Seti accesses services and programs and crashes computer

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J R

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Joined: 5 Feb 17
Posts: 2
United Kingdom
Message 75729 - Posted: 5 Feb 2017, 20:33:56 UTC

Running Boinc/Seti on 3 win 7 32 bit and 1 win 7 64 bit computer
Latest version on each, but issue over several previous versions

Background. Has problems with all pc blue-screening, crashing etc. etc and
on reading the dumps Seti was to blame. Reset firewall for Seti/Boinc permissions and
found Seti was occassionally requesting access permissions for all sorts of random, running
programs - as if a memory overflow somehwere - usually when screen saver kicked in.

Testing permissions, proved that when Seti asked for access to RAID, it crashed to Blue Screen,
when asking Windows explorer, removed all tray items, reset tray preferences and other very
odd things.

Seems Seti wanted access to any running program or process on a random basis.

As same across 4 machines, i figure this must be quite a common problem, but only started
happening within last 12 months.

I have now blocked seti from access all programs, so stopped the issues - but - when asks and is denied
permission to open windows explorer, clears all its data and projects but only from program,. Shutting
down the Boinc client and restarting brings the data back.

Last part, we do NOT have the Boinctray exectuable running.

Any help graetfully received as no access to the code to see what is really going on.

JR
UK
ID: 75729 · Report as offensive
Juha
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Joined: 20 Nov 12
Posts: 801
Finland
Message 75731 - Posted: 5 Feb 2017, 20:58:14 UTC - in response to Message 75729.  
Last modified: 5 Feb 2017, 21:03:00 UTC

Usually when people have problems with just one project we direct them the forums of that project. People there know their applications better than us. But since I started writing this...

What you describe is not typical at all for Seti@home applications. From the symptoms you listed here's what I'd suspect:

1. Your systems are infected with malware. Before you reject this saying you have this or that AV installed please get a second opinion from some other AV program. Really.
2. If you are running Seti@home GPU applications. Some GPU drivers are really bad, try another version.
3. Your systems have hardware problems. Perhaps they are overheating or their PSUs are dying. Clean any dust inside the computers and use some sensor reading program to check that voltage levels are correct. HWinfo has been working for me. Also run a memory tester.

And finally, if you want to know what you are running, Seti@home applications are open source. See Porting and optimizing SETI@home. The page is not entirely up to date. Source code for GPU applications are in sah_v7_opt branch.
ID: 75731 · Report as offensive
J R

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Joined: 5 Feb 17
Posts: 2
United Kingdom
Message 75740 - Posted: 6 Feb 2017, 23:47:51 UTC - in response to Message 75731.  

Thanks for reply, but sorry, not much help. We are a computer company, buiding and repairing PCs here in UK.

All systems regularly scanned and protected by a "serious" firewall - run Eset on demand just in case with zero
outcomes.

This applies to 4 computers, all windows 7 (3 x 32 bot 1 x 64 bit) and is not hardware related as different CPu,
Graphics and motherboards. Newish built as well.

Seems the manager is trying to write data somewhere, but possibly a memory leak or similar as the firewall traps
these. Just a few seconds ago on this machine, as it would appear the program was about to update to the
server, it treid to open 4 x windows services, several running programs and finally itself! Just for "fun" I let
it open its own process and it promptly closed as well as closing my scanner application. One of life's mysteries
here and probably never get to the bottom of it, but only started to happen in last few months with later
versions!......now to sort out why a Wordpress installation won't write to certain folders on a Linuz system...
no peace for the wicked.


Any real clues would still be gratefully received.

john

Uk
ID: 75740 · Report as offensive

Message boards : Questions and problems : Seti accesses services and programs and crashes computer

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