CPU suddenly running at 10% non-stop after Windows Update

[fishsponge]

- On 10 July i installed "Windows 2000 Service Pack 4 Express Install for End Users" from Windows Update.
- On 17 July i installed "Security Update for Windows 2000 (823980)" from Windows Update.
- On 20 July i installed "Security Update, February 13, 2002 (MSXML 4.0)" from Windows Update.

One of these installs has caused my computer to start using the processor at 7-12% non-stop throughout the day and night. The process using the CPU is simply called "System", and i don't know how to find out more about it i'm afraid. I can run any commands you tell me to, but i don't know them myself.

I know it was one of these Windows Update installs that caused this because i haven't made any other changes to my system at all... no programs installed or uninstalled, no backgrounds or colors changed, and no files altered. All i use it for is to play games once in a while, and i haven't even changed any settings in any games either. I only play Colin McRae and Driver anyhow.

I've tried multiple reboots, and i'm 99% sure it was one of those updates. i can't imagine anything else causing the "System" process to run at 10% constantly.

Is this a known issue? Is there a fix i can apply? Is the a Knowledge Base ID number, or a Bug ID number that anyone knows about?

Any help would be appreciated, and i'm not too keen on donating 10% of my CPU to the operating system non-stop. It used to run somewhere between 0% and 2%.

The system's been up for 3 days, 9 hrs now. Here's the manually typed-in info from the Task Manager:

  Image Name         PID      CPU     CPU Time     Mem Usage
  -----------------------------------------------------------
  dnetc.exe         2748       91     64:37:10       2,492 K
  System               8       09      7:00:06          24 K
  TASKMGR.EXE       2980       00      0:00:00       3,724 K
    <<<snip>>>

For the record, i have the following system:

AMD Athlon XP2000+
256MB RAM
80GB HDD
64MB GeForce4 MX
Windows 2000 Professional

any ideas??

thanks in advance

[pickel]

I'm not too familiar with 2000, but isn't there something like
" System restore" or "last known configuration" that you can use like in 98 ???? Can you undo the updates from the registry???
Good luck

[Telexen]

What motherboard do you have? I seem to remember seeing some BIOS fixes for a few boards saying they fixed that same problem in Windows 2000.

[SiliconJon]

http://www.f-secure.com/v-descs/bymer.shtml

dnetc.exe? Are you using that for something? Read this link.

And I recently removed Windows2kPro from all my systems, as two in a row caught a virus while getting an update through windows update. I know that's how they happened because when I did a fresh install on the bigger one, did an update, shabam. The virus returned.

Gettin' time to stop procrastinating my switch to Linux...

[fishsponge]

pickel - i would rather not do a system restore.... i've never heard good things about those. i have a working system, so i'd rather find a better way i'm afraid. thanks for the idea though

Telexen - i have an MSI KT3 motherboard i think, but it's never caused an issue before.

SiliconJon - i am running DNETC.EXE... this is the client from http://distributed.net. You can read about it on there. The reason that virus copies this program and it's config file to your machine is so the virus writer can start to use your machine to process DNETC data packets on his behalf. DNET is like SETI@home, but for encryption challenges set by RSA instead of aliens.

[SiliconJon]

What else do you have running in the background? (listed in the registry- RegEdit, and your StarUP folder)

[billniceguy]

do u have latest mcafee viruscan and firewall?

[fishsponge]

Originally posted by SiliconJon
What else do you have running in the background? (listed in the registry- RegEdit, and your StarUP folder)

right.... um... here u go:
CMESys
DataLayer
Kernel32
LiveMonitor
MessengerPlus2
Mirabilis ICQ
Mouse Suite 98 Daemon
NAV Agent
NeroCheck
Nokia Tray Application
NvCplDaemon
nwiz
QuickTime Task
SoundMan
Synchronization Manager
TkBellExe
Tweak UI
WinampAgent

Originally posted by billniceguy
do u have latest mcafee viruscan and firewall?

well, Norton AntiVirus2002, but yeah.... my firewall is my ADSL router.