Windows 10 - File Explorer uses up CPU to refresh a folder being modified by other programs

Question

So I have encountered this problem and successfully recreated it numerous times.

The problem is simple: whenever using any software other than explorer, to delete/move/copy/rename... contents of a any folder, if that folder is opened in explorer while the operation is running, explorer will instantly use up 100% CPU to refresh the folder, and slow down the operation, and cause my computer to become very irresponsive(not freezed), and keep doing so until either the operation has ended or the folder is closed in explorer...

So is this the normal behavior of Windows? Is this a bug? How can I fix(or improve) this? I am using Windows 10 20H2 x64 if that helps.

Edit: I can confirm there are no system file corruptions, I have run DISM and SFC numerous times and they can't fix this issue, they fail to detect any problem. Also I had just reinstalled Windows very recently. I have also run many hard disk utilities to check if hard drives have any bad sectors, and there is none. And I have also run chkdsk numerous times and no filesystem corruptions. So they are not the case.

Example: Try this in PowerShell, it should recreate the problem described, use at your own risk.

$test=[string]"C:\test"+$(get-random)
md $test
explorer $test
taskmgr
0..10000 | % {ni "${test}\${_}.txt"|out-null}
(gci $test).fullname | %{ri $_}
rd $test

Screenshot:

P.S. If it really succeeded recreating the problem described, just restart explorer, and let PowerShell do its job, don't close PowerShell before it completes deletion, because explorer deletion speed is lower than PowerShell(maybe)(because explorer will compute number of files and ETA before deletion, the script finds one and deletes one)

Edit:

I use PowerShell 7.1 and

gci $test | %{ri $_}

works fine, but it might not work on lower versions of PowerShell, So I generalized it, now lower versions of powershell can find the paths.

Proof:

If the files were not deleted first, removing the folder will cause it prompt the warning Recurse parameter not specified and asking for confirmation.

Context Menus:

Desktop:

Explorer(not "This PC"):

"This PC"

"New"

My hard drives are Hard Disk Devices, I guess you people are all using Solid State Drives? You are so rich...

Answer 1

I had a similar problem on a specific folder with Windows Explorer. I disabled thumbnails to avoid high cpu usage. Maybe it helps you, How to disable thumbnails on Windows 10

Answer 2

How can I fix(or improve) this?

The official way of reporting issues with Windows is to use their "Feedback Hub" app, included with Windows 10: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/feedback-hub/9nblggh4r32n

This then relies on upvotes and such, like you'd expect to find with most crowdsourced feedback.

This is a replacement of the now-defunct http://connect.microsoft.com/ that attempted to do the same thing.

Unfortunately, collecting issue reports and acting on them do not go hand in hand. Well documented, easily reproducible bugs (like not being able to undo the actions taken by using a Quick Step action in Outlook) go for years and versions of Windows just collecting upvotes and dust.

So is this the normal behavior of Windows? Is this a bug?

It doesn't sound unreasonable that two applications working on the same dataset at the same time would run into record locks and so forth that either the system or the software would have to overcome, and that CPU usage would get out of hand. Especially when it comes to Windows File Explorer showing the contents of a directory. Windows 7/8/Vista was horrible at refreshing the directory in the first place, even without something in the background changing the contents it's meant to display. Windows 10 is much better, but still not great. So, is it normal? Yes. Is it a bug? Maybe.

Report the issue, and find a way around what you're trying to accomplish.