Strange Issue resolved to share

[DaveLembke]

Client came to me with a old Celeron 540 single-core Toshiba Satellite laptop running Windows Vista Home Premium on 2GB RAM and 120GB SATA 1.5Gb/s HDD in which the computer was constantly busy with almost 100% CPU all the time making it unusable.

* I expected to find a virus on this system based on the clients description of the problem. I quoted the repair at being the cost of a full rebuild after data backup.

Google Desktop was using the majority of the CPU processing power at idle keeping the CPU at 90-100% so that the system would just about lock up at times. Uninstalled Google Desktop and CPU calmed to 40-60%.

Next problem, Firefox was acting unresponsive. Performed reboot of computer. Firefox still unresponsive. Was able to get out to the internet through IE, but computer was lagging badly yet the CPU was not busy. Checked for Virus's and none found with Norton AV and latest definitions. So I downloaded and installed Malwarebytes to perform an additional scan.

1/2 way through the Malwarebytes scan I walked away from the laptop to check on dinner that was cooking and I came back to the computer 10 minutes later to see how far it has gotten with the very slow computer, and the screen was off. Thinking that the power options may be to shutoff the display I touched the touchpad and the display came up, but the system was logged off. Logged back in and the system told me that it recovered from a crash. I went to look at what crashed and it stated that it was caused by Firefox and it gave a link to update Firefox to newer version as for the version is out of date. Followed this update, and Firefox was updated and then Firefox was running fine and fast.

Rebooted the computer and now after all services start its responsive and no problems. Both NAV and Malwarebytes came up clean with latest definitions.

Never seen an outdated Firefox version crash Windows Vista before as well as make the computer almost unresponsive at times, yet the CPU was showing only 40-60% used and it was changing regularly so I know it wasnt a hung measurement of CPU use indication.

Figured I'd share this in case anyone else has a system that has Firefox installed that comes to a crawl and crashes to make sure Firefox is the latest version.

Ran this system through its paces as fast as that slow single-core Celeron  would run to make sure that this was the end of the issues. It continued to behave and so I delivered the computer to the client today charging just for 1 hr time. They were happy to get it back with an inexpensive repair, but I did mention that they may want to look into getting a new laptop with a dual-core minimum at some point and that I would suggest a quad-core for their multitasking usage in which this celeron 540 single-core is struggling to keep up with their needs.

*Figured I'd share this in case anyone on Google searches for a same issue with Google Desktop eating up all of CPU resources as well as Firefox unresponsive on fully patched Vista Home Premium which causes a system crash. The fix is to uninstall Google Desktop and update Firefox to latest version.

[Geek-9pm]

Thanks for sharing. Google desktop has been dropped by Google.
In Windows one would expect the  CPU  to be under 10% or less if no significant takes are running. Thee are a number of services that do not show in Task Manager. But they do take up CPU time.  If Task manager shows usage above a low percentage, suspect there is something going on in a background service.
Check this out.
http://www.computerhope.com/issues/ch001111.htm

Unfortunately, not all processes and services can be seen by the Windows Task Manager.

[DaveLembke]

This system was full of applications and services, all of them important according to the user, so with the computer now able to be used as a computer vs a paperweight that can also serve as a lap warmer they are happy to be able to use it again. They are asking too much of this old single-core celeron. If they had all the services etc and software on a dual-core or better, the usage would likely be less due to balanced load among cores as well as processes like realtime protections would end sooner.  It takes a good 5 minutes or so after boot before everything settles down below 40-60% to 5 to 30%.

[Geek-9pm]

Milty-tasking and Milty-core are not all that great.
If a user really needs lots  of things to be done, best to buy separate appliances to do the job.

• A fax machine for FAX. 
  
• A  printer to print. 
• A coffee machine to make coffee. 
• A telephone to answer incoming calls. Obviously.
• Need a document server? Get another computer.
  
• Need e Mail server? Get another computer.
• Need a wife? Don't use a computer.

Hope this helps all those out there that think computers do everything.
No they don't.

Note to moderator:
The Spell checker says it is Milty-tasking 
 -but Google calls it Multitasking.   So there.      

[patio]

Then you need a new spell-checker...