svchost.exe high memory usage - wuauserv

Question

I'm running Windows 7, and I've been experiencing high memory usage from one of my svchost.exe processes.

Services under that particular process are BITS, EAPHost, IKEEXT, LanmanServer, MMCSS, ProfSVC, RasMan, Schedule, SENS, SharedAccess, ShellHWDetection, Themes, winmgmt and wuauserv.

I've been able to narrow it down to a specific service by separating each services into its own process and identified wuauserv as the cause.

Stopping the Windows update service(wuauserv) stops the insane memory usage but that's not a solution.

Any help please?

I've have already tried re-naming the SoftwareDistribution folder and re-registering the Windows Update Agent. Nothing has worked so far.

Solution 1

An update to fix the issue has been rolled out:

Please see KB3050265

Solution 2

In my experience, when wuauserv starts eating memory, the best thing to do is to wait until it finishes installing the updates and then reboot.

If you can't or aren't willing to reboot now, you can always reset wuauserv with the following BAT script (right click & run as administrator):

net stop wuauserv
net stop bits
rd /s /q %windir%\softwaredistribution
net start bits
net start wuauserv
wuauclt.exe /detectnow

Hope it helps.

Solution 3

I don't know if you still have this issue but I had something similar in Windows 8. I had data transfer of several hundred MB per day and using NetBalancer identified the issue as the Windows update service (wuaserv) so I disabled it and then ran the MS Fixit option for Windows update. I think there is one for Windows 7 here but do check it is compatible before you run it.

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-gb/windows/troubleshoot-problems-installing-updates#1TC=windows-7

Although its early days I have turned automatic updates back on and so far so good. At least I know what to stop if the problem comes back again. The NetBalancer program was a great help in identifying the problem.

Hopefully you have already solved it, if not this might be worth a try.

Solution 4

I found the following article: https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windows/en-US/4a782e40-bbd8-40b7-869d-68e3dfd1a5b4/windows-update-scan-high-memory-usage?forum=w7itproperf&prof=required

I think microsoft did something in the mid of 2014 - this post also starts in Nov 2014, yours in Oct 2014...

We have this issue too at a customer with about 60 PCs... we had to disable the Windows Update service for now. Official answer from microsoft is pending, hopefully the give us a patch sometime...

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Comments

[Raystafarian]

What do you mean memory leak? Is the RAM not released after you kill processes? My understanding was that svchost combines multiple services so they take less resources overall. Windows 7 manages resources by keeping them available to itself e.g.

[magicandre1981]

this is normal. The service must handle a lot of update data. My usage is during setup of updates also several hundred MB.

[Oz Edri]

Oliver, did you manage to solve it? If so - how?

[elachell]

Have you checked this question: superuser.com/questions/951960/… ? I'd recommend stop the automatic updates and run that on demand

[Ravi Parekh]

This is still happens in Windows 10

[CrouZ]

On my computer, windows update hogs almost 2GB immediately after each reboot. Restarting the windows update service worked for me though. Thanks!

[Chani]

stopping that windows update service did indeed help. Thanks!

[Synetech]

you can always reset wuauserv with the following BAT script For the record, it's either (.)BAT file or batch script (or batch file), not BAT script which sounds more like a script for The Bat!.

[bcody]

Thanks! This seems to have fixed the problem. Now my mom's old computer with 2 GB of RAM, on which I recently installed Windows 7 due to XP's end-of-service, is usable again.

[Wok]

I have this problem on a computer unused since 2013. However, I had to download a new version of Windows Update before searching for updates ( answers.microsoft.com/fr-fr/windows/forum/… ). The problem might come from this new version of Windows Update, which might have been released in 2014.

[Wok]

Trying this fix right now.

[Wok]

You literally saved my laptop, bro!

[aoetalks]

I haven't tested KB3050265, but KB3102810 worked for me. superuser.com/a/997067/433287 links to a recent (11/3/2015) patch that worked for me on 2 separate machines.

[JumpingJezza]

I already had KB3050265 installed. KB3102810 worked for me.

[c00000fd]

Neither KB3050265 nor KB3102810 fixed the issue for me. The only way to address it was to disable updates in Control Panel -> Windows Update -> Change Settings. Then once a month, manually enable them after 2nd Tuesday, sit through this 100% CPU usage or better go get a meal while it installs everything and then disable updates again & repeat. Otherwise if you keep it on, the wuauserv service may kick in whenever it wants and halt your system down to a crawl. Too bad that Microsoft can't fix this for over a year that this issue has been out!

[Andreas]

This patch made it even worse for me since the CPU load now is much higher than before. I uninstalled this patch and disabled the automatic update service. I do a manual update once in a month instead.

[m-p-3]

KB3050265 has been superceded by KB3112343 support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3112343

[Dee]

Not this time. According to description it is about wuauserv involved in the process and it is a common Microsoft bug as usual.

[Ross Smith II]

According to blackmanticore.com/30becce9a227e690c0ae63bedc26c9be del /s /q %windir%\softwaredistribution\download\*.* & for /d %i in (%windir%\softwaredistribution\download\*.*) do rd /s /q %i would be a safer bet