Solved HDD spikes to 100% usage activity and video freezes

imeem · Dec 25, 2025

I was watching a .mkv video using VLC media player. On several occasions the video paused on its own and didn't want to play.

When this happened, I notice my new HDD that I bought a couple weeks ago (WD Black 6TB WD6004FZBX) reached 100% usage, when it did resume the HDD usage dropped back to 0%

I close the player and retried to recreate the problem, but it couldn't make it happened at the same timestamp.

What's the chance that it's VLC, or could it be my new HDD faulty?

Other than that, I don't think I notice any day to day issues. HDD passed all SMART tests and error checking on Windows.

Steps i tried:

plug and replug psu and sata cables
swap the sata cable with a difference one
Updated my VLC player
tried a different movie

I can try playing the video on a different HDD/SSD to further rule it out.

FreeBooter · Dec 26, 2025

Have you checked Task Manager for a process that is utilizing CPU more than others?

abactuon · Dec 26, 2025

What is caching in video playback?

This screenshot is from the VLC preferences menu. I initially had some stuttering issues while playing videos at 2x. Then I changed the File Caching to 10000ms, and the issue is likely gone. How does

superuser.com

win11raider · Dec 26, 2025

I have experienced the same problem you describe since the days of Windows 7, at least with mechanical hard drives. I suppose with an SSD this problem is not so serious. Sometimes the video playback is smooth and other times I notice as if the video were stuttering because the hard drive was doing God knows what. My only theory is that the antivirus software decides to scan the contents of the disk just as you play the video, or there is another background task doing something similar. To guarantee 100% smooth playback, my only solution is to restart the computer and not run anything, especially the internet browser.

Of course, to rule out any problems with your disk, try running a surface scan. On one occasion, I found a hard disk full of bad sectors. Obviously, that disk should be discarded.

spapakons · Dec 26, 2025

Also this can happen if the video has too high bitrate and the computer tries to play it without hardware acceleration, or if the disk is fragmented and needs defragmentation. However I would also blame Windows Defender or Windows Update since a new disk is unlikely to be faulty or fragmented.

cereberus · Dec 26, 2025

Buy an SSD as OS drive and use HDD as second drive. Problem solved.

spapakons · Dec 26, 2025

cereberus said:
Buy an SSD as OS drive and use HDD as second drive. Problem solved.

Not it's not if the problem is related to high bitrate or fragmented disk.

imeem · Dec 26, 2025

FreeBooter said:
Have you checked Task Manager for a process that is utilizing CPU more than others?

Yes. Under Processes, there was nothing, it show disk usage there 0%. I was doing my troubleshooting and my computer was mostly unresponsive during File Explorer (showing not responding), and I saw my HDD (F drive in photos) showing 100% as well with nothing in processes. I had to hold the shut down button since it also was slow on shutting down.

See pictures on task manager.

https://imgur.com/a/c8VRWsL

This drive I cloned my old secondary drive on it (1 TB) using Marcum Reflect and defragged it recently btw.

cereberus said:
Buy an SSD as OS drive and use HDD as second drive. Problem solved.

The HDD is my secondary and SSD is primary. I never had issue playing videos on a HDD before. But also this 6TB is the largest one I have so idk if it's just the cost of larger drives.

bobkn · Dec 26, 2025

I didn't comment because I don't use VLC media player.

But, if I play 4k HDR video from my 18TB HD using Media Player Classic, the disk activity as shown by Task Manager stays below 4MB/s. Less than 1% disk utilization. (I don't know how to reconcile those numbers.)

imeem · Dec 26, 2025

bobkn said:
I didn't comment because I don't use VLC media player.

But, if I play 4k HDR video from my 18TB HD using Media Player Classic, the disk activity as shown by Task Manager stays below 4MB/s. Less than 1% disk utilization. (I don't know how to reconcile those numbers.)

I may consider using MPC and klite media codec as a troubleshooting method if the issue occurs on different storages that I have.

I was able to exchange the HDD. Just in the process of cloning things over and seeing if the issue occurs again..

spapakons · Dec 26, 2025

imeem said:
Yes. Under Processes, there was nothing, it show disk usage there 0%. I was doing my troubleshooting and my computer was mostly unresponsive during File Explorer (showing not responding), and I saw my HDD (F drive in photos) showing 100% as well with nothing in processes. I had to hold the shut down button since it also was slow on shutting down.

See pictures on task manager.

https://imgur.com/a/c8VRWsL

This drive I cloned my old secondary drive on it (1 TB) using Marcum Reflect and defragged it recently btw.

The HDD is my secondary and SSD is primary. I never had issue playing videos on a HDD before. But also this 6TB is the largest one I have so idk if it's just the cost of larger drives.

First I would check disk F health with Hard Disk Sentinel or Crystal Disk Info. If the health is 100%, then probably needs defragmentation.

spapakons · Dec 26, 2025

bobkn said:
I didn't comment because I don't use VLC media player.

But, if I play 4k HDR video from my 18TB HD using Media Player Classic, the disk activity as shown by Task Manager stays below 4MB/s. Less than 1% disk utilization. (I don't know how to reconcile those numbers.)

Like I said watching video in high bitrate without hardware acceleration will hardly be a smooth experience. My previous graphics card, nVidia GTX 1050 Ti would struggle to play 4K videos. The only way to watch such a video was by using MPC-HC with LAV filters and MADVR renderer and as simple as possible resizing algorithm. Needless to say I shouldn't do anything else in the background. This card didn't support hardware acceleration for the HEVC codec, so it was up to my 3rd generation Intel Core-i7 CPU to play the video. My new card, nVidia RTX 3050 supports hardware acceleration for the HEVC codec, so I can play 4K videos more easily with better resizing algorithm and without having to close all other applications. Of course occasionally I need to defragment my VIDEOS disk (mechanical SATA III 6TB HDD). To make it easier for your computer to play such a video, you can try converting from 4K HEVC to 4K AVC with a little higher bitrate than the original file. Of course the quality will degrade a little, but it will play smoother than the original video. Even better, if you convert it to 1080p. A good utility for conversion that also supports hardware acceleration is Handbrake and Avidemux.

win11raider · Dec 27, 2025

I just remembered something that might help you.

I usually use SMPlayer. In the preferences for this player, I can choose between two engines: MPLAYER and MPV. It even gives you the option to add more engines. For a long time, I didn't think much about which engine to choose and assumed that my computer wasn't capable of playing content with a high bitrate. However, when I decided to change engines (I can't remember now which one I had before and which one I put in afterwards), the problems were solved. Suddenly, I was able to play that content without any problems.

Try this player (it is opensource) and try to change the engine.

imeem · Dec 28, 2025

so i replaced the HDD and tried a third SATA cable for good measure. Like my previous drive, this one is 0% fragmented & passed both Extended test (SMART and Media Scan) on WD Kitfox.

Watching the same movie using VLC (did not change anything compare to before), no issue so far... I think it was the drive's fault.

on an unrelated note, I find it interesting my original drive was actually faster in benchmarks (rated above advertised speeds of 267MB/s). My replacement drive is within the specs technically.

Original:

Replacement:

spapakons · Dec 29, 2025

I have seen drives with 100% health that are faulty and slow due to age or some mechanical shock or other reason. Even if Hard Disk Sentinel or Crystal Disk Info report 100% health they are far from perfect. The most common symptoms are too slow and constantly busy.

imeem · Dec 31, 2025

win11raider said:
I just remembered something that might help you.

I usually use SMPlayer. In the preferences for this player, I can choose between two engines: MPLAYER and MPV. It even gives you the option to add more engines. For a long time, I didn't think much about which engine to choose and assumed that my computer wasn't capable of playing content with a high bitrate. However, when I decided to change engines (I can't remember now which one I had before and which one I put in afterwards), the problems were solved. Suddenly, I was able to play that content without any problems.

Try this player (it is opensource) and try to change the engine.

imeem said:
so i replaced the HDD and tried a third SATA cable for good measure. Like my previous drive, this one is 0% fragmented & passed both Extended test (SMART and Media Scan) on WD Kitfox.

Watching the same movie using VLC (did not change anything compare to before), no issue so far... I think it was the drive's fault.

on an unrelated note, I find it interesting my original drive was actually faster in benchmarks (rated above advertised speeds of 267MB/s). My replacement drive is within the specs technically.

Original:

So today it's happening again. I checked my HDD and it was only 1% fragmented. I will try SMPlayer and report back..
Apart from that, i am wondering do larger HDDs and the 256 mb cache causing a problem..?

bobkn · Dec 31, 2025

I run 4k HDR video off an 18TB HDD fairly often. I've never experienced your issue. (Media Player Classic.)

spapakons · Jan 1, 2026

If we rule out the disk, then most likely your media player settings are not optimal and the videos play through the CPU, that is with software decoding without hardware acceleration from the graphics card. The CPU cannot cope and stutters. Are you sure Windows Update is not working in the background? Maybe Windows Defender does some scan? Disable both and check again. Last suspect some spyware consuming resources. Check with Superantispyware and remove all results.

JLArranz · Jan 1, 2026

Apart from that, i am wondering do larger HDDs and the 256 mb cache causing a problem..?

SMR drive? I intensely hate their mere existence, but Idk if they're prone to experience problems watching video, that doesn't involve writing. They're structurally bad at recording disk images. These drives should be happier with an assorted and "random" writing load (at least not a lot worse than normal HDDs, all are slow in random loads by nature), but writing an entire track and just afterwards the contiguous one time after time thousands or millions of times in a row isn't their thing.

At reading I wouldn't expect differences with a normal drive (I believe SMR is just as "fine" reading as CMR), and the video playing bar is very low for any modern disk.

spapakons · Jan 1, 2026

If the disk can cope with the video data rate, then see if something is running in the background consuming resources. I would also scan for viruses and spyware. Also make sure you enable hardware acceleration in the media player, playing in software (CPU) can freeze and stutter.

Solved HDD spikes to 100% usage activity and video freezes

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