I had some malware scanners and antivirus programs that I keep around but don't use much so I got rid of them. What have you done to reduce high disk usage? How much has it helped? This seems to be a common problem with Windows 8.1. I have my doubts, because it also happens when I do simple things that would have nothing to do with Avast, like a file search or typing a Word document.
Long sad story with many broken promises to call back, from 1st and 2nd level support. It took 6 calls to Microsoft and an email to (courtesy of ) to get their attention. I'm working with a 3rd level support tech and he's calling back tomorrow. And they've run scans, checked system files, deleted/uninstalled things, started & stopped services, etc. I've talked to Microsoft and they can't think of anything else, so they are blaming it on Avast. I have Task manager running and it's mostly system files at the top of the Disk list. It clears up for a while and then starts up again. I've noticed that my disk usage spikes frequently on Windows 8.1.
