Subject: Running BOINC Project (SETI@home) for 48 Hours Killed My Galax GeForce GTX 1650 4 GB GDDR5 GPU

Good day from Singapore,

I bought my Galax GeForce GTX1650 4 GB GDDR5 GPU on 29th September 2019 Sunday.

REFERENCES:

[1] http://lkml.iu.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/1909.3/04148.html

[2] http://lists.linuxfromscratch.org/pipermail/lfs-chat/2019-September/029039.html

[3] https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-chat/2019-September/007361.html

[4] https://lkml.org/lkml/2019/10/1/200

[5] http://lists.linuxfromscratch.org/pipermail/lfs-chat/2019-October/029040.html

[6] https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-chat/2019-October/007363.html

At the time of this writing, it is 5th October 2019 Saturday.

Over the past 48 hours, I have been running BOINC project (SETI@home) on my Windows 10 Home Edition home desktop computer. This morning, my home desktop computer suddenly gave me a Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) with the error code: "Windows System Exception".

I thought my Windows 10 had become corrupted. ***Every time Windows 10 boots up, it would show me a BLANK SCREEN after a few seconds.***

I have tried the following resolution methods for about 2 hours on a Saturday morning but NOTHING worked.

1. I tried to perform Windows Startup Repair but it would not run.

2. I tried to start Windows in SAFE mode but it would show me a BLANK SCREEN as well.

3. I tried to start Windows in SAFE mode with Networking but it would show me a BLANK SCREEN as well.

4. I tried to start Windows with low video resolution but it would show me a BLANK SCREEN as well.

5. I tried to start Windows with Driver Signature Signing disabled but it would show me a BLANK SCREEN as well.

6. I tried to run "sfc /scannow" on a command prompt but it would not run.

7. I tried to uninstall Windows quality updates but it would still show me a BLANK SCREEN.

8. I tried to uninstall Windows feature update but it would still show me a BLANK SCREEN.

9. I tried to perform System Restore but Windows would still show me a BLANK SCREEN.

In short, none of the resolution methods which I have tried above worked.

Exasperated, I tried to reset Windows 10 while retaining personal data. After resetting Windows 10, I *successfully* booted into Windows with a Basic Microsoft Display Adapter Driver. Then I tried to install NVIDIA drivers. When NVIDIA drivers started to load, my Windows showed me a BLANK SCREEN AGAIN. At this point, I realized that my Galax GeForce GTX 1650 4 GB GDDR5 GPU has been killed/fried by BOINC project (SETI@home).

On 5th October 2019 Saturday afternoon, I took my Galax GeForce GTX 1650 4 GB GDDR5 GPU to the 4th story computer shop in Sim Lim Square in Singapore for a 7-day 1-to-1 exchange, citing that the Galax GPU has malfunctioned. The shop keeper gave me a MSI GeForce GTX 1650 Ventus XS OC 4 GB GDDR5 GPU as replacement but I have to top up SGD$10.

When I brought the replacement MSI GeForce GTX 1650 Ventus XS OC 4 GB GDDR5 GPU home, I plugged it into my home desktop computer and Windows 10 booted up *SUCCESSFULLY*. I proceeded to reinstall NVIDIA drivers again. Everything went well and everything is working fine now.

Conclusion: BOINC project (SETI@home) fried my Galax GeForce GTX1650 4 GB GDDR5 GPU after 48 hours. Now I am actually afraid of running SETI@home again for fear of frying my replacement MSI GeForce GTX 1650 4 GB GDDR5 GPU again.

Question: Will BOINC project (SETI@home) be able to work towards ensuring that it will not fry anyone's GPU again? I had my whole Saturday wasted. It was only Saturday evening when I returned home and got everything working again.

Thank you very much.

Mr. Turritopsis Dohrnii Teo En Ming
Republic of Singapore
6th October 2019 Sunday 11.49 AM Singapore Time

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Mr. Teo En Ming (Zhang Enming)
Singapore Citizen

Question: Will BOINC project (SETI@home) be able to work towards ensuring that it will not fry anyone's GPU again?

Not possible, as correlation is not causation.
The failure of the video card was most likely due to a manufacturing issue or some other hardware failure, and not a result of processing Seti work.

As long as your system has good airflow, and the fans on your video card are working correctly, processing Seti work (and other projects for that matter) will not result in any sort of hardware failure.
Of course if you choose to overclock your hardware, and overvolt it in order to support that overclock, then you should expect hardware failure at some stage, particularly if the cooling is not up to the job.

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Grant
Darwin NT

I have been running GPU's on SETI@Home since the Geforce 8800 ( 10 years?) and I can say that I have never had a card fail due to Seti@Home crunching.

I have only replaced cards due to age and better specifications on newer ones. Until recently I had 4 PC's running 6 GPU's 24 /7 and never had a failure.

I now tend to process work on the Linux special app which stresses the GPU even harder and have still not had a GPU fail.

I suspect your problem was caused by a faulty GPU.

It could very well be the GPU driver that you are using (any driver with drivers above 431.xx will give you problems with Arecibo VHAR work).

Another thing is that you need to turn the GPU fan speed up for crunching, but if you have it stuck in a poorly ventilated case then you'll have to pop the side off it and maybe even have to direct a good desk fan into it.

Cheers.