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Consumer Products => Avast Free Antivirus / Premium Security (legacy Pro Antivirus, Internet Security, Premier) => Topic started by: REDACTED on June 18, 2014, 06:36:07 AM

Title: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: REDACTED on June 18, 2014, 06:36:07 AM
I have a brand new PC with a fresh install of Win 7 Pro 64, when and only when I install avast, WmiPrvSE.exe keeps spiking from 0 to ~50% CPU usage, it slows the system down and will completely freeze it when doing anything CPU intensive, resulting in having to do a hard reboot.

I've tried a clean boot, making a new user account, disabling widgets and sidebar, but nothing has helped. However when I uninstall Avast, the problem goes away.

When I inspect the process in Process Monitor, it shows as you can see here (http://i.imgur.com/Ju5f5aN.png) that tzres.dll is being called thousands of times over a few seconds. It seems that tzres.dll is related to daylight savings time, and there are a lot of Windows Servers that have issues with this. If I inspect the process in Event Viewer Analytic and Debug logs, it shows that WmiPrvSE.exe's ClientProcessId=0 for system.

Any ideas?

edit: I should mention that I tried installing Microsoft Security Essentials and did not have this issue.
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: REDACTED on October 05, 2014, 11:49:33 AM
I have exactly the same problem. With avast installed wmiprvse calls tzres.dll about 200 times every few seconds resulting in cpu spikes. Uninstall avast - problem solved.

Any resolution please?
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: REDACTED on October 26, 2014, 05:05:42 PM
I am also having this problem.

Uninstalling AVAST resolves it, but the issue returns as soon as it is re-installed.

Process Monitor shows these file system interactions as happening very frequently and the spikes in CPU usage correlate to the access times.

Is there a better way to bring this to the attention of Avast?  I have found this article on answers.microsoft.com that is talking about the same issue, and avast was found to be the cause for a few users there as well.  http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_7-performance/wmiprvseexe-constantly-creating-tzresdll/740e2064-a689-4690-8413-97e48f7ca8f2 (http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_7-performance/wmiprvseexe-constantly-creating-tzresdll/740e2064-a689-4690-8413-97e48f7ca8f2)
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: bob3160 on October 26, 2014, 05:17:09 PM
Moderator notified. We'll see if that gets us a response. :)
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: REDACTED on January 04, 2015, 01:49:26 PM
Hi Folks,

Have the same problem, but dug in deeper. 2 Windows 7 and 1 Windows 8 machine affected with same problem.
When you look close you see the system tries to create tzres.dll and immediately after it fails it tries to create tzres.dll.mui in the localized map in the windows\system32 folder.
After it fails to do so for 100 times (you can actually filter in procmon and see it happen) the process starts to read the objects.data file in the Wbem\Repository.

The WMIPRVSE services can be stopped with the penalty of stopping the IPHelper and Security Center services as well.
tested;
WmiPrvSe stopped + IPHelper stopped + Security Center stopped = No disk activity anymore - problem away
WmiPrvSe running + IPHelper running = problems
WmiPrvSe running + Security Center running = problems

Shutting WmiPrvSe totally is a problem because I have other software relying on the WMI event Sink like for Instance my office file synch and Defrag software.

Setting the debug option on the WMI Event Sink gave me a bunch of extra info, but always led to svchost as the culprit since the Sink service is running there and notifies all back with, off course, the same proc id.
And with no spirit to dive into the cim files to see what's in, the track ends here for me.  :-[

I have no more time to fiddle around to get the exact avast part up on the table, so avast, please fix this fast!
It will enhance the performance of the computer it's running on, since it's now trashing capacity,
(On my SSD it takes like 1-3% of queue length when loaded fully) that must be a nice performance improvement for all.

Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: Vlk on January 04, 2015, 03:14:42 PM
Try turning off the Avast tray icon animation. Does it make any difference?
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: REDACTED on January 10, 2015, 11:29:41 AM
I uninstalled avast
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: bob3160 on January 10, 2015, 03:09:18 PM
I uninstalled avast
That's a drastic move and solves nothing except removing excellent protection from your system.  :'(
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: REDACTED on February 14, 2015, 11:27:30 PM
Hi,

So is anything being done to fix this for people who want to keep Avast? I'm not too keen on keeping it if it uses services in such an unoptimized way. Not sure why they would use WMI in the first place. Hopefully this is a bug that can be fixed?

btw, i tried disabling the icon animation - did not help.
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: V1King on April 09, 2015, 02:17:14 AM
Same problem here.

Has anybody got a solution yet? Getting a bit frustrated with this slowing everything to a crawl.

Do I have to look for an Avast replacement?
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: bob3160 on April 09, 2015, 02:19:25 PM
Same problem here.

Has anybody got a solution yet? Getting a bit frustrated with this slowing everything to a crawl.

Do I have to look for an Avast replacement?
Welcome to the forum. :)
See if the following solves your problem:
https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=19387.msg1202686#msg1202686 (https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=19387.msg1202686#msg1202686)
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: REDACTED on April 16, 2015, 04:41:56 PM
Same problem here.

Has anybody got a solution yet? Getting a bit frustrated with this slowing everything to a crawl.

Do I have to look for an Avast replacement?
Welcome to the forum. :)
See if the following solves your problem:
https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=19387.msg1202686#msg1202686 (https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=19387.msg1202686#msg1202686)
I would not call that fix. because problem comes back when restarting windows.
i quess only way is chance antivirus until avast team fix this
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: bob3160 on April 16, 2015, 06:31:14 PM
Same problem here.

Has anybody got a solution yet? Getting a bit frustrated with this slowing everything to a crawl.

Do I have to look for an Avast replacement?
Welcome to the forum. :)
See if the following solves your problem:
https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=19387.msg1202686#msg1202686 (https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=19387.msg1202686#msg1202686)
I would not call that fix. because problem comes back when restarting windows.
i quess only way is chance antivirus until avast team fix this
You can try the latest beta release:
https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=169573.0 (https://forum.avast.com/index.php?topic=169573.0)
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: REDACTED on April 16, 2015, 07:52:41 PM
latest beta wont fix this either... :'(
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: bob3160 on April 16, 2015, 09:03:55 PM
latest beta wont fix this either... :'(
Won't or doesn't ??? Did you try it ???
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: REDACTED on April 16, 2015, 10:17:18 PM
latest beta wont fix this either... :'(
Won't or doesn't ??? Did you try it ???
of course. beta or "normal" version like every 4 seconds WmiPrvSe.exe uses cpu. and only way get rid of it, is uninstall avast...



Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: Endt on April 17, 2015, 10:10:22 AM
Hi all,

can i ask you to little cooperation with solving this issue :) ? As a starter, support package will be really appreciated. (Download link and little how-to available at: https://www.avast.com/en-us/faq.php?article=AVKB33) Please don't forget to tick the 'Automatically send to Avast' option and to post your package id here.

Thank you for your help,
B.
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: bob3160 on April 17, 2015, 02:50:17 PM
Hi all,

can i ask you to little cooperation with solving this issue :) ? As a starter, support package will be really appreciated. (Download link and little how-to available at: https://www.avast.com/en-us/faq.php?article=AVKB33 (https://www.avast.com/en-us/faq.php?article=AVKB33)) Please don't forget to tick the 'Automatically send to Avast' option and to post your package id here.

Thank you for your help,
B.
File sent: 20150417_1248_SCFI0_3859521404.zip
If you need a full dump, please let me know.
Thanks
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: REDACTED on April 17, 2015, 03:36:51 PM
id: 20150417_1138_VXBEA_367335794
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: REDACTED on April 18, 2015, 10:45:01 PM
I have noticed my machine is not creating and constantly recreating tzres.dll in the background leading to heavy CPU usage also. Support ticket created and file uploaded

20150418_2043_5FWNB_2974868179.zip
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: REDACTED on April 25, 2015, 11:30:31 PM
FYI, same issue; confirmed via WMI-Activity Trace event log entries.  Restarting the WMI service does temporarily resolve the issue.
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: REDACTED on May 09, 2015, 06:42:37 AM
Avast calls create file on tzres.dll about 4000 times a second (shows as wmievent) .

confirmed here too.

ran mbam to see if it came from some malware - nothing - came clean.

removed AVAST - problem stopped !

I am sorry i love avast but can't keep it when there is code that does this and slows my comp.
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: REDACTED on May 09, 2015, 04:07:01 PM
Been suffering through the WmiPrvSe.exe calling tzres.dll due to avast bogging down my laptop for over a month now.  Came back to this thread as a last resort before uninstalling avast.  Disappointing.
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: REDACTED on October 22, 2015, 03:15:05 PM
+1 for the same issue. Over 5000 people have looked at this thread and plenty have confirmed they're seeing the same problem with tzres.dll being called by WmiPrvSe.exe.

I've uninstalled Avast and have been running without it for 2 weeks now. Since then, I've not had a repeat of the system choking that I was getting (Task Manager reporting 99% disk usage) and looking in ProcMon I find no reference to tzres.dll which was practically filling my screen previously.

I appreciate that problems are often not A+B=C, but making no other changes other than to uninstall Avast has removed this tzres issue so it looks pretty damning!

Unless I see something to make me confident that Avast have identified and fixed this issue, I will not be renewing my contract when it expires in January (3x PCs and 3x mobile devices).

CAN WE PLEASE HAVE AN UPDATE FROM ENDT OR OTHER STAFF AS TO CURRENT STATUS!

Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: bob3160 on October 22, 2015, 04:04:20 PM
+1 for the same issue. Over 5000 people have looked at this thread and plenty have confirmed they're seeing the same problem with tzres.dll being called by WmiPrvSe.exe.

I've uninstalled Avast and have been running without it for 2 weeks now. Since then, I've not had a repeat of the system choking that I was getting (Task Manager reporting 99% disk usage) and looking in ProcMon I find no reference to tzres.dll which was practically filling my screen previously.

I appreciate that problems are often not A+B=C, but making no other changes other than to uninstall Avast has removed this tzres issue so it looks pretty damning!

Unless I see something to make me confident that Avast have identified and fixed this issue, I will not be renewing my contract when it expires in January (3x PCs and 3x mobile devices).

CAN WE PLEASE HAVE AN UPDATE FROM ENDT OR OTHER STAFF AS TO CURRENT STATUS!




Posting in an old topic is never a good idea. This isn't a problem if you're running the latest version of Avast.
Please start your own topic and supply us with system and security related information so you can receive some help. :)
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: REDACTED on October 22, 2015, 04:30:20 PM
Hi bob3160 - thanks for getting involved.

I was/am running the latest version of Avast - I'm pretty meticulous about that (but without jumping on beta releases) - and it is a problem.

I spoke with support about this two weeks ago, and they eventually told me it was a 'known Windows issue' which they could fix for me if I took out an annual contract. The upsell seemed to be all they were interested in telling me. It was at that point that I risked uninstalling and voila, manifestation of the problem went away.

I called them again today to let them know that uninstalling seemingly removed the problem, which suggested a strong association with Avast itself. When I discussed this thread with the operator, he said that as a member of staff (ENDT) had got involved in the thread, the likelihood was that there was a fix currently in process for the next release.

I don't really see how raising a duplicate thread on a subject covered here - a thread which is still open and unresolved - is helpful.

My comment here was to encourage Avast to chime in and say "Yep. We've identified the problem and are working on a fix, hopefully for release by X date."
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: bob3160 on October 22, 2015, 06:25:25 PM
Hi bob3160 - thanks for getting involved.

I was/am running the latest version of Avast - I'm pretty meticulous about that (but without jumping on beta releases) - and it is a problem.

I spoke with support about this two weeks ago, and they eventually told me it was a 'known Windows issue' which they could fix for me if I took out an annual contract. The upsell seemed to be all they were interested in telling me. It was at that point that I risked uninstalling and voila, manifestation of the problem went away.

I called them again today to let them know that uninstalling seemingly removed the problem, which suggested a strong association with Avast itself. When I discussed this thread with the operator, he said that as a member of staff (ENDT) had got involved in the thread, the likelihood was that there was a fix currently in process for the next release.

I don't really see how raising a duplicate thread on a subject covered here - a thread which is still open and unresolved - is helpful.

My comment here was to encourage Avast to chime in and say "Yep. We've identified the problem and are working on a fix, hopefully for release by X date."
You spoke to a third party support contracted by Avast but you didn't speak to Avast.
To contact Avast directly use the following:
https://www.avast.com/en-us/support (https://www.avast.com/en-us/support)
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: bluto32 on October 23, 2016, 07:33:14 PM
(I am running Windows 10 Professional 64-bit and the latest version of Avast Free.)

While using Procmon ("Process Monitor" from SysInternals) to diagnose an unrelated issue, I noticed that my PC was accessing tzres.dll and tzres.dll.mui 100s of times a second via wmiprvse.exe.

Having spent most of the day trying to figure out what was causing the problem, I eventually stumbled across this thread. I temporarily disabled Avast (turned off self-defence, removed from start-up) and rebooted my PC. Success! Upon restarting Avast, the problem immediately returned.

It's been a year since the last post in this thread; is there a proper fix for this problem yet? (Other than the workaround described by the link in post 10: manually restarting the "Windows Management Instrumentation" service.)

Bluto
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: bluto32 on October 25, 2016, 01:54:51 AM
I checked my parents' laptop today: they also have Avast Free (12.3.2280 build 12.3.3154.19), but with Windows 10 Home rather than Professional.

Same problem with constant hard disk activity due to wmiprvse calling tzres.dll hundreds of times per second.

Assuming there isn't a fix within Avast itself, does anyone know how to:

1) Force the WMI service ("Windows Management Instrumentation") to load after Avast while booting up Windows 10

or

2) Get the WMI service to restart automatically at the end of booting up Windows 10?

Bluto
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: REDACTED on October 25, 2016, 03:06:26 PM
Just did a Windows 10 update. Then I enabled developer mode and installed bash on ubuntu on windows. Then I ran mv command that hanged the bash terminal. This is noted in a bug: https://github.com/Microsoft/BashOnWindows/issues/1261

Then I started seeing this problem of CPU high utilization of WmiPrvSe.exe and tzres.dll.  DCOM Server Process was shown as the culprit. I stumbled upon this thread: http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_10-performance/windows-10-auto-update-broke-computer/594c54f7-f54f-4084-bf8d-ee1adc12d6d0

This thread claims, "This issue may arise when some of the Windows components gets corrupted." In fact, there are many other threads that don't mention Avast as the culprit. So I thought mv command had corrupted Windows files. Did a scan using sfc /scannow but no problems were found.

Then I restarted my PC. Now, instead of "DCOM Server Process", Avast was shown the culprit. I am inclined to think that Avast is the scapegoat. The problem occurred somewhere and "settled" at Avast.

I did a little experiment. I restarted PC. Before Avast had a chance to start, went to Services and manually stopped it. CPU was at 2%. A minute later I started Avast. CPU remained at 2%. Everything looks good. Possibly, a solution is to manually start Avast at boot up. But I am unable to change it to Manual mode due to Permission Denied error.

EDIT
====
I realize that even if Avast starts automatically, I could manual stop and start it from the icon tray. This returns the system to low CPU utilization.
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: bluto32 on October 25, 2016, 04:17:24 PM
Thank you for taking the trouble to reply.

I don't think that Avast is a scapegoat in my case due the following:
I'd be interested to know if other users reading this post have the same issue. It is easy to check with "Procmon", a tiny (974 KB) download from Microsoft. Simply run Procmon, click "OK" on the filter box that appears, and then turn off the following from the main window:
That should leave only "Show file activity" selected. If you have the same problem with Avast as me, your screen should very quickly look like the image in the post above from "thedrs", with wmiprvse.exe accessing tzres.dll and tzres.dll.mui 100s of times each second.

Bluto
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: bob3160 on October 25, 2016, 04:19:58 PM
I've reported this topic to Avast let's see if that get's a reply from Avast. :)
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: bluto32 on November 04, 2016, 09:43:06 AM
Did you hear back from Avast?

I sent them a ticket about the problem shortly after you, but haven't had a response other than an automatic reply. Of the four people I know personally who use Avast, all four experience the same issue. I'm guessing it's very widespread.

Bluto
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: Asyn on November 04, 2016, 09:44:35 AM
I sent them a ticket about the problem shortly after you, but haven't had a response other than an automatic reply.
Post your ticket-ID.
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: pk on November 04, 2016, 01:23:10 PM
Hi guys,
we have fixed this issue in Browser Cleanup component and it'll be delivered through an emmergency update on Monday. We'll let you know when it's released.

Thanks
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: bluto32 on November 05, 2016, 12:11:45 AM
Many thanks for the info (I have also seen your email reply now) - much appreciated.
Look forward to the update.
Bluto
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: pk on November 08, 2016, 01:04:13 PM
We just released minor update for this issue (for Avast 12.3.x version) -- it'll update AvastUI.exe file within 4-6 hours or immediately after several minutes when a user logs in to Windows. System restart is required to apply the patch, because AvastUI.exe process is running in background. Please verify the change and let us know if it helped.

Opening tzres.dll very frequently isn't critical, because this file is small and already cached in system memory, but I agree Avast should avoid using WMI queries to cause these side effects in system.
Title: Re: WmiPrvSe.exe is calling tzres.dll multiple times per second with Avast
Post by: bluto32 on November 08, 2016, 10:25:19 PM
I have just rebooted and can confirm that the fix seems to have done the trick.
The build is showing as 12.3.3154.22 now (rather than .21) and wmiprvse is behaving itself.

Many thanks for resolving this,
Bluto