is csrss.exe supposed to use your gpu?

[Keyes]

Using process explorer, I find that idle at the desktop , csrss.exe is using from 0.10- 1.5% of my gpu (mostly sub 0 .50)


If I interact with the aero Ui, it sometimes spikes to around 10% and back down, e.g moving aero windows, holding cursor over show desktop etc, could make it pop up to 19%, and if keep it there, it goes back to normal, a bit like how task manager spikes the cpu when you open it but its fine after wards.
Another example is that if I have the desktop open, and if I however over the programs taskbar window, and move my mouse across the mini window that appears, then it continuously goes to about 15%.



Is this activity normal? The constant 0.50% ish csrss.exe gpu usage and the spike when using an aero feature?

Gpu is a gtx 970 4gb.

 

[Keyes]

Anyone have any idea? It seems dwm.exe uses no gpu at all, which I would have thought used it for aero. The csrss files are in the right directories

 

[logicearth]

Well, did you run an anti-malware scan? Did it com back negative? Then that means the system is running as it should.

Of course I have an unpopular view of these situations here. If it's not broken, dont fix it. More likely just to cause more problems.

 

[Keyes]

Yes. Scans are clean (I ran my occasional mbam scan a couple days ago, all clean. )


I would have presumed dwm.exe would come up dor gpu usage due to it being the one to draw the aero interface? I looked into the csrss process and it seems to have links with cdd.dll being used which I belive has something to do with kt.

 

[Berton]

GPU A graphics processing unit (GPU) is a computer chip that performs rapid mathematical calculations, primarily for the purpose of rendering images. In the early days of computing, the central processing unit (CPU) performed these calculations.

Since the desktop is dynamic [versus static] it is constantly being refreshed/redrawn, I would think it entirely possible for csrss.exe to be running.
Is csrss.exe a safe process ? - Microsoft Community

 

[Keyes]

My question is, shouldn't dwm.exe be using the gpu rather than csrss.exe? I found this helpful info.

Under DWM, GDI calls are redirected to use the Canonical Display Driver (cdd.dll), a software renderer.
So perhaps it's something in csrss.exe actually redirecting calls to cdd.dll. Confirmed further by going back to the first Wikipedia article:
instead of issuing a system call, the Win32 libraries (kernel32.dll, user32.dll, gdi32.dll) send an inter-process call to the CSRSS process which does most of the actual work without compromising the kernel.
So application calls to gdi32.dll (which would be anything that renders any Windows GUI component like buttons, scrollbars, text, etc.) end up making their way to csrss.exe via IPC, which csrss.exe redirects to cdd.dll.