After a lot of searching I finally found someone else with a similar problem.
I reported it earlier over at the Geforce forums but no response there. https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/forums/geforce-graphics-cards/5/586495/black-artifacts-while-using-solidworks-with-remote/
We have recently assembled from scratch a new computer from off-the-shelf components to use as a workstation/server.
The goal is having two designers using various CAD software, one using it locally, the other using it through Remote Desktop. Windows server 2025 was cleanly installed fresh from an official Microsoft ISO, currently on driver version 596.36.
We installed an older RTX 4070 as graphics card we had laying around with the hopes of reusing it, and started experiencing some black artifacts during use of Solidworks.
The artifacts show up occasionally for both the local user (working locally directly from a monitor) and also the remote one (not necessarily at the same time), so its unlikely the remote connection is the source of problem.
Applications don’t crash or close, artifacts happen across the whole screen, across Windows desktop, Windows Explorer, SolidWorks viewport, toolbars, etc, and are typically constrained to specific graphics elements (not randomly shaped across the screen). It often starts by blacking out the whole screen, then progressively UI elements like icons in toolbars, menu text, tabs, and various graphic elements recover from black to proper rendering when refreshed, like on mouse hover with the cursor.
Here is a screenshot and video of the issue:
Notice how the toolbars turned black, and menus and icons gradually refresh when hovered by the cursor. Is this similar to what you experienced?
This clearly indicates some sort hardware acceleration or graphics card issue, and immediately thought the card was either defective or not compatible for not being Solidworks certified. Since we had an older NVidia Quadro P4000 that is Solidworks certified laying around I tested it in the same computer. After proper drivers installed, soon the same black artifacts were happening again.
Maybe this card is too old? We bough a brand new RTX Pro 4000 Blackwell in the hopes of fixing the problem once and for all. Again another fresh OS install, new certified drivers and voilà: Black artifacts happening all the same.
Three defective cards? No way in hell! Something else has to be wrong with the computer. Motherboard, PSU, Overheating?
In the meantime since we moved on to Solidworks 2026 and could not go back because of file version compatibility, we were forced to also upgrade the older workstation to Solidworks 2026 (and consequently the required Windows11/Server 2025). In this older workstation no artifacts occur with the exact same setup, and same Windows ISO. It has been working flawlessly for several weeks now.
In yet another third older workstation with an aging NVidia Quadro P4000, again same exact setup, fresh install of Microsoft Windows 2025, Solidworks 2026, proper clean drivers, and a soon after boom! Black artifacts as well. On another computer now?
So why did the original workstation never have issues and all others do? What is common among them? Nvidia cards! The old workstation has an AMD Radeon Pro WX 5100 and all others we tested have NVidia cards.
Is this a compatibility issue with server editions of Windows specifically? Probably not, we tested regular Windows 11 as well and black artifacts occur all the same with simultaneous users.
My only guess is this is some sort of bug or incompatibility between Windows 11/Server 2025 and remote desktop/simultaneous users.
The graphics card is technically effectively driving the equivalent to three full HD monitors at 1920x1080 (two local and one remote), but that seems well withing the capabilities of even the older Quadro card.
We’ve had a similar setup using Windows 10 like this for years without any issues whatsoever with the AMD Radeon Pro WX 5100. We have since found out the issue also occurs outside SolidWorks (in AlphaCAM for example), albeit less often.
We spent quite some money on a professional line graphics card to try and avoid it only to find it doesn’t, and because it is professional product, no returns are accepted, so now we are stuck with a ineffective solution.
I have exhausted all my knowledge about this without success. This is probably an “exotic” setup, but only now have I found any post with what appears to be a similar issue.
Have you ever found a solution? Can this be reported anywhere? I’m not even sure NVidia is aware of the issue, and there doesn’t seem to be any way to report it.
