Hi Mike,
Sure is weird my friend!
I've got my Dino W10 Test Machine (Dell Dimension E521 c. 2007) running AU from Clean Install as we previously talked about on the AU threads here with zero problems on Chrome, IE11, and Edge. Like we talked about, I believe it's got something to do with new CPU instructions available in the newer 5th & 6th gen Intel Processors. I can't remember, does your test machine run Intel or AMD CPU?
Clearly, my machine which is early Vista-era, is on like 3rd or 4th gen Intel dual-core CPU, and doesn't support stuff like DirectX v.11 or v.12 as your machine may along with a host of other internal CPU instructions they've added that would take us months to track down and figure out. As I had stated before, this may be causing the problem as if there is a bug in Chrome or one of the default Chrome extensions that gets enabled when you install it (since it doesn't sound like you added any extensions at all in your descriptions above), perhaps the bug is calling an instruction in the processor incorrectly and returning a result with a non-zero or negative parameter value. In older machines such as mine, without that CPU instruction, it just ignores the request and returns a "not-there" or "not available" result to the Chrome program or library call, and moves on without a hitch. Your CPU may be giving Chrome a response to the instruction or loop that's causing Chrome to choke on the returned result since that instruction is available in your CPU, but Chrome can't figure out the response and goes into a "feeback loop", gets stuck and has no way out; the program slows to a crawl or crashes completely and jams up the CPU with high utilitization or something. Result is your PC runs crappy, and until you remove Chrome, continues to degrade your entire PC's performance. This is all surmisal of course.
Since several of us are running a combination of new and old hardware with the AU, such as Ross and Norway, it doesn't make a lot of sense. Have you reported the bug to Chrome (Google) on their forum yet? Maybe it's something they can look into.
In the meantime, it might be worth re-installing Chrome on your AU test setup in a quarantined environment such as a virtual environment. Could you try to run VMware or Hyper-V and install Chrome in a virtual session and see if you get the same result?
Might give us some more information on the problem.
EDIT: As I was re-reading my post, I thought of another thing; have you tried installing your AU on DIFFERENT hard drives? I mean one at a time of course. Is that hdd you have your current AU installed on a mechanical or SSD drive? If it's an SSD drive, you might swap out to a mechanical drive and repeat the test. Maybe it's a quirky in your particular SSD drive; not the brand as I know you use stuff we've both tested. We've seen stranger stuff. If you are now on a mechanical drive, swap to a different mechanical drive that is known good or from your parts pile or from another working PC and retest the Chrome. If the Chrome problem abates in either case, it could be a thing with a faulty read sector error in just the right spot on your hdd that could be the culprit. Swapping out the drive would remove that possibility from the picture.
Talk to you soon,
Marc