NT Kernel & System - High CPU

Press F10 while restarting the computer to enter Setup Utility
Under Advanced tab select "Processors"
Make sure Hyper-Threading is set to "Enable"

You'll have to re-start the computer, but once you do all processors should be activated (check in Task Manager) and CPU usage will be distributed across all processors.

Hope this helps

Hi Trogdor! Welcome to the Windows 7 Forums website!

Congratulations... you just revived a thread that is nearly 6 months old!

However, I am sure your tip will help someone out and it's appreciated.

Sorry for reviving this thread again, but I had the same problem on windows 7 x64 Retail with all available updates on my pc. I lost my hardrive a few days after I noticed my proccesor running at a constant 100%. Now I got myself a laptop with windows 7 x86 with no updates, and now I have the same story all over again, the install isnt even two days old. Proccesor usage is not adding up in the task manager, and the hungriest process is "System NT Kernel...." . Is there a solution or should I move to old reliable xp.

I've got the same problem for about 25min then it went back to the normal state

I didn't do anything.

Hi, I've got a similar problem. I did some digging and here's what I've got:

1. For no reason that can currently be explained the "System" process (NT Kernel) takes up 100% of 1 CPU for a long period of time. For me, this does not go away until I restart the computer.
2. This will not show up in task manager unless you show processes from all users.
3. SysInternals Process Explorer gives additional details when showing the properties of the "System" process (under the Threads tab):

It shows that the ntoskrnl.exe thread, KdPollBreakIn at address 0x1a0 is using approx. 50% of the CPU (I have 2, so that's one whole CPU).

4. Because this is a kernel thread and the system process, I cannot get any additional info about it.
5. There are some discussions I've been able to find by Googling for KdPollBreakIn, but none have led to a solution to my particular problem. Here are some examples:

http://forums.pcper.com/showthread.php?t=466616

http://social.answers.microsoft.com/...e-0f2733c5f789

No good solutions thus far. I'm not sure if sleeping the computer or hibernation are related, but I do know that KdPollBreakIn is related to some debugging functions. I'm not sure what exactly.

All, I found the solution to my problem. I had to perform an xperf trace on Windows 7 64-bit to get to the bottom of it (as suggested here: http://social.answers.microsoft.com/...e-0f2733c5f789). There are some programs you'll need to install to assist you and it can be a bit technical. The tutorial on installing and running xperf is here:

http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=140264

There are a few pre-reqs you need to install, so read it carefully. For 64-bit win7 you need to modify a registry value as well to get a full trace.

Ultimately, the problem was with my bluetooth connection. I had my Blackberry Pearl 8220 smart phone paired with my PC (a Lenovo T61 laptop).

The xperf trace identified the btwavdt.sys driver as the hog. Disconnecting my phone from the PC resolved the matter. My CPU usage is back to normal. Many thanks to Andre.Zeigler over at MS Answers for the xperf info.

Hope this helps someone else out there!

I found one solution after looking into Wulff1e answer, I simply went to realteks update auto install and my CPU usage dropped from 158,000 down to 477. I hope this helps.

I had the same issues following a blue screen crash dump, after my system started to use 51% of CPU resourse, my whole system slowed to the point of immobility until I was forced to manually shut down the computer.
Here are some basic things that I did, that helped my system recover
1. Enable hyper threading in setup
2. Disconnected an external USB DVD drive
3. Removed and swapped the RAM around.

While I am no technical person this helped me with my issue, hope it helps someone else out there

Using Veedaz's advice, I find the process behind high CPU consumption.

1) You must run Sysinternals Process Explorer (download from http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/s...rnals/bb896653)
2) In the left panel, select "System" (or the process name with high CPU consumption)
3) Right click on the process name and select Properties
4) Select Threads tab. Explore inside or order by CPU consumption and select process
5) Now, press Module. You can try other options like Stack, Kill, Suspend or Permissions, but maybe unavailable.

In my case, the problem was caused by Ricoh driver (risdsne64.sys). This driver controls Memory Stick hardware.

Looks like this is the solution. Look at my CPU usage after reinstalling network devices.(I'm using an Asus N53S)