I have a Windows Server 2003 SP2 box that immediately begins to consume higher than normal amounts of CPU after my ntbackup fails. CSRSS and Explorer are the culprits. Process explorer shows the threads to be winsrv.dll and shlwapi.dll. The backup is run as a scheduled task and fails only periodically, but at least once every two weeks. This did not start happening until after I applied Windows updates in March. The backup is run as a dedicated domain account created for backup purposes only. There is always an account logged in at the console and as soon as you log in with it through remote desktop or at the console the CPU returns to normal levels. I actually have to log in with another domain account to which processes are causing the high CPUuse. When you log into the server a windows delayed write failed message is displayed. I have other servers with periodic backup failures but none of them exhibit this behavior. Anybody have any ideas?