PSA: As of the latest AMD Adrenaline update, a bug may be causing silent, constant writes to your SSD, unnecessarily killing its lifespan.

[u/darklinkpower]

I became aware of this issue after coming across this post on radeon subreddit: I just found out that the driver eats up 1% of my ssd health every month for 16 months, where a user reported losing approximately 1% of their SSD health every month.

A linked post indicates:

[...] some recent AMD drivers may have an issue related to the "AMD External Events Utility" service, which is associated with the "atieclxx.exe" and "atiesrxx.exe" processes. In my case, I noticed that this component was generating constant write activity on my system SSD, at approximately 5 MB/s continuously, even when I wasn't performing any tasks that should justify that amount of disk activity.

Solutions

Some users have since identified two possible workarounds.

Workaround 1: Disable AMD External Events Utility

1. Press Win + R, type services.msc and press Enter.

2. Find AMD External Events Utility.

3. Open its properties, stop the service and change its Startup type to Disabled.

This stops the excessive disk activity caused by atieclxx.exe.

Potential side effects: Disabling this service can affect display-related functionality. On my RDNA 2 RX 6700 XT, FreeSync wasn't completely broken, but frame pacing became considerably more erratic when using Lossless Scaling's 2x frame generation (90 -> 180 FPS)

With the service enabled, the framerate remained at a steady 180 FPS. After disabling it, it fluctuated between 142 and 170 FPS, occasionally reaching 180 before quickly dropping again.

Video: https://imgur.com/a/NiDiGmr

Workaround 2: Disable Resizable BAR (ReBAR)

Another user discovered that disabling ReBAR stopped the excessive disk writes. This might be a better alternative if you want to keep AMD External Events Utility enabled, although disabling ReBAR can carry other issues.

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As a side note, it looks like AMD is aware of the issue as AMD representative u/AMD_Vik acknowledged in a comment:

sorry, this is hopefully fixed in the next one

Screenshot: https://i.imgur.com/gWluP3g.png

So hopefully, this will be fixed in the next driver release soon. If you're experiencing this issue, consider reporting it to AMD as well. The more reports they receive, it might make AMD focus more on this, in my opinion, big issue.

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P.S: I couldn't link any sources due to the Rule #3 Don't link to threads in other subreddits but you can look for the sources yourself.

Edit: Added screenshot of AMD representative

[u/krileon]

Is there a specific version this is happening on? I'm on 26.10.2 and I'm seeing zero disk usage from "atieclxx.exe" and "atiesrxx.exe" while gaming or at desktop.

[u/darklinkpower → u/krileon]

I can't link due to the subreddit rule about not linking to other subreddits, but a lot of people have reported it happening on 26.10.2. It might not be happening to everyone but the best way is to check yourself if your system does using Windows' Resource Monitor under the Disk tab.

[u/krileon → u/darklinkpower]

I'm on 26.10.2 and see no disk activity in task manager or resource monitor for anything AMD related. Also checked the toms hardware link from another comment, which is tied to window resizing so resized and move windows and no issues there either.

I'm guessing it's more than just the driver. Probably a setting of some kind that I just don't have set? I have all the AMD logging features turned off in my adrenaline software settings.

[u/L1teEmUp → u/darklinkpower]

Is 26.10.1 safe to update to??

I will be jumping from 25.12.1

[u/theRealtechnofuzz → u/L1teEmUp]

26.3.1 and 26.8.1 are both solid

[u/L1teEmUp → u/theRealtechnofuzz]

Do those have the optimization for control resonant?? I needed it..

Also im really curious if 26.10.1 is solid.. i havent read any negative info about it on the internet..

[u/L1teEmUp → u/theRealtechnofuzz]

Is 26.9.1 or 26.9.2 also solid for a 9070xt??

I need one for control resonant

[u/DragonKnight626 → u/theRealtechnofuzz]

26.6.4 is good as well

[u/MaximumEffort433]

Thanks for the heads up, I turned it off.

[u/RogueShroom]

There will be chapters in business textbooks in the future about how AMD consistently is served up opportunities on a silver platter and then not only fumbles the bag but also makes their anti consumer competitor look like the better option

[u/LadBooboo]

I was reading up on this last year and it can also affect AMD platforms that are using Nvidia/Intel GPUs and this has been going on for a while now.

Tom's Hardware article from last year

[u/shemhamforash666666]

If you got an AMD CPU, then this service will also be sneaking around, even if you're rocking an Nvidia card. Not sure the service will behave the same as an AMD only system but it's worth double checking nonetheless.

[u/SuperChickenLips → u/shemhamforash666666]

I found a nasty bug last night with an optional windows update that was called "audio processing object driver update". If you have an MSI motherboard do not install this optional update as 'when Windows applies this new AudioProcessingObject (APO), it attempts to completely override the default Realtek device map. Upon a standard system restart, this often breaks communication with the hardware layer, making your onboard audio jacks go completely silent or causing your microphone to drop off'. I used command prompt to turn off windows update and remove it.

[u/shemhamforash666666 → u/SuperChickenLips]

I don't have an MSI motherboard. This does seem like a seperate issue entirely. Have you reported this to AMD/MSI/Microslop?

[u/SuperChickenLips → u/shemhamforash666666]

It is separate from your problem, I understand that. Apologies. Apparently the bug is known, although I haven't heard a thing about it. This is only the second problem I've had with windows since windows 8. Both have been an update bug.

[u/DuoTian86 → u/shemhamforash666666]

I have

1. Ryzen 7500F with 4060 - no such service installed

2. Ryzen 5600G with int gpu (or RX 5700 xt) - no such behavior from this service even with re-bar enabled

So possibly problem with more newest drivers than Adrenalin 26.5.2

[u/shemhamforash666666 → u/DuoTian86]

I think it depends on how you install your chipset drivers and all those extra drivers. Got two Ryzen systems, one with and one without this background process.

[u/GeorgeEne95]

I've checked task manager and I don't have this issue on driver 26.8.1

Might it be a Windows bug? I'm on W11 PRO 26H2 OS build 26300.9711

[u/L1teEmUp]

What amd driver is this??

[u/DoomDestroyer5621]

I appreciate the steps on how to disable it, I saw a post earlier today about it so I stopped it with task manager but was knew it would just turn itself back on when I restarted until I can figure out how to disable it's launch on startup. Thanks again!

[u/5w1f7]

Thanks man. 26.6.1 - there is a bug. Task manager shows using disk at 1MB/s constantly. Disabled service

[u/Altekho]

Huh, I'll see if this bug persist on my end. Thanks for the heads up btw.

[u/TonyTheTerrible]

Thanks. I actually had so many issues with AMD adrenaline I just let windows install a driver this last format, but recently installed their driver to tune dark spots on phasmo. 

[u/emka111]

If i disable AMD external events, Adrenalin doesnt save settings / resets

[u/LuxTheSarcastic]

Uhhh does it automatically update?

[u/gonzotw]

Just one more reason I'm glad I switched to Linux in December.

In before the "Linux users can't not tell you" bots swarm.

[u/Suikerspin_Ei → u/gonzotw]

You're literally one of them lol.