Troubleshooting : Need help with Ntoskrnl thread causing high CPU

 

I have an ASUS N53S and between my last OS (Windows 7) to my new one (Windows 8.1) that I installed last winter I've had the intermittent problem of Higher than normal CPU while idle (~20%) and while that is happening my Wireless card fails out.

 

I have a Qualcomm Atheros AR9002WB-1NG Wireless Network Adapter. Currently installed version 10.0.0.274. Which I believe is the cause of the problem.

 

I mentioned before that the problem was intermittent because as long as the computer remains stationary on a solid surface the computer works normally 90% of the time. But if the computer gets picked up/bumped/shifted position it will run the computer CPU up and the wireless card will stop responding. Any attempt to disable the wireless card through the Device Manager will freeze the Device Manager. The rest of the computer seems to work fine (able to play games offline, watch videos saved to the computer). The problem will normally disappear after a force shutdown and turn back on. Attempts to shutdown normally or restart will seemingly shut down the OS, but the computer will stay on (screen black) till a force shutdown is made (hold power button).

 

I have attempted to update my Atheros Wireless driver to 10.0.0.287 with these files 

But after installing them and re-starting my computer (some times on the second restart) Windows fails to start properly and requests to load a previous save point. I've tried this twice.

 

Here is a link to my etl file:

 

Looking at it it shows that "athwbx.sys" is causing the cpu usage to spike up (which seems connected to the Atheros wireless card).

 

I saved another etl file and that one showed that "atw8x.sys" was causing the spike, but I can't find any google search saying what that file is connected to (also I can't remember what drivers I had installed at the time for that run). I can upload that one too if need be.

 

With the nature of the "bumping" causing it to go haywire it is possible that it's a physical connection that is causing the error. With the computer being a laptop it's a bit harder (though not impossible) to open it up and either change the wireless card or check it out with the naked eye. But because it can fix itself after a restart I begin to doubt that. (also I doubt it was caused by heating or cooling of a connection as running any games on high causing the computer to heat up, play for an extended period of time, stop the game, then cool down after wards does not cause this issue to happen during any of that).

 

After reading through the thread some I also noticed some people have problems with their USB ports. I have the following on my computer:

(2x) Generic USB Hub - v6.3.9600.17238

(2x) USB Root Hub - v6.3.9600.17238

Fresco Logic xHCI (USB3) Controller FL1000 Series - v3.5.93.0

Fresco Logic xHCI (USB3) Root Hub - v3.5.93.0

 

I've tried updating the Fresco USB3 to 3.5.100.0 from this site:

I tried updating it during the same time I updated my wireless card which crashed after restarting that time. I have not tried to updated it after that.

 

The two websites that I downloaded the drivers from, I'm not sure if they're the correct place to get the driver information. I was pretty sure that the www.atheros.cz was fine, but possibly not.

 

Thank you in advance for any pointers or insight.