Menu Bar icon:
attachment.php
(not indexing)
attachment.php
(indexing)
 
Thanks GGJ for the quick response!

Alas no, Spotlight is not running. In fact all appears normal in Apple's Activity Monitor: a few things using 1% or less.

Still have one CPU core completely pegged at 100% which doesn't seem normal.

Surely, not a virus of some sort?

I am wondering whether I should go nuclear and reinstall the OS.
 
^^ He said he already did that.

Anyway, have you tried using in Terminal.app, running either "ps -A" or "top"? These both give current processes.
 
^^ He said he already did that.

Anyway, have you tried using in Terminal.app, running either "ps -A" or "top"? These both give current processes.

top did nothing but ps -A gave back the following: (in addition to some other stuff. this is the interesting part)

193 ?? 0:00.39 /System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Fram
677 ?? 0:10.86 /usr/sbin/cupsd -l
678 ?? 15:35.25 mdns://4C9A6DE5-4C9A-6DE5-4C9A-6DE54C9A6DE5 158 andy s
707 ?? 0:01.90 /Applications/TextEdit.app/Contents/MacOS/TextEdit -ps
711 ?? 0:00.20 /System/Library/Services/AppleSpell.service/Contents/M


so how do i stop it?
 
^^ He said he already did that.

Anyway, have you tried using in Terminal.app, running either "ps -A" or "top"? These both give current processes.

Better yet: ps -A | grep 4C9A

This will also give you the full command line.

There are no viruses for Macs in the canonical sense of the word, may I tell you, but Trojans and rootkits are sure as hell to exist, spreading via social engineering.

top did nothing but ps -A gave back the following: (in addition to some other stuff. this is the interesting part)

193 ?? 0:00.39 /System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Fram
677 ?? 0:10.86 /usr/sbin/cupsd -l
678 ?? 15:35.25 mdns://4C9A6DE5-4C9A-6DE5-4C9A-6DE54C9A6DE5 158 andy s
707 ?? 0:01.90 /Applications/TextEdit.app/Contents/MacOS/TextEdit -ps
711 ?? 0:00.20 /System/Library/Services/AppleSpell.service/Contents/M


so how do i stop it?

sudo launchctl unload /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.mDNSResponder.plist
sudo launchctl unload /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.mDNSResponderHelper.plist

See if your system actually settles; Bonjour will belly up but that's expected.

sudo launchctl load /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.mDNSResponder.plist
sudo launchctl load /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.mDNSResponderHelper.plist

to start the thing back.
 
Better yet: ps -A | grep 4C9A

This will also give you the full command line.

There are no viruses for Macs in the canonical sense of the word, may I tell you, but Trojans and rootkits are sure as hell to exist, spreading via social engineering.

678 ?? 22:13.72 mdns://4C9A6DE5-4C9A-6DE5-4C9A-6DE54C9A6DE5 158 andy smbprn.00000001 Microsoft Word - MO INFORMED CONSENT FOR VOLUNTEERS Application-1 1 job-originating-host-name=192.168.1.105 job-uuid=urn:uuid:110fd65f-be96-39a5-50b8-2d54691fe9cb /private/var/spool/cups/d00158-001
 
Hey Interslicer, I have the same thing!

Did a ps -A and got a screenfull of stuff. All the "times" (what does that actually mean BTW) are pretty much 0.00 or close to it, EXCEPT for the following:

63 ?? 4:59.13 mdns://ADE31741-ADE3-1741-ADE3-1741ADE31741 408 anonym

So looks like the same issue. What is this and should i/we be worried? (off to Google I go...)
 
678 ?? 22:13.72 mdns://4C9A6DE5-4C9A-6DE5-4C9A-6DE54C9A6DE5 158 andy smbprn.00000001 Microsoft Word - MO INFORMED CONSENT FOR VOLUNTEERS Application-1 1 job-originating-host-name=192.168.1.105 job-uuid=urn:uuid:110fd65f-be96-39a5-50b8-2d54691fe9cb /private/var/spool/cups/d00158-001

So! Are you printing a file over the network, actually?
 
this looks like a file my roommate tried to print.. but i have no idea where to go from here

1. Go to your printing queue and remove the job from it. By the way, did you know that buggy printer drivers can cause 100% CPU? If you don't see it, point your browser to http://localhost:631/, go to Jobs and delete it.

2. Go to your roommate and slap him with a large clue-by-four. Should help.
 
1. Go to your printing queue and remove the job from it. By the way, did you know that buggy printer drivers can cause 100% CPU? If you don't see it, point your browser to http://localhost:631/, go to Jobs and delete it.

2. Go to your roommate and slap him with a large clue-by-four. Should help.

i love you sir. i love you as only a man loving magic words from the internet can.

all problems solved. the entire queue for that printer was deleted so i needed the link, but now its all back to normal cpu loading :D
 
jafd, you are DA MAN (or woman?)

As you suggested, I had to go to http://localhost:631/jobs/ to kill the test page (there was nothing in the print queue) but killed it successfully and now all is back to normal.

Thanks everybody for all the help. Man, I love the interwebs...
 
jafd, you are DA MAN (or woman?)

As you suggested, I had to go to http://localhost:631/jobs/ to kill the test page (there was nothing in the print queue) but killed it successfully and now all is back to normal.

Thanks everybody for all the help. Man, I love the interwebs...

Next thing to google up is what your printer is and are its drivers reported to be crap these days.

P. S. I am a man, just in case. Straight, if you don't mind.
 
Next thing to google up is what your printer is and are its drivers reported to be crap these days.

Interesting thread. I was just about to chime in with:

ps -er |head

but got beaten by sammich (ps -A).

Seems we still don't know why Activity Monitor wasn't showing that proc.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.