RDP - Windows 10 FAH Client Crash/Freeze/Stops Running

[gunnarre]

This might be a known issue, but I wasn't aware of it before. It seems that if you use Remote Desktop, you must stay logged in to it when a work unit starts on the GPU. Otherwise the GPU core will hang around waiting for a login.

If I log into the Windows 10 Pro machine with Microsoft's Remote Desktop, and then log out, the current GPU work unit will finish, but the next one would be stuck at 0% (more accurately, Core 22 would initialize, but never even get to 0%). This would happen even though FAHClient was started in a local user session. When I logged in via Remote Desktop to check, the core actually started right away.

It seems the way to fix this is to either obsessively log into Remote Desktop all the time, or (what I did) go home and log into the machine normally, and never use Remote Desktop again.

[bruce]

RDT is known to disrupt a GPU that's folding. We recommend you NOT use RDT. There are other ways to connect remotely. It will BLOCK FAHs ability to get a new WU, depending on how you disconnect.

[ajm]

I've been using Remote Desktop constantly for months, now on three distant Win 10 machines (1909 and 2004) with GPU(s), without any such issue. Like... ever.

[ajm]

I guess it is a permission problem: the distant machine is started on an account X and the RDP connection uses another account. So depending on the installation of FAH and the permissions of the accounts, the logging out will stop the folding. But this would be normal, and not an RDP issue. I think the best is to use a Microsoft account on the distant machine and to log in with RDP using that same account. If the issue comes from a permission mismatch, this should solve it.

[aetch]

I've been using RDP for years and the last few months to fold as well.
I normally just disconnect the session if I'm leaving something running.
The laziest way is to go to the top of the screen, when the bar drops down click the X on the right and confirm.

[ajm]

I recommend to use the app. Very convenient, especially if you have several remote machines: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/micro ... verviewtab

[bruce]

In order to establish a remote connection, RDP must make some changes so it can redirect video. How does this affect FAH's connection to the video drivers?

[ajm]

As far as I can tell, it just does not at all, but I actually don't know. What I can say, for example, is that it makes no difference whether the machines are connected to a monitor or not. It works quite well in a headless setup. I don't see any difference either in FAH performance between a normal session and an RDP session.
The displaying of the remote machines seems to be totally separate, like independent, and entirely dynamic (it just adapts in one second when you resize the RDP window, whoop, from a 4k monitor to a smartphone display and back).
And you cannot alter the display settings of a remote machine through RDP. If you open the control panel through RDP, you get "The display settings can't be changed from a remote session."
But otherwise, you can do what you want. I routinely shut them down for maintenance or tinkering (for example, these days, I reformat old NAS drives on one of the remote machines before dumping them) through RDP, then boot them manually and just open the RDP session while they are booting for restarting the utilities and FAH (all my installations are with manual start)- you can then sometimes even see the blue Windows Update screen progressing...

[Joe_H]

Do you leave the user logged in when you disconnect from the remote system? On Windows the client needs to be run by a logged in user to access the video subsystem for GPU folding. Some people both disconnect and logout, that would make a difference.

Have been needing to use RDT over the last few months doing the work from home bit and access work PC for software that can't be run remotely. Our default is to log out, the PC needs to have the user account inactive for their nightly backup and update processes.

[ajm]

I use the same user for "local" and RDP. So I never specifically log out, I just close the RDP window(s), just like any window. And I open them as needed, in the taskbar:

Right clic to see/select the configured connections:


Simple clic to see/select the open connections:


Open the "Bureau à distance" (Remote Desktop) to see/select/connect/disconnect/configure/delete the configured and/or open (green badge) connections and configure the general settings of the app:

[ajm]

But I just tried it and you can indeed sign out through RDP and once it's done, the connection closes, too.
But then everything is closed, incl. FAH.

[bruce]

So the question becomes how to re-enable the GPU client's connection once RDT has disrupted it. My suggestion is to avoid using RDT.

[ajm]

Disrupted? The disruption here is the sign out.

[bruce]

Disrupted? The disruption here is the sign out.

Yes. That's why this topic is called now "RDT - Logging out of Remote Desktop blocks GPU startup"

[ajm]

It doesn't block the GPU startup, at least not specifically: it closes the software that were running under the logged-in user.
Now if you have a backup software that needs a sign out, you are indeed out of luck. But there are backup solutions that don't need that. And Windows can prepare the updates normally, too.