Potential graphics bug for Analysis v3 on Windows

Analysis Version 3
#1

Hi,

I think that there might a graphics related bug for the Windows installation of Analysis 3.0.4. Essentially, sometimes when I run Analysis suddenly the screen becomes black and I have to hard reboot machine before getting the display back. This happens only occasionally but only when I run Analysis. I have not found any way of getting the display back other than rebooting (e.g. reloading graphics driver with shortcuts does not help). I am pretty sure that everything besides the display works because I can save the project.
I am running Windows 11 Enterprise (21H2 build 22000.593). As far as I can tell Analysis is using Intel UHD Graphics P630 (driver 27.20.100.9664; I also have also Nvidia Quadro RTX 5000 - any idea how I can force the system to force to use this graphics card instead, I know how to do that for regular apps but not something that I have to use a bat file for).
I tried to look at the logs but I cannot find anything specific. Any advice on how to debug to hunt down the exact nature of the problem would be appreciated (I understand that at the moment I am not giving you much to go on about).

Thanks,
Józef

#2

Hi Józef,

Windows installations are always much less reliable than Linux or Mac and can be quite dependent on the individual setup. I haven’t looked at this systematically, but my impression is that we might be seeing a number of people with Windows 11 Enterprise having problems of various kinds. Our Windows machine runs Windows 10 and that is what we compile on. Anyway, I’ll get @ejb on the case - he can hopefully help you further on the graphics card/debugging front.

Vicky

#3

Thanks, Vicky. @ejb - I just had a screen going black then recovering. As far as I can tell from the output in the terminal this is what happened during that time:
“INFO : Validating Project integrity… (Project._getAPIObjectsStatus:960)”
Does that help? Does it do anything related to graphics while validating project integrity?
Sadly about a minute after the screen recovered from being black I got BSOD with:
“Stop code is: SYSTEM_THREAD_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED
What failed: RtsPer.sys”

#4

It looks like we might have to build a separate Windows 11 conda environment in order to get this working reliably on Windows 11. We’ll see if we can persuade IT to give us a machine for this.
Vicky

#5

Hi Vicky,

Just as an update. A bunch of Windows updates later it seems to have gotten better. I have not had a blue screen of death in a while. This suggests that the problem was/is related to a specific driver. I do still get occasional freezes of the graphics but in about last two weeks when I have been using assign a lot of time I have not had the black screen issue even a single time.

A quick question. What is the best way to report bugs/weird behaviours? This forum?

Thanks,
Józef

#6

Hi Józef,

that’s good to hear and suggests that perhaps some of the issues were on the Windows/Driver side. We’re still hoping to procure a new Windows computer soon, so we can have both a Windows10 and Windows11 machine for testing and creating builds.

You can report things either here on the forum or e-mail us direct at support@ccpn.ac.uk. The advantage of the forum is that others will also get to see the issues and solutions (if there is one!).

Vicky

#7

We finally have a Windows11 build available for download at Software Downloads - CCPN

We haven’t tested it extensively, but it might be worth switching to that if you are experiencing issues with the Windows10 build on a Windows11 machine.

Vicky

#8

Thank you, Vicky. I will take it for a spin.
Regards,
Józef