Installing nRF Connect for Desktop causes operating system problems with excessive lag until next system restart

[puz_md]

Hi,

after working with old SDK on nRF52 for a long time, we decided to switch to nRF53 with the new SDK and toolchain for our new project.

When I tried installing the nRF Connect for Desktop software, I was confronted with several issues. I use Windows 10 and I tried installing nrfconnect-setup-3.12.0-ia32.exe from the user account of my company's notebook. (There was no popup etc. asking me for administrator rights, and the nRF Connect software was installed into my user account's AppData\Local\Programs directory.

After installation, the system was lagging so much that I could not work with it anymore. The user Windows interface almost could not be used anymore, taking several seconds of lagging until it reacts etc. Also, I observed in the task manager many tasks which ware named driver installation or something like that. I'm using my user account without administrator rights anyway, so I wonder why some divers would be installed, as they usually require administrator rights.

I also canceled the installation of SEGGER JLink driver which was started in a new window at the same time I started the nRF Connect installation, as I already have a newer version of the SEGGER Jlink driver installed on my system-

My questions:

1. Has this behavior been observed before? What's the problem here?

2. Is my copy of nRF Connect installed correctly? Or may there be any problem later in using the nRF Connect SDK or any tools installed via nRF Connect for Desktop?

3. Did I install the correct version of nRF Connect for Desktop? The installer file suggests this is a 32 bit version, but my OS is 64 bit. Installed SEGGER Jlink driver is also 64 bit version. I could not find a specific 64 bit version of nRF Connect for Desktop for download.

[Joakim Jakobsen]

Hi.

1. Has this behavior been observed before? What's the problem here?

Not sure. I haven't seen this particular issue before. But I'll ask our developers if they have seen something similar.

2. Is my copy of nRF Connect installed correctly? Or may there be any problem later in using the nRF Connect SDK or any tools installed via nRF Connect for Desktop?

Sounds like you installed the correct version of nRF Connect for desktop.

As you can see from the download section here:

https://www.nordicsemi.com/Products/Development-tools/nRF-Connect-for-Desktop/Download?lang=en#infotabs

Version 3.12.0 for windows 32-bit and 64-bit.

If you downloaded the latest version and installed it. There shouldn't be an issue with any other tools installed from nRF Connect.

_______

After installation, the system was lagging so much that I could not work with it anymore.

Is this still an issue?

Was/is the system lagging only when nRF Connect is open? Or all the time after installation?

Br,
Joakim

[puz_md]

Hi Joakim,

Joakim Jakobsen said:

_______

After installation, the system was lagging so much that I could not work with it anymore.

Is this still an issue?

Was/is the system lagging only when nRF Connect is open? Or all the time after installation?

No, the problem stopped once I restarted my notebook (it was almost impossible to reach the shutdown button because of the lag).

It is related to the installer itself, not to nRF Connect. The installer seems to trigger some high priority processes during installation that block the system.

Do you know if the nRF Connect installer needs administrator rights? Does it install any drivers (except from starting the SEGGER JLink installer)? It should be fine installing from my user account, right?

[Joakim Jakobsen]

Thanks.

Might be hard to identify the problem as it disappeared after restarting the notebook. I haven't seen other reports of the same (I haven't experienced it myself either), but I can check if there has been other reports of the same.

puz_md said:

Do you know if the nRF Connect installer needs administrator rights? Does it install any drivers (except from starting the SEGGER JLink installer)? It should be fine installing from my user account, right?

I don't think the installer requires admin rights. Except from the SEGGER JLink prompt to install, it shouldn't install any drivers. The applications inside nRF Connect might require some driver installation.

Br,
Joakim

[puz_md]

Hi Joakim,

I reproduced the problem and can give you some more details:

- The task manager shows hundreds of processes called "Treiberpaket-Installation" (German), which means driver packet installation.

- It appears like the lag and system control problems comes from new processes being started all the time. (I click somewhere and within less than half a second, the focus disappears, so I cannot use my keyboard anymore etc.)

- When I right-click on the processes mentioned above and select details, it shows "dpinst_x64.exe" and path "[...]AppData\Local\Temp\nrf-device-lib".

Once again: This happens when I start nrfconnect-setup-3.12.0-ia32.exe on my Windows 10 User account (without Administrator rights). Did not want to try with Administrator account.

I think this should help with tracking down the problem.

Best regards,

Michael

[Joakim Jakobsen]

Thank you for the detailed description!

I’ll forward the information to our developers.

Br,

Joakim