Random CPU usage increases

[Jace]

Unless it's an outside resource using the component. Process Explorer, sort by CPU column, see the one probably at the top using constant 25% or so. Doubleclick on it and see 'Threads' tab. Then report back.

Also try to just hover over the task, it might even say which process is using it.

 

[Phonemelter]

Shouldn't these be sorted by CPU usage?

Yeah, though at the time I was checking to see if any of the processes using a bunch of physical memory were also using a lot of the CPU, since they generally go hand in hand.

 

[Splintert]

I've been using a nice little thing called Process Hacker which gives a cool color-coded process tree, you *might* be able to figure out the cause and kill it if you knew the host process.