Windows 10 users who experience issues such as slow response time may look into their Task Manager for guidance. Task Manager provides you with a wealth of information regarding the processes that are currently running on your machine.
You need to take some corrective action. Here are 10 methods you can use to attempt to resolve the problem of high disk usage on your Windows 10 system. Some may take longer than usual due to the stress and increased usage that your hard drive is already under. You know from experience that restarting your machine can often resolve all kinds of issues. While taking this route may not help you find out the underlying reason for the problem, if it goes away, that may be sufficient for you.
Installing the latest updates can often resolve mysterious problems with your Windows 10 system. This may improve the overall performance of your system including that of your hard drive. Your computer may be infected with malware that is causing your disk usage to spike. If you have antivirus software running in the background it should have caught the issue.
Nothing is perfect though, so force your antivirus package to scan your hard drive for a potential infection.
This could be a time-consuming process since your disk is already experiencing high usage but might be necessary to identify and remove malicious software.
A known bug in Windows 8 and 10 can cause a search loop that can be the cause of your high disk usage. To temporarily stop the Windows Search facility and see if it improves your disk issue, open an admin prompt and enter the command : net.
This will stop Windows search from running until the next time Windows is restarted. Another Windows 10 feature that can cause problems is the Windows Superfetch service.
You can disable this service temporarily in a similar fashion to Windows search with the command: net. Use this procedure:. See if this improves your disk usage. If so, you may want to consider changing antivirus packages.
Virtual memory treats your disk as if it is RAM and uses it to swap out temporary files when it runs out of actual RAM. Errors in the pagefile. The remedy to this problem is to reset your virtual memory settings. Installing the latest updates can often resolve mysterious problems with your Windows 10 system. This may improve the overall performance of your system including that of your hard drive. Your computer may be infected with malware that is causing your disk usage to spike.
If you have antivirus software running in the background it should have caught the issue. Nothing is perfect though, so force your antivirus package to scan your hard drive for a potential infection. This could be a time-consuming process since your disk is already experiencing high usage but might be necessary to identify and remove malicious software.
A known bug in Windows 8 and 10 can cause a search loop that can be the cause of your high disk usage. To temporarily stop the Windows Search facility and see if it improves your disk issue, open an admin prompt and enter the command : net.
This will stop Windows search from running until the next time Windows is restarted. You can disable this service temporarily in a similar fashion to Windows search with the command: net. Use this procedure:. See if this improves your disk usage. If so, you may want to consider changing antivirus packages. Virtual memory treats your disk as if it is RAM and uses it to swap out temporary files when it runs out of actual RAM. Errors in the pagefile. The remedy to this problem is to reset your virtual memory settings.
A check disk can show you if there are any physical problems with your hard drive. Usually, a high disk usage indicates that there is an application or logical issue driving the disk usage, but it is worth your time to rule out any physical damage.
Run check disk and note its results. Some users have reported that making these changes to your Google Chrome and Skype settings can have a beneficial effect on your disk usage. One last thing to try is to disable any automatic defrag processes that are running as they may be causing you problems.
You need to fix the issue or risk a very slow moving computer. Jeff Cochin is a data management and recovery expert.
