It's also known as Windows Defender or something, and uses A LOT of CPU power. So I want to get rid of it. So far, I have tried excluding msmpeng.exe from the Windows Defender's scan list. It didn't help one bit. This app still consumes nearly 40% of my CPU power. And then I toggled off "Real Time Protection" along with other options available on the page. Still no help at all. Anyone here has a more permanent solution?
this is quite common issue actually. while there are several possible causes, there are also several possible solutions for it. 1. some ppl were able to reduce the cpu usage by disabling the cloud and sample submission option 2. other solutions includes changing/disabling the scheduled scan in Task Scheduler 3. the same as what you already did 4. if you have one drive turned on, you might one to unlink it from being scanned 5. disable the windows defender, and use 3rd party antivirus instead personally, I've run into such issue a few times too over the years, but i don't remember the exact things i did that made it go away. very likely i did all the things i found online, including resorting to use 3rd party antivirus as a last ditch effort. you probably already read some of these, in which case, just ignore it High CPU usage because of Antimalware Service Executable - Microsoft Community MsMpEng.exe Causing High Usage Of Disk And CPU (itechtics.com) What is msmpeng.exe Process and Why It Causes High RAM Usage? (techcrises.com) How to fix ‘Antimalware Service Executable’ high CPU usage | Emsisoft | Security Blog
the worst expierience i had with AV high cpu usage was actually norton taking 30-40% CPU time in idle made me see norton as malware itself M$ was for me the most minimalistic AV protection idle i got about 4% CPU usage and thats with chrome, firefox, edge, epic ubisoft wg launchers while mainboard stuf fand killer network suite takes the other half (and thats on a rather weak 5 year old 4 core i5 6600k)
Just delete the process, or rename or whatever. hope this helps. edit: there might be an addition step with trusted installer depends on your windows. You have to change your security settings and permissions. Make sure you don't change the permissions of other files. Messing up with the windows files permissions can make your whole usage of windows difficult. You experience of windows will be kinda like security enhanced windows (security enhanced Linux) with all kinda of permissions on different files and disks.
hmm deleting more or less essential systemfiles ... best case they are back after each update med case you wont be able to update windows anymore worst case get ready for a roll back or fresh install
Then just disable windows updates all together. However only enterprise version of windows get to disable them and others have to disable the Microsoft store together, no one likes Microsoft store anyway. that won't likely happen, windows update is another service all together. Though I don't have time to do a fresh windows and test it, but it's unlikely in theory. yeah, if OP messed up with trusted installer it's guaranteed for a fresh install or a roll back. I happened to have to do it 5 years ago with windows 7, cause I messed up the system privilege's and permissions while removing and making change to essential system files. There is definitely risk involved in making change to the OS, it's not recommended to make changers without backing the OS up.
for the med case i thought about checking for files creating a hash sum and with missing files the sum might change making the patch refuse to run thought thats a mechanic i have mostly seen in games - not sure if M$ appield them for windows too
If windows checked there is a missing/corrupted files, it will just download the missing files on their server, usually updating windows don't check for existing files, unless some major updates maybe. but you probably won't be able to run sfc /scannow unless you want to delete files all over again.