Ridiculous CPU load (50% to 99%)

Arag_e · Unread post by **Arag_e** » 2017-09-22, 03:51

For a while now, I've had weird episodes with Pale Moon slowing down all of a sudden, and then my whole machine slowing down, to the point of Pale Moon deciding it needs 99% of the CPU to work which obviously grinds everything to a halt.

I had thought it seemed to spike randomly, but I have seen it happen often enough around the time I open Twitter that I think it's that website causing the problem. As I am typing this, PM is taking around 50% of the CPU despite it needing around 5% a few minutes ago with the exact same number of active windows and tags. All that's changed is that I browsed twitter (and watched a twitter video) and then closed the window.

The really annoying part is that the CPU load hogging persists even after closing down the new windows, and leaves me with no recourse but to kill the process altogether and restart it. That's probably what causes it to jump to 99%: whatever goes wrong, it sticks and adds onto itself.

Troubleshooting info:

Unread post by **Moonchild** » 2017-09-22, 08:08

What would probably help here is if you could, when this CPU usage occures:

Open up the devtools (F12)
Switch to "Timeline" (if "Timeline" doesn't show, open up the devtools options first with the gear and enable it)
Click the gauge button to start recording events
Stop recording after a few seconds

Check the graph for things that take a lot of time. I don't think there's an easy way to share that data so you'll have to analyze it yourself and see if there's anything that's either repeated exceedingly quickly and constantly, or taking large chunks of time.
(A screenshot of the overall timeline might also help, if you're having issues pinpointing issues)

Latitude · Unread post by **Latitude** » 2017-09-22, 14:24

Off-topic:
Moonchild, is that built-in "Web Developer" or "The Pale Moon (codename Tycho) Web Developer Tools" [Firebug 1.0.0a1] - https://addons.palemoon.org/addon/devtools/"?

Are they different to each other?

Arag_e · Unread post by **Arag_e** » 2017-09-22, 15:30

Moonchild wrote:A screenshot of the overall timeline might also help, if you're having issues pinpointing issues

Yeah, I'm not gonna be much help here, I have no idea what I'm looking at. This is while browsing twitter.

Pallid Planetoid · Unread post by **Pallid Planetoid** » 2017-09-22, 16:54

Run a few seconds --- Select "show in separate window" (example):

then "maximize" the window (example):

and post screen-shot.

Unread post by **Moonchild** » 2017-09-22, 17:28

Obviously, you need to do this when you see the excessive CPU usage.

Arag_e · Unread post by **Arag_e** » 2017-09-23, 03:26

I don't think you're gonna get anything useful out of this.

I tried different behaviors to try and isolate the spike, but nothing makes sense. I've stayed out of twitter but then had the spike while browsing a forum. Stayed out of THAT, and it just did it again while browsing pastebin of all bloody things.

This is what it looks like when replaying the actions I was doing when I noticed the spike. The actions in question were to go from a blank paste, to the "My Pastes" screen and then back to the blank. I'm not posting a recording of what happens when I'm idling in any of the pastebin pages because they're all blank. Nothing's happening unless I click on things.

The second image is what happened just a few moments ago. That spike is PaleMoon. It's now eating around 50-60 CPU when it was chugging at a stable 5-10% most of the time, and 15-20% while watching youtube videos.

Besides, I don't think it's related to ANY of the windows due to something else I've been noticing since awhile ago. Even after I close all the windows, PaleMoon still keeps running for around a minute, doing SOMETHING in the background until it finally decides to vanish from the task manager. During that time, after one of these spikes, it still keeps eating around 40% of the CPU, which matches nicely with the superfluous post-spike CPU usage. The actual windows I have open only eat around 5-10% of the CPU and selectively closing some or all only has a 5-10% effect on the CPU consumption, so that 40~% seems likely to be from whatever is causing the spikes, which keeps running even after every window is closed.

Unread post by **Moonchild** » 2017-09-23, 07:44

Yeah there's no info to be had from the performance graph. Pity.
At least it confirms that it's not site-related then, but it's still a mystery what exactly is going on.

Pallid Planetoid · Unread post by **Pallid Planetoid** » 2017-09-23, 09:25

How about using Sysinternals Process Explorer to see if this would help determine what is using up the CPU?

Example partial screen-shot of Process Explorer capturing some of the CPU usage higher than most:

Unread post by **satrow** » 2017-09-23, 10:27

Yes, Process Explorer might be of some help here, you might be able to pinpoint some types of issues by studying the graphs, etc. from the Properties sheet for Pale Moon, or whichever software is showing the excess CPU. It can also (main window, bottom pane) point you towards any 3rd party software/dlls loaded with Pale Moon, they may be triggering something heavy (security software being most common) - but I've also seen orphaned dlls that have caused sporadic issues.

Autoruns might also show up something loading in the background that you aren't aware of that might be having an impact.

https://www.howtogeek.com/school/sysint ... o/lesson1/ might help you use these tools to good effect.

Enabling Kernel activity in TaskMan might show whether the problem lies close to the Windows kernel (drivers, DirectX, maybe security software) or not.

Checking the disk I/O (via Resource Manager) for Pale Moon might find something like an unusual log belonging to a 3rd party software being written to...

Toa-Nuva · Unread post by **Toa-Nuva** » 2017-09-23, 16:30

Have you tried disabling your extensions? The issue might be caused by one of those.

In particular, I see you are using the "MEGA" extension. I remember that there was a similar issue a while ago which indeed was resolved by removing this extension: viewtopic.php?f=3&t=15257&hilit=mega

Arag_e · Unread post by **Arag_e** » 2017-09-24, 22:44

I have no idea what you think you can get from this. It looks just like Task Manager's graph in another colour.

For the record, I was taking a shower when this happened. It happened earlier while I had PM minimized and was playing a game. It's completely divorced from any of my actions, PM will just suddenly decide it needs an extra 40% CPU to do hell knows what, even if it's idling. And the intervals this happens at seem to be increasing.

And no, it's not MEGA. It happens while that's disabled too.

Unread post by **satrow** » 2017-09-24, 23:51

The bicolouration of the CPU graph indicates a very excessive CPU Kernel activity situation, more sensitive users would 'feel' 5-8% as being too much and almost everyone would feel the impact of 10-12%. Something hooked into Pale Moon is hogging your CPU to the tune of 28-30%.

Arag_e · Unread post by **Arag_e** » 2017-09-25, 00:32

This is what the threads look like.

Unread post by **satrow** » 2017-09-25, 00:59

I'm not familiar enough with browser internals to be able to get anything useful from that. Can you use the View menu and enable the lower pane and enable that to show the loaded .DLLs?

Sort by Company Name and list the 3rd party (not MS, Intel, AMD/ATI, Nvidia, Mozilla, Moonchild Productions or The ICU Project) .dlls?

Ignore those with no company names for the time being.

Arag_e · Unread post by **Arag_e** » 2017-09-25, 02:38

These are the only ones not belonging to those companies. They're not the threads eating up CPU though, that's MSVCR120.dll and mspeg2vdec.dll.

Arag_e · Unread post by **Arag_e** » 2017-09-26, 01:20

Sorry for the double post, but now I'm running at 99%. Whatever the reason, MSVCR120.dll and mspeg2vdec.dll keep appearing in duplicate and hogging the CPU.

If you have no idea what to do, then please tell me so I can uninstall Pale Moon and look for an alternative, because at this rate not only is the browser useless, it's gonna cut the CPU's life short by overburdening it.

John connor · Unread post by **John connor** » 2017-09-26, 05:38

I'm wondering if this is add-on related. Have you tried safe mode in PM? Also, process explorer could help narrow it down. Like what was mentioned already, something could be hooked into Pale Moon. You could try Auto Runs and make sure you don't have crap starting with your computer that shouldn't be.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sysint ... s-explorer

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sysint ... s/autoruns

Edit- Looks like you are using Process Explorer. I'm curious. Under the threads tab what's it say for Pale Moon.

This might shed some light as well. http://www.novirusthanks.org/products/r ... k-scanner/

Nigaikaze · Unread post by **Nigaikaze** » 2017-09-26, 05:52

Another troubleshooting option here would be to restart Pale Moon with a new clean profile and let it run that way for a while, just to rule out the possibility that something in your profile is causing this odd behavior.

Arag_e · Unread post by **Arag_e** » 2017-09-28, 17:44

John connor wrote:Edit- Looks like you are using Process Explorer. I'm curious. Under the threads tab what's it say for Pale Moon.

That's what I showed you in my last two posts.

I already told you what thread is doing this. It's MSVCR120.dll at the top of the list. It shows up at random intervals along with a slew of associated mspeg2vdec.dll threads. If I kill it, everything goes back to running normally at regular speeds, but it only lasts for a while before it shows up again and it means playing whack-a-mole while keeping an eye on the graph at all times.

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Ridiculous CPU load (50% to 99%)

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