Graphicscardenginestarter.exe Virus (Coin Miner Trojan) Removal

Graphicscardenginestarter.exe process belongs to a malevolent application that can accurately be identified as a coin miner virus. That malware type utilizes your hardware to mine cryptocurrencies, basically – Monero or DarkCoin1. It makes your personal computer pretty much nonfunctional as a result of high CPU utilization.

What is Graphicscardenginestarter.exe process?

Graphicscardenginestarter.exe is a malicious process created by coin miner virus
Graphicscardenginestarter.exe Windows Process

Graphicscardenginestarter.exe – Very high CPU and GPU use

Besides CPU usage, some of the coin miners additionally make use of GPU power for their tasks. In that situation, you will struggle also to see the mouse arrow moving – GPU is usually utilized on 100%. It is not as important as processor for system work, so Graphicscardenginestarter.exe coin miner viruses don’t waste time on trifles and utilize it all. It sometimes can cause sad effects.

Shortly about cryptocurrency mining

List of the typical coin miner symptoms

  • Extremely bad performance
  • CPU/GPU cooler fan creates a lot of noise
  • High temperature of the device (for laptops)
  • 80-90% consumption of CPU/GPU resources by an unknown process
  • Microsoft Defender is not working
  • How dangerous is the Graphicscardenginestarter.exe miner?

    Coin miners does not deal damage to your files. However, they make a lot of unpleasant things with the whole system

    First, Graphicscardenginestarter.exe virus makes your PC overloaded. It is not able to run your applications now, because all processor power is consumed by a virus. That malware does not care for your wants, all it focuses on is making money on you. Even if you are patient, and you waited until web browser is open, you will likely experience exceptionally slow performance. Pages will open for years, any kind of logins will take about a minute – just a horror story for a person who does a job online.

    Graphicscardenginestarter.exe Technical Summary.

    File Name Graphicscardenginestarter.exe
    Type Trojan Coin Miner
    Detection Name Trojan:Win32/CoinMiner
    Distribution Method Software bundling, Intrusive advertisement, redirects to shady sites etc.
    Similar behavior Operfmon.exe, Nvnodejslauncher.exe, Googleupdatecore.exe
    Removal Download and install GridinSoft Anti-Malware for automatic Graphicscardenginestarter.exe removal.

    “Visible” harm is not a solitary bad thing coin miners perform to your personal computer. Graphicscardenginestarter.exe coin miner likewise deals damage to your OS. To complete all malicious functions successfully, it wrecks the protection mechanisms of your system. You will likely see your Microsoft Defender disabled – malware halts it to avoid detection. If you check the HOSTS file, you will likely see a load of new notes – they are brought in by this coin miner to connect your system to a malicious mining network. All these changes shall be thrown back to the original in the process of system recovery.

    Hardware effects of coin miner activity

    Besides making your computer slow, performing at peak power for long times can trigger damage to your device as well as raise power costs. PC components are created to easily get along with high load, but they can do so only when they are in a good shape.

    Little and well-protected CPU cooling system is hard to damage. Meanwhile, GPUs have big and easy-to-access rotors, which can be easily cracked if touched while spinning, for example, by the user much before the virus injection. Malfunctioning cooling system, together with the very high load caused by Graphicscardenginestarter.exe virus can easily lead to GPU failure3. Graphic cards are also tend to have very fast wearing when used for cryptocurrency mining. It is likely an unwanted situation when the performance of your video card decreases on 20-30% just after 1-2 weeks of being exploited in such a way.

    How did I get Graphicscardenginestarter.exe coin miner virus?

    Coin miners are spread through different ways, but their main sources are malicious banners and programs from dubious sources
    Unwanted banners adware

    The example of malicious banners you can see in the Internet

    Another way you could get this item on your PC is by downloading it from the unreliable website as a part of a program. Users who spread hacked variants of popular programs (which do not need the license key) have small chances to make money. Hence, there is a huge lure to include malware to the final package of the hacked application and acquire a coin for every installation. Prior to blaming these individuals for hacking and malware spreading, ask yourself – is it OK to avoid purchasing the program in this manner? It is much cheaper to pay $20-$30 at once than to pay a much greater figure for antivirus software and new parts for your PC.

    How to remove the Graphicscardenginestarter.exe miner from my PC?

    The best way to get rid of this coin miner virus is to use anti-malware software

    Booting the PC into Safe Mode with Networking

    Press the Start button, then choose Power, and click on Reboot while holding the Shift key on the keyboard.

    Boot into Windows Safe Mode

    Windows will reboot into recovery mode. In that mode, choose Troubleshoot→ Startup Settings→ Safe Mode with Networking. Press the corresponding button on your keyboard to choose that option.

    windows safe mode boot option with command prompt

    When your system is in Safe Mode, all third-party programs, just like the majority of non-crucial operating system components, are not started with the system start. That gives you the ability to clean the computer without dealing with high CPU usage of the coin miner.

    References

    1. Read about why Monero and DarkCoin are so popular amongst cybercriminals.
    2. About unwanted effects for GPUs in the process of cryptomining.

    Spanish Turkish

    About the author

    Robert Bailey

    Security engineer focused on malware behavior, removal workflows, and Windows hardening. Robert reviews threat articles for practical accuracy, checking detection names, symptoms, and cleanup steps before publication.

    Leave a Comment