High CPU and memory use in Windows 10 when daylight saving time is configured

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Symptoms

You have a computer that's running Windows 10 version 1507 or version 1511 and that's configured to use a time zone where daylight saving time (DST) changes occur at midnight (12:00 AM) instead of at 2:00 AM. In this situation, you may experience the following issues.

Issue 1
The TaskHostw.exe process consumes 100 percent of CPU resources. Therefore, system performance and battery life decrease dramatically. On small form factor devices, this issue may affect thermal management, as the process keeps running in a loop doing time conversion calculations.

Issue 2
The pagefile consumes excessive disk resources, which triggers the high disk utilization.

Issue 3
Excessive memory use occurs.

Issue 4
Excessive disk, CPU, or memory use causes the computer to hang or freeze.

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Cause

This issue occurs because of a race condition in the TaskHostW.exe process (a generic host process for Windows services) that runs one of the energy.dll scheduled tasks. This scheduled task runs according to the time that's set on the computer. This issue occurs only on the day when DST changes.

The energy.dll file is loaded when DST changes occur at midnight instead of at 2:00 AM.

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Resolution

To resolve this issue, upgrade your computer to Windows 10 version 1607.

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Workaround

To work around the issue, disable the Power Efficiency Diagnostics task by using one of the following methods.

Method 1: Use the UI

Select Start .
Type task scheduler in the Start Search box, and then click Task Scheduler Desktop app.
In the Task Scheduler console, expand Task Scheduler Library, expand Windows, and then click Power Efficiency Diagnostics.
In the middle pane, select and right-click AnalyzeSystem, and then click Disable.
Close the Task Scheduler console.

Method 2: Use a command prompt

Select Start , and then type cmd in the Start Search box.
Right-click Command Prompt Desktop app, and then select Run as administrator.
At the elevated command prompt, run the following command line:
schtasks /Change /TN "\Microsoft\Windows\Power Efficiency Diagnostics\AnalyzeSystem" /DISABLE
Exit the command prompt.

You can query the status of the task by running the following command:

schtasks /Query /TN "\Microsoft\Windows\Power Efficiency Diagnostics\AnalyzeSystem"

The output should appear as follows:

Folder: \Microsoft\Windows\Power Efficiency Diagnostics
TaskName Next Run Time Status
===================== =========== ===============
AnalyzeSystem N/A Disabled

Method 3: Use Local Group Policy Editor to run computer startup scripts

From the Group Policy Preferences (GPP) of a domain controller: