Task manager in Windows 8 slower because it reads CatRoot?

Question

It seems that whenever the Windows 8 Task Manager is about to be launched, it first reads the file C:\Windows\System32\launchtm.exe, and then it reads the contents of my C:\Windows\System32\CatRoot folder. Because of the sheer number of files in that folder (> 1000), it takes more than ~2 full seconds on my SSD on a cold boot before Task Manager comes up.

Is there a way to prevent this? Why does it happen, and how can I make the task manager start up quickly as in Windows 7?

Solution 1

This seems to be fixed in Windows 8.1.

Solution 2

This looks like a bug in Windows 8 itself. If you go to the bottom left of your screen and right click the mouse button where the menu opens (see the picture at the bottom) and click on "Task Manager" menu item there, it should open almost immediately.

Comments

[user541686]

Yeah it's not task manager that's the problem, it's WinLogon. Trouble is that usually when you actually need to start task manager with the key combo, it's because the UI has frozen (so this isn't necessarily viable).

[shashwat]

+1 but how to stop UI for being freeze..? @Mehrdad

[paulius_l]

@Shashwat: I would recommend creating a shortcut to taskmgr.exe and assigning a shortcut key to it (see here). Although waiting for Task Manager to open is annoying, it still behaves just like it used to in older versions of Windows, so it is not really a problem when the UI freezes.

[Mels]

But what is the problem in WinLogon, then? Is there any backing documentation for this statement? Any word on how/when this will be fixed? Whether workarounds are available? I have this problem but definitely don't want the old task manager back.

[Coops]

Has this bug been raised with Mirosoft

[Coops]

Upgrading to 8.1 seems to be a huge problem for a lot of people