Hi CPU Usage on Windows.

[b33rdy]

Plan

Premium

Country

UK

Device

Windows 10

Operating System

1903 - OS Build 18362.356

My Question or Issue

Opening Spotify immediately causing Spotify.exe to use 100% of a single core.

I've uninstalled and re-installed (both the Store version and directly from spotify.com) and cleared out user data.

It does not happen on any other devices I have.

[AndrewRobs01]

Hi there!

One potential solution I've found for this issue is to start a private listening session. This means less data is being sent out, which might correct the issue.

If the issue persists, get in contact with Spotify support! The easiest way to contact them is by messaging SpotifyCares on Facebook or Twitter.

In the meantime, you can use the Spotify web player on your browser of choice.

I hope I was able to help! Let me know of any new developments!

[Sebasty]

Hey @b33rdy 

One reason whyt his might happen is tied to local files. Spotify looking for, and creating a library of your local files might hog a bit of CPU / hard drive resources, especially when there's a lot of them (let's say, thousands).

To fix that, do this:

1. Go to your Spotify preferences.
2. Scroll down to Local Files.
3. Deactivate (turn grey) all sources, then deactivate "Show Local Files".

Note: if you have already disabled Local Files, try re-enabling to make sure none of the sources are "active" (green).

I'd also recommend ensuring you have all updates installed for Windows.

Do you have any other WIndows 10 devices? 🙂

Let me know how you get on!

[b33rdy]

Local files are disabled for that machine.

[b33rdy]

Local files have been disabled for that machine.

[Loxer]

Hey @b33rdy, welcome to the Community.

Hope you're doing great!

Could you try disabling Hardware Acceleration by going into the … top left corner inside View?

Let me know how that goes 🙂

[b33rdy]

No dice I'm afraid.

Looking at the process via Process Explorer, it seems a single thread is causing the thrashing. The thread is stuck on GetHandleVerifier.

[bluesatin]

By the way for anyone that runs into this issue and finds this thread, for me the issue (regarding high CPU usage in a GetHandleVerifier thread) appears to be caused by Spotify getting stuck in some sort a loop trying to figure out how to correctly write a filepath.

I don't know of an easy way of checking exactly what file path it's checking for your average user, I had to use CheatEngine and debugging it until I found what was causing the issue. You might be able to find the memory address (and the path it's struggling with) by doing a Unicode string search for sections of your downloads folder etc., as Spotify was constantly replacing some of the slashes with various symbols searching for the whole path might not be possible.

e.g.  Search for the Unicode string "Downloads", not "C:\Users\Bluesatin\Downloads\" as the string that Spotify is getting hitched on is constantly changing to like "C:_users/Bluesatin_Downloads" with missing slashes etc.

For me, Spotify was getting hung up trying to figure out how to write the path to a folder that was a 'Junction Point', switching it over to a 'Symbolic Link' seemed to resolve Spotify getting stuck figuring out how to write the folder path properly.

Note that it appears Spotify still scans local directories even with the option to 'Show local files' is disabled, so that didn't fix the issue in my case. Although disabling the 'Show local files' option seemed to delay the issue until something triggered it to scan the directories anyway, it might have been triggered by playing a song for me from a cursory check.

There may be a proper way of actually disabling the local file scanning properly via a config/permissions botch-job or something if you're unable to mess around with the file-path it's getting stuck on.

[yndtrud · Accepted solution]

Thanks, i followed your research and solved the problem.

My folder c:\users\MyName\Downloads is junction to m:\music.

I had the option disabled: play local files.

My Intel Core i7 10700K  gave 10% of its resources to the Spotify (GetHandleVerifier thread)!!!!!

I have enabled playback of local files, but disabled the Downloads and My Libraries folders, added an empty folder on the disk M:\muisc\playlists.

...And problem has gone!!!

Thank you very match!!!!