datastore\datastore.edb
 

I'm using Vista but googling has shown the exact same problem is found
in win7. The relevant file exists in XP, but I don't know if the
problem does or not.

AFAIC, I've solved the problem, so this is just to share with you. The
solution was simply to turn off automatic Windows Update.

Vista is getting few or no updates these days. Not sure about 7, but
there is manual update.

Now that I'm using Windows Resource Monitor to watch my disk usage,
I've noticed that I was creating Previous Versions. I stopped that
and things seem faster now. So that's good.

This morning, I needed to write and send one short email and then
leave within an hour. Sounds like plenty of time, except the
harddrive light was on constantly for at least an hour, and I could
barely type a single character in the email program. (I think this
has happened other mornings, but this time I was in a hurry.)

It was reading (and maybe writing)
C:\windows\SoftwareDistribution\datastore\datastor e.edb It ranged
from 20 to 45MB/minute. I forgot to note CPU usage.

When I got back 3 hours later, at least by then, that stage was over.

I used, for the first time in Vista, the built-in WinVista search to
search for the file, and searched everythwere, and I'd heard that the
search was slow, but it did NOT even find the file!!!! (I tried
again giving the fully qualified name, and it still didnt' find it,
even though it's there and it's not a hidden or system file. How can
that be?)

So I used Search Everywhere and it quickly found it. 528K, updated 2
hours ago.

(I also dl'd RAMmap, from Sysinternals, because one webpage mentioned
it. It didn't really help me but it's free and interesting.
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/...ls/rammap.aspx )

(I also used esentutl.exe /g
c:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution\DataStore\DataStor e.edb
in administrative mode to check the files integrity. I don't know why
that was recommended but it passed. )

So what's the solution. Suggestions from other people:

http://superuser.com/questions/53941...-computer-down
PC Boots then writes giant datastore.edb file slowing the computer
down. " If you stop the Windows Update service, within a minute the
system will stop reading and writing from the file and everything runs
smoothly. " But if you read further, apparently that's not enough
for him. I hope it's enough for me. The service is called wuauserv
but I didn't stop it directly.

Another one says:
"So I had to completely disable Windows Update Service autorun. This
greatly lowered waste of RAM, CPU and disk IO. The system is much more
responsive now."

AFAICT windows update for Vista has stopped updating. In the last two
weeks I've only gotten one new "Check for selected Malware file". I
don't know if that means there is no point to disabling it, or if it's
still wasting cycles and there is no reason not to disable it."

********************
However, I turned off Windows Updates and I havent' had the problem
this post is about since then. I can always check for updates
manually when it won't interfere with my compute use.
**********************

Another guy said "On my computer, during start up, the anti virus
program (windows essentials) seemed to be taking a lot of time on the
datastore.edb file. .....The solution basically involves telling the
virus scanner (windows essentials) to exclude checking this file. I
did the other exclusions on the windows files as well. (but i'm fine
with the scanners checking my photos, even though they should be
safe)" I didn't think AVG scanned files on startup, and it listed
under "Image" svchost (netsvcs), not AVG , but I'll wait until this
happens again and see if AVG is using appreciable CPU. (I think I've
fixed it so it won't happen again.)

Another guy said "Microsoft released a new WindowsUpdate Client Update
to fix the slow Update searching/Installation." but it's only for 7
and Server 2008.

https://www.reddit.com/r/pcmasterrac...storeedb_help/
"Every day it ramps up my disk usage to 100% which pretty much kills
anything I want to do. It lasts from 5 min to an hour or two depending
on how long my machine has been off for previously (The longer its
been off, the longer the disk disruption and usage lasts) although it
will happen every day even if the machine is never shut down.
Finally the original poster said there was something wrong with the
original implementation: "This applies to Zeiss OCT machines" but the
problem is more widespread." I don't even know what Zeiss OCT is!

Another guy complains more about it using RAM and the webpage guy
says:
Can you please zip/attach your c:\windows\windowsupdate.log file? If
it's too big to attach, please upload to SendSpace and just provide me
the link. Finally told him to do a repair install! (I don't think
so!)
https://www.sysnative.com/forums/win...gging-ram.html

datastore\datastore.edb
 

Micky wrote:

I'm using Vista but googling has shown the exact same problem is found
in win7. The relevant file exists in XP, but I don't know if the
problem does or not.

AFAIC, I've solved the problem, so this is just to share with you. The
solution was simply to turn off automatic Windows Update.

Vista is getting few or no updates these days. Not sure about 7, but
there is manual update.

Now that I'm using Windows Resource Monitor to watch my disk usage,
I've noticed that I was creating Previous Versions. I stopped that
and things seem faster now. So that's good.

This morning, I needed to write and send one short email and then
leave within an hour. Sounds like plenty of time, except the
harddrive light was on constantly for at least an hour, and I could
barely type a single character in the email program. (I think this
has happened other mornings, but this time I was in a hurry.)

It was reading (and maybe writing)
C:\windows\SoftwareDistribution\datastore\datastor e.edb It ranged
from 20 to 45MB/minute. I forgot to note CPU usage.

When I got back 3 hours later, at least by then, that stage was over.

I used, for the first time in Vista, the built-in WinVista search to
search for the file, and searched everythwere, and I'd heard that the
search was slow, but it did NOT even find the file!!!! (I tried
again giving the fully qualified name, and it still didnt' find it,
even though it's there and it's not a hidden or system file. How can
that be?)

So I used Search Everywhere and it quickly found it. 528K, updated 2
hours ago.

(I also dl'd RAMmap, from Sysinternals, because one webpage mentioned
it. It didn't really help me but it's free and interesting.
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/...ls/rammap.aspx )

(I also used esentutl.exe /g
c:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution\DataStore\DataStor e.edb
in administrative mode to check the files integrity. I don't know why
that was recommended but it passed. )

So what's the solution. Suggestions from other people:

http://superuser.com/questions/53941...-computer-down
PC Boots then writes giant datastore.edb file slowing the computer
down. " If you stop the Windows Update service, within a minute the
system will stop reading and writing from the file and everything runs
smoothly. " But if you read further, apparently that's not enough
for him. I hope it's enough for me. The service is called wuauserv
but I didn't stop it directly.

Another one says:
"So I had to completely disable Windows Update Service autorun. This
greatly lowered waste of RAM, CPU and disk IO. The system is much more
responsive now."

AFAICT windows update for Vista has stopped updating. In the last two
weeks I've only gotten one new "Check for selected Malware file". I
don't know if that means there is no point to disabling it, or if it's
still wasting cycles and there is no reason not to disable it."

********************
However, I turned off Windows Updates and I havent' had the problem
this post is about since then. I can always check for updates
manually when it won't interfere with my compute use.
**********************

Another guy said "On my computer, during start up, the anti virus
program (windows essentials) seemed to be taking a lot of time on the
datastore.edb file. .....The solution basically involves telling the
virus scanner (windows essentials) to exclude checking this file. I
did the other exclusions on the windows files as well. (but i'm fine
with the scanners checking my photos, even though they should be
safe)" I didn't think AVG scanned files on startup, and it listed
under "Image" svchost (netsvcs), not AVG , but I'll wait until this
happens again and see if AVG is using appreciable CPU. (I think I've
fixed it so it won't happen again.)

Another guy said "Microsoft released a new WindowsUpdate Client Update
to fix the slow Update searching/Installation." but it's only for 7
and Server 2008.

https://www.reddit.com/r/pcmasterrac...storeedb_help/
"Every day it ramps up my disk usage to 100% which pretty much kills
anything I want to do. It lasts from 5 min to an hour or two depending
on how long my machine has been off for previously (The longer its
been off, the longer the disk disruption and usage lasts) although it
will happen every day even if the machine is never shut down.
Finally the original poster said there was something wrong with the
original implementation: "This applies to Zeiss OCT machines" but the
problem is more widespread." I don't even know what Zeiss OCT is!

Another guy complains more about it using RAM and the webpage guy
says:
Can you please zip/attach your c:\windows\windowsupdate.log file? If
it's too big to attach, please upload to SendSpace and just provide me
the link. Finally told him to do a repair install! (I don't think
so!)
https://www.sysnative.com/forums/win...gging-ram.html


I enable the BITS and WU services only after I have prepared to do
Windows updating: gotten some time reserved, made a full backup image,
poll for the available update and wait ... and wait ... and wait, review
*EACH* update before allowing it (hiding the unwanted or nonapplicable
ones), reboot even if not told to do so, and disable the BITS and WU
services. When those services are disabled, there is no Windows
updating going on, not even to poll for new ones.

I use the following batch files:

___( WU-disable.bat )___
echo off
cls

echo Stop BITS (Background Intelligent Transfer Service) ...
sc.exe stop BITS
echo Disable BITS ...
sc.exe config BITS start= disabled
echo.

echo Stop Windows Update service ...
sc.exe stop wuauserv
echo Disable Windows Update service ...
sc.exe config wuauserv start= disabled
echo.

exit
___( EOF )___

___( WU-enable.bat )___
@echo off
cls

echo Enable BITS (Background Intelligent Transfer Service) to Manual
startup mode ...
sc.exe config BITS start= demand
echo.

echo Enable Windows Update service to Manual startup mode ...
sc.exe config wuauserv start= demand
echo Start Windows Update service ...
sc.exe start wuauserv
echo.

exit
___( EOF )___

I have a folder containing shortcuts to WU-enable, Windows Updates, and
WU-disable. When I am prepared to do some Windows updating, I just
click on WU-enable, Windows Updates (review each one and allow some),
and end with WU-disable. Then when I am not in update mode, there is no
background checking going on.

I'm also assuming that you configured Automatic Update to "notify only".
During my Windows Updates step, I still only want to get notified of new
updates, not have them crammed down my throat.

datastore\datastore.edb
 

[Default] On Sat, 9 Apr 2016 16:16:05 -0500, in
microsoft.public.windowsxp.general VanguardLH wrote:

Micky wrote:

I'm using Vista but googling has shown the exact same problem is found
in win7. The relevant file exists in XP, but I don't know if the
problem does or not.

AFAIC, I've solved the problem, so this is just to share with you. The
solution was simply to turn off automatic Windows Update.

Vista is getting few or no updates these days. Not sure about 7, but
there is manual update.

Now that I'm using Windows Resource Monitor to watch my disk usage,...
This morning, I needed to write and send one short email and then
leave within an hour. Sounds like plenty of time, except the
harddrive light was on constantly for at least an hour, and I could
barely type a single character in the email program. ...

It was reading (and maybe writing)
C:\windows\SoftwareDistribution\datastore\datastor e.edb It ranged
from 20 to 45MB/minute. ....


So what's the solution. Suggestions from other people:
http://superuser.com/questions/53941...-computer-down
PC Boots then writes giant datastore.edb file slowing the computer
down. " If you stop the Windows Update service, within a minute the
system will stop reading and writing from the file and everything runs
smoothly. " .....
....
https://www.reddit.com/r/pcmasterrac...storeedb_help/
"Every day it ramps up my disk usage to 100% which pretty much kills
anything I want to do. It lasts from 5 min to an hour or two depending
on how long my machine has been off for previously (The longer its
been off, the longer the disk disruption and usage lasts) although it
will happen every day even if the machine is never shut down. ....

I enable the BITS and WU services only after I have prepared to do

I never even heard of BITS before! I see it started with win2000.

Windows updating: gotten some time reserved, made a full backup image,
poll for the available update and wait ... and wait ... and wait, review
*EACH* update before allowing it (hiding the unwanted or nonapplicable

I have been doing that.

ones), reboot even if not told to do so,

I havent' been doing that.

and disable the BITS and WU
services.

I haven't been doing that.

When those services are disabled, there is no Windows
updating going on, not even to poll for new ones.

I've read online that it's the checking for updates that takes so much
ram and cpu. (He didnt' mention

I use the following batch files:

Thank you for these. I've saved them.

___( WU-disable.bat )___
echo off
cls

echo Stop BITS (Background Intelligent Transfer Service) ...
sc.exe stop BITS
echo Disable BITS ...
sc.exe config BITS start= disabled
echo.

echo Stop Windows Update service ...
sc.exe stop wuauserv
echo Disable Windows Update service ...
sc.exe config wuauserv start= disabled
echo.

exit
___( EOF )___

___( WU-enable.bat )___
@echo off
cls

echo Enable BITS (Background Intelligent Transfer Service) to Manual
startup mode ...
sc.exe config BITS start= demand
echo.

echo Enable Windows Update service to Manual startup mode ...
sc.exe config wuauserv start= demand
echo Start Windows Update service ...
sc.exe start wuauserv
echo.

exit
___( EOF )___

I have a folder containing shortcuts to WU-enable, Windows Updates, and
WU-disable. When I am prepared to do some Windows updating, I just
click on WU-enable, Windows Updates (review each one and allow some),
and end with WU-disable. Then when I am not in update mode, there is no
background checking going on.

I guess that can take a lot of disk reading too. In fact maybe that
is what took an hour the other morning. I went out but I don't think
it dl'ed anything. If it did, it was just that one optional update,
the "MalwareChecker on restart for specific malware" file. or maybe a
MS Security Essentials file. Why does it take an hour to check and
download that?

I'm also assuming that you configured Automatic Update to "notify only".

Yes, I've had that for a long time.

During my Windows Updates step, I still only want to get notified of new
updates, not have them crammed down my throat.

Indeed.

Thanks a lot for the advice and bat files.

datastore\datastore.edb
 

[Default] On Sat, 09 Apr 2016 18:10:07 -0400, in
microsoft.public.windowsxp.general Micky
wrote:


I use the following batch files:

Thank you for these. I've saved them.

And I made them bat files and I tried them and.....

wu-disable went by so fast I couldn't read all of it.

Instead of ending in exit, I thought there was a command that would
end a bat file without closing the cmd box. I thought it was Return,
but that didn't work.

Tomorrow I'll plug in my XP archives and find out.

___( WU-disable.bat )___
echo off
cls

echo Stop BITS (Background Intelligent Transfer Service) ...
sc.exe stop BITS
echo Disable BITS ...
sc.exe config BITS start= disabled
echo.

echo Stop Windows Update service ...
sc.exe stop wuauserv
echo Disable Windows Update service ...
sc.exe config wuauserv start= disabled
echo.

exit
___( EOF )___

___( WU-enable.bat )___
@echo off
cls

echo Enable BITS (Background Intelligent Transfer Service) to Manual
startup mode ...
sc.exe config BITS start= demand
echo.

echo Enable Windows Update service to Manual startup mode ...
sc.exe config wuauserv start= demand
echo Start Windows Update service ...
sc.exe start wuauserv
echo.

exit
___( EOF )___

datastore\datastore.edb
 

Micky wrote:

And I made them bat files and I tried them and.....

wu-disable went by so fast I couldn't read all of it.

They are batch files. They run in a console windows (aka command
shell). Unless you first open a console windows (cmd.exe) to run them
there, the console window will close as soon as the batch file
completes. You don't know how to run console (DOS mode) commands?

Besides, there is really not much to show. It may show whether the
command succeeded or failed but you can see that by looking in
services.msc (or make sure to refresh its display if you have it open at
the time you change service state).

Instead of ending in exit, I thought there was a command that would
end a bat file without closing the cmd box. I thought it was Return,
but that didn't work.

That would require opening the console window (cmd.exe), telling it to
run the batch file but not close the console window afterward.
Basically you are independently opening the console window so what you
run inside doesn't close that window. DOS-mode commands may open a
console window but may not. If you rely on the console command to show
a window, it will get unloaded as soon as it is no longer needed, like
when the console command finishes.

You could:
- Run cmd.exe to load a console window. That console window is owned by
the cmd.exe process, not by any programs started within that console.
- Run wu-enable.bat or wu-disable.bat.
- Since the console window remains open - until you exit cmd.exe - you
can see any stdout produced by any non-GUI (DOS-mode) programs you run
inside that console.
- To exit the console (close the window) means you have to enter the
'exit' command (tells cmd.exe to unload) or you use the titlebar icons
or control menu to close the window (which will kill the cmd.exe
process).

Or you could just double-click on the shortcut to the wu-enable.bat or
wu-disable.bat files, let the console window flicker by (opened for the
shell to run the batch file and then immediately closed when the batch
file ends) and run services.msc to see what happened to the state of the
BITS and WU services. I prefer this method to verify what happened
rather than relying on the stdout from the console commands (sc.exe)
which will only report a failure not what is the resultant state of the
services.

datastore\datastore.edb
 

On Sat, 09 Apr 2016 22:14:34 -0400, Micky wrote:

And I made them bat files and I tried them and.....

wu-disable went by so fast I couldn't read all of it.

Instead of ending in exit, I thought there was a command that would
end a bat file without closing the cmd box. I thought it was Return,
but that didn't work.

You can use pause to make it wait until you press return and you can
even add a comment ie;

pause Press Return to continue

--
Faster, cheaper, quieter than HS2
and built in 5 years;
UKUltraspeed http://www.500kmh.com/

datastore\datastore.edb
 

In message . me.uk,
Rodney Pont writes:
On Sat, 09 Apr 2016 22:14:34 -0400, Micky wrote:

And I made them bat files and I tried them and.....

wu-disable went by so fast I couldn't read all of it.

Instead of ending in exit, I thought there was a command that would
end a bat file without closing the cmd box. I thought it was Return,
but that didn't work.

You can use pause to make it wait until you press return and you can
even add a comment ie;

pause Press Return to continue

Or, you can run them from a command window you've opened, rather than
running them directly.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Ask not for whom the bell tolls; let the machine get it

datastore\datastore.edb
 

In message , Micky
writes:
[]
(I also dl'd RAMmap, from Sysinternals, because one webpage mentioned
it. It didn't really help me but it's free and interesting.
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/...ls/rammap.aspx )
[]
Yes, it does look interesting. Sadly, it says it only runs on Vista and
above - and that is indeed the case.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Ask not for whom the bell tolls; let the machine get it

datastore\datastore.edb
 

[Default] On Sun, 10 Apr 2016 16:15:59 +0100, in
microsoft.public.windowsxp.general "J. P. Gilliver (John)"
wrote:

In message , Micky
writes:
[]
(I also dl'd RAMmap, from Sysinternals, because one webpage mentioned
it. It didn't really help me but it's free and interesting.
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/...ls/rammap.aspx )
[]
Yes, it does look interesting. Sadly, it says it only runs on Vista and
above - and that is indeed the case.

Yes, that was only a sidebar to the main post. But I know the file in
the subject line is used in XP too. I don't know if it caused me
problems in XP like it did in Vista, but I was quite a bit more stoic
then and just waited for problems to go away. So it might have been
the source of major problems in XP too. Now I'm on a campaign to rid
myself of problems. First I got rid of making Previous Versions and I
will rely on my own backups; then I got rid of this;

And the last planned stage is to improve how FFox saves tabs. Right
now, if theres' a crash or even if I close Windows normally, when I
restart, the Restore Session tab will likely be hours old (older than
the time Windows closed) not including tabs created later and
including ones already deleted. Even though the interval time
between saving sessionstore is set at 5 minutes or less.

The suggestions seem to be add-ons, either Session Manager or Tab Mix
Plus. Do you know if either can make the problem worse? They both
have millions of downloads, and the first has a 4.6 star rating over
456 reviews, and the second 4+ stars over 2600 reviews.

datastore\datastore.edb
 

On Sat, 09 Apr 2016 22:16:05 +0100, VanguardLH wrote:

[]

I enable the BITS and WU services only after I have prepared to do
Windows updating: gotten some time reserved, made a full backup image,
poll for the available update and wait ... and wait ... and wait, review
*EACH* update before allowing it (hiding the unwanted or nonapplicable
ones), reboot even if not told to do so, and disable the BITS and WU
services. When those services are disabled, there is no Windows
updating going on, not even to poll for new ones.

I use the following batch files:
[]

[This is for XP]

Here's my wupdate.bat (I have the services off most of the time)


@echo off
sc config msiserver start= demand
sc config wuauserv start= auto
sc config BITS start= auto


ping -n 1 -w 10 127.0.0.1 nul

net start msiserver
net start BITS
net start wuauserv

echo Select Custom, scrap .net and malicious sw
"C:\program files\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe"
http://update.microsoft.com/windowsu....aspx?ln=en-us
pause

net stop wuauserv
net stop BITS
net stop msiserver

sc config msiserver start= disabled
sc config wuauserv start= disabled
sc config BITS start= disabled




--
Bah, and indeed, Humbug