How To Fix 100% Disk Usage In Windows 10

If you’re a Windows user, you face a 100% disk usage problem. If you check your task manager, then you will come to know that your hard drive is doing some seriously hard work. In reality, your machine doing nothing but playing your favorite song. I don’t think the media player would be responsible for all this. As Microsoft released Windows 10, but you still face the problem of Windows 10 disk usage 100.

I didn’t see the issue on my machine. Maybe, it might have gone unchecked. But there many people who say their disk usage always touches 100%, and their machine slows down.

Best Ways To Fix 100% Disk Usage In Windows 10

Anyway, I landed on this problem recently and after reading many forums and threads, I realized that there is no particular cause to 100% disk usage problem in Windows, there are many. So, I would like to tell you the reasons behind disk always touching the sky!

What causes 100% disk usage in Windows?

Many people blamed different applications like Google Chrome and Skype which trigger some unwanted high disk usage on the machine. The list further includes features like Print Spooler, BITS, etc.

If you cut off the Spooler, your printer can’t work until you re-enable it. And it’s not sure that the problem would get resolved, but you have to take the shot.

This problem can also occur if your system is infected with some malware. To resolve the issue you have to spot the application or Windows component responsible and stop it.

Fx 100% disk usage in Windows 10

You can also use the task manager in Windows 10 to find the applications and services that are consuming more disk resources. Under the tab of Processes, click the Disk Usage column to arrange the numbers in descending order. Then you’ll come to know what application is trying to steal more than it deserves.

1. Fix 100% Disk Usage Via Google Chrome

In Google Chrome, the web page pre-load feature is at fault. You can turn it off by clicking Settings > Show Advanced Settings > Privacy. After that, untick the option called Prefetch resources to load pages more quickly.

The newer versions of Chrome feature available. And then search option Use a prediction service to load pages more quickly under Privacy and security heading.

2. Fix 100% Disk Usage due to Skype

In the case of Skype, the high disk usage goes down when write permission is granted for (ALL APPLICATION PACKAGE) group. Follow these steps to fix the problem if it’s because of Skype. This method is to apply only on the desktop version of Skype, not for the Windows Store version.

1. At first closing the Skype app. Right-click on its icon in the taskbar and after that click Quit.
2. Then Open This PC or My Computer and navigate to C:\Program Files (x86)\Skype\Phone\
3. Right-click the file Skype.exe and then go to Properties.
4. Under the Security tab, select ALL APPLICATION PACKAGES and then click Edit.
5. In the next step a box appears, select ALL APPLICATION PACKAGES, and tick Allow checkbox for Write permissions.
6. Click OK to save and continue. Again Click OK.

After that, if Skype is responsible, you should observe a reduction in disk usage when you open the task manager.

3. Fix Usage due to Windows features

A Redditor also suggested how to disabling the Windows Search service. Well, the service is always running in the background, it makes the situation worse if not initiate it. It runs a “search loops” in Windows due to a bug. You can temporarily turn off  Windows Search using the command line in Windows to check if it’s causing 100% disk usage.

There are so many users who don’t use Windows Search. May be due to this reason today everything’s cloud-based and one rarely access the files stored on the disk. In that case, feel free to disable Windows file search and enjoy a faster experience.

Use the following commands after open command prompt:

net.exe stop “Windows Search”

It is a command to start a window:

net.exe start “Windows Search”

How to turn off Windows Search?

1. Now press CTRL + R to open the Run utility.
2. After that type of services.msc and then press Enter.
3. Now you’ve to look for Windows Search in the list.
4. Right-click the Windows Search service and then go to Properties.
5. Look under the General tab and set the Startup type to Disabled
6. Click Ok to save and then continue.

4. Fix 100% disk usage because of Superfetch

As we told you earlier what SuperFetch can do. Sometimes, error related to the data pre-loading feature may make you experience high-disk usage on your Windows machine. So, you can disable SuperFetch for some time.

In Admin mode run CMD and type the following command:

net.exe stop superfetch

Next press enter.

Now, wait for some time to check if there any change in the high disk usage in the Task Manager. You can also run a simple disk check on your machine.

Now use the following command to enable it:

net.exe start superfetch

Another way to do this is that you can use the ‘services.msc’ utility to disable Superfetch on Windows. Now look for Superfetch in the list of services.

5. Disable Windows tips

There is an option in Windows 10 Settings which display tips and tricks. Some users have linked with it. You can also disable tips by visiting Settings > System > Notifications and actions. After that turn off getting tips, tricks, and suggestions as you use Windows toggle button.

6. Perform a disk check

The best technique to resolve issues with your Windows installation is performing the disk check using your computer’s inbuilt disk check utility. To do so and, take care of Windows 10 100 disk usage, perform the following  steps one by one:

• First, click Windows key and X at the same time and go for Command Prompt (Admin) option to run CMD with.
• Then click Yes on the prompt window.
• After that type following command in command prompt and hit enter:
  chkdsk.exe /f /r
• Now type Y to make sure the disk check during the next restart.
• At last, during the next restart, disk check utility will run. Now check again in Task Manager to see if the problem has been fixed.

7.  . Fix your StorAHCI.sys driver

Another issue for your hard drive is that it is going full capacity firmware bug in Microsoft AHCI driver called StorAHCI.sys. It causes the 100% hard disk problem and even BSODs in Windows. Here are some steps to disable Message-Signaled Interrupts support for the driver and fix the issue:

1. First open Device Manager (Right-click This PC > Manage > Device Manager).
2. Now extend the IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers entry in the list.
3. Now right-click Standard SATA AHCI Controller and then go to Properties.
4. Under the Driver tab, click Driver Details. If it shows C:\Windows\system32\DRIVERS\storahci.sys in the Drivers files field, then your system may be affected due to the bug.
5. Click on OK and go to the Details tab.
6. After that Select Device instance path from the drop-down menu. You can copy the value present there or keep the box open.
7. From now on open Windows Registry (Windows + R > Type Regedit).
8. Navigate to:
   HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Enum\PCI\
   Look for the value you saw in the Properties (or you copied earlier) and expand the relevant key. Make sure you expand the correct key.
9. If you found the correct AHCI Controller using the given string, navigate to:
   Device Parameters\Interrupt Management\MessageSignaledInterruptProperties
10. Now double-click MSISupported and change it’s value to 0 (it means you turn off the MSI).
11. Then click OK to save the value. Now close Windows Registry and restart your machine

8. Disable Adobe Flash and fix 100% disk usage

Nowadays Adobe Flash is already counting the days for its extinction. Many users blamed that they possess many vulnerabilities and loopholes. But it’s also linked with the 100% disk usage in Windows.

So many users use Flash on their system because many applications run on it. And if you’re one of them experiencing high disk usage, you face disabling Adobe Flash to see if it’s at fault or not.

9. Check for some evil software

Some viruses are responsible for consuming 100% HDD resources on your computer. You need to run a full scan using the inbuilt Windows Defender or take the help of some third-party software.

10. Reset virtual memory

You might have come across in the term of virtual memory while reading about the RAM management in Windows 10. When the RAM of your computer isn’t enough for processes,  Windows stores files in the virtual memory and keeps swapping them to RAM when needed. You can even reset Windows 10 virtual memory to fix high disk usage.

So, these were some of the ways which can help you fix the 100% disk usage error in Microsoft Windows. These might not be the best fool-proof solutions, but they could be useful.