Windows 10 Cryptographic service high disk usage

Susan Dodds 191

Upgraded from Win 10 1909 to 2004.

Ever since, I've had high disk usage from the Cryptographic Service.

No errors, just running slow due to high disk usage.

Looking for solutions.

Thanks

Dale Kudusi 3,236 Reputation points

2020-09-04T06:31:42.037+00:00

Hi,
Was the issue resolved?
If any reply is useful for you, please accept it as answer.
If you have any issue or concern, please reply to us directly.
Best Regards.
Brian Uphoff 1 Reputation point

2021-01-23T05:48:54.38+00:00

Hello,

I'm hitting this same issue and I've been unable to update my PC for some time now.

I ran sfc /scannow and then through the steps of clean boot. After this, I ran Windows Update and my 3 pending updates (20H2, KB4586876, KB4580325) keep failing with a generic error (0x8000ffff).

-Brian
Patrick S 6 Reputation points

2021-05-17T16:12:55.787+00:00

Same issue here.
High disk usage and high CPU usage by cryptographic services.

And also for me "run sfc /scannow" does not fix this problem!

MS please support.
Thank you
TK 11 Reputation points

2021-05-20T05:46:43.24+00:00

See answer from @Darren Lathen
I had the same problem and It worked! It seems Cryptographic services keeps recreating logs on and on and on due to some error. Deleting catroot2 fixes it!
CJohnson509 16 Reputation points

2022-01-05T18:14:50.923+00:00

I manage a domain network with around 40 windows machines running 21H1. Starting on Monday (1-3-22) we've had 12 machines suddenly experience this issue, and I expect more to crop up. The solution from DarrenLathen-9492 listed below seems to work, but I wish I knew why this has suddenly become an issue for us. This is what we've been doing to fix:

Boot into safe mode
cmd > Run as Administrator > net stop CryptSvc
Go to Windows\system32 > rename or delete folder catroot2
net start CryptSvc
Restart
Aun Raza 1 Reputation point

2022-01-24T08:15:18.943+00:00

Hey CJ, i tried your method on my laptop by renaming the catroot2 folder in safe mode. However, on restart, the catroot2 folder got created again but the cryptsvc didn't use high cpu or high disk usage like before. Are your machines running smoothly since then?
Ian K 1 Reputation point

2022-12-14T14:12:43.817+00:00

I got a razer mouse and installed the software. Had performance issues until I removed the software. Task manager told me the cryptographic service was on the fritz but I know what changed and it was only that software.
Janos Garam 0 Reputation points

2023-03-10T14:40:28.9066667+00:00

It is March 2023, and the same problem still exists. Luckily, the same fix also applies (getting rid of catroot2).

Sadly, MS can't be bothered to deal properly with things like this...

11 answers

Darren Lathen 111 Reputation points

2021-05-17T16:38:09.05+00:00

I did stumble on another page on something that has worked for us.

1) STOP the Cryptographic Services service either in command prompt (run as administrator) or in services.msc It may take a few minutes for the service to finally stop. It may also, stop, but restart on it's own again requiring you to stop it again.

2) DELETE or RENAME the catroot2 directory located in C:\Windows\System32

3) Restart the Cryptographic services service.

I honestly don't know why this works, I found it on another forum and it has helped me out as we've had this issue on over 50 different machines in our office at various times. We have wondered it is all just Windows or if it is Windows conflicting with Carbon Black or Syxsense -- we just don't know.
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13 people found this answer helpful.
TK 11 Reputation points

2021-05-20T05:42:12.037+00:00

This worked for me

mustafa 1 Reputation point

2021-06-12T15:58:11.013+00:00

Excellent. It works. Thanks

mustafa 1 Reputation point

2021-06-12T16:01:22.82+00:00

Exellent. It works. Thanks

Mark Adams 1 Reputation point

2021-09-18T12:13:13.75+00:00

Brilliant thank you! It worked for me too, so I'm very happy indeed. :-)

K C 1 Reputation point

2021-09-19T01:29:01.223+00:00

"I honestly don't know why this works,"
My issue started when I stopped the MS WAAS Service from downloading a Windows update. I could see that the update was tying up all my Disk, CPU and Memory, and I was trying to do work. (Why is it Windows Updates will not adhere to the schedule that I set in System Settings??? GRRRR)

Anyway, I think Windows gets confused and retries the same update/download over and over and over and over, even though I manually stopped it. (Maybe I should have gone to System Settings and clicked PAUSE updates. LOL )

Anyway, your suggestion has resolved the issue. Thank you, https://learn.microsoft.com/answers/users/6492038/darrenlathen-9492.html

Andreas Mueller 1 Reputation point

2021-10-20T11:11:50.543+00:00

This solution worked for me.

Found a log file in C:\Windows\System32\catroot2 named dberr.txt. It shows that there were corrupted catalog databases. And the service tried repetitively to recover the corruptions.

[...] CatalogDB: 12:36:48 20.10.2021: SyncDB:: Sync started for database {F750E6C3-38EE-11D1-85E5-00C04FC295EE} CatalogDB: 12:36:52 20.10.2021: SyncDB:: 2661 catalogs synced (2661 added, 0 attributes changed, 0 deleted) for database {F750E6C3-38EE-11D1-85E5-00C04FC295EE} CatalogDB: 12:36:52 20.10.2021: catdbsvc.cpp at line #6679 encountered JET error -1811 CatalogDB: 12:36:52 20.10.2021: catdbsvc.cpp at line #4398 encountered JET error -1811 CatalogDB: 12:36:52 20.10.2021: catdbsvc.cpp at line #3418 encountered JET error -1811 CatalogDB: 12:36:52 20.10.2021: catdbsvc.cpp at line #6679 encountered JET error -1811 CatalogDB: 12:36:52 20.10.2021: catdbsvc.cpp at line #4398 encountered JET error -1811 CatalogDB: 12:36:52 20.10.2021: catdbsvc.cpp at line #3418 encountered JET error -1811 CatalogDB: 12:36:52 20.10.2021: Recovering corruption CatalogDB: 12:37:02 20.10.2021: catdbsvc.cpp at line #1307 encountered JET error -1601 CatalogDB: 12:37:02 20.10.2021: SyncDB:: Sync started for database {127D0A1D-4EF2-11D1-8608-00C04FC295EE} CatalogDB: 12:37:02 20.10.2021: catdbsvc.cpp at line #1307 encountered JET error -1601 [...]

Gábor Calbert 1 Reputation point

2021-12-16T11:34:53.303+00:00

it works! thank you so much!!

Rene Baumann 0 Reputation points

2024-07-15T09:23:46.59+00:00

This one still works today. Just applied that today.
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Win10user2 16 Reputation points

2021-05-20T14:39:13.257+00:00
I found simple a way to safely rename the catroot2 directory:

Click the "Start" menu, and select "Run." Type "cmd" (without quotation marks), and click "OK" to open the command line interface.

Type "net stop cryptsvc" (without quotations), and press "Enter" to temporarily disable the cryptographic service. Wait until the command line interface says "the cryptographic service was stopped successfully" before continuing.

Type "ren %systemroot%\System32\Catroot2 oldcatroot2" (without quotations), and press enter; this will rename the unwanted catroot2 folder to "oldcatroot2", allowing Windows to create a fresh copy of it.

Type "net start cryptsvc" (without quotations) to reactivate the cryptographic service. Wait until the command line interface says "the cryptographic service was started successfully" before closing the interface.

The above works every time. Renaming that folder looks like it has solved my problem. MS should take notice and periodically purge that folder if CryptSvc is churning too much or too often!
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3 people found this answer helpful.
planebagel 1 Reputation point

2021-10-16T21:45:25.963+00:00

it kept saying access denied- how do i get access?

Qwenil 1 Reputation point

2021-10-22T18:50:40.877+00:00

This seems to have worked for me. Went from chugging up to 50% of my CPU to sitting at 0%.

Don't know if this will hold, but for now, it's working.

If anyone attempting this gets "permission denied" in CMD, then you need to go back and launch CMD as admin.

Robert Reeves 1 Reputation point

2022-03-25T11:33:04.957+00:00

Thanks, this worked for me.

leslie perkins 0 Reputation points

2023-09-09T19:24:59.6966667+00:00

Hi home computer complete novice
Followed instruction admin cmd prompt
when running **ren %systemroot%\System32\Catroot2 oldcatroot2 i get acces is denied ?

regards Les**
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Willem van Ede 11 Reputation points

2021-01-28T20:05:39.553+00:00

Same problem here,
Cryptograpic Services taking lots of disk usage after update to 20H2 yesterday.

0x8000ffff on KB4580325

sfc /scannow halts on "Verification 100% complete"

Drivers like NVIDIA not running...

Any help?
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2 people found this answer helpful.

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Kapil Arya 8,161 Reputation points MVP

2020-09-01T06:12:02.057+00:00
Hello,

Suggest you to run System File Checker scan:

Search for 'command prompt' using Cortana or Windows Search.

From results, right click on Command Prompt and select Run as administrator.

Type sfc /scannow command and press Enter key.

Let the command complete and then reboot the machine.

If issue still persists, perform clean boot:

https://support.microsoft.com/en-in/help/929135/how-to-perform-a-clean-boot-in-windows

Let us know if this helps!
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Vaidik Dubey 1 Reputation point

2020-11-09T07:09:56.877+00:00

I am having the same problem after the update..... I ran the command promt and it gives the error "Windows Resource Protection could not perform the requested operation." At 95% completion and my problem hasn't been fixed

sharath kumar kolipaka 1 Reputation point

2021-08-16T06:25:36.533+00:00

i got the error at 40% any suggestions on how to solve this issue.
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Dale Kudusi 3,236 Reputation points

2020-09-15T07:08:35.41+00:00

Hi, @Susan Dodds
We have not heard from you in a couple of days.
Please post back at your convenience if we can assist further
If any reply is useful for you, please accept it as answer.
Best Regards.
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Vaidik Dubey 1 Reputation point

2020-11-09T07:09:39.503+00:00

I am having the same problem after the update..... I ran the command promt and it gives the error "Windows Resource Protection could not perform the requested operation." At 95% completion and my problem hasn't been fixed
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Windows 10 Cryptographic service high disk usage

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