5d ago

How can I tell if my GPU is being utilized properly?

I purchased a system76 Thelio Mira Elite With a AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT. I kinda regret not going with Nvidia at this point but it is what it is. I primarily use it as a developer workstation, but want to play games on it as well so I can be rid of my windows box.

I didn't expect it to be able to play the latest and greatest games but I did expect it to be able to play older titles reasonably well. Games launch from steam and seem to work, but I'm getting between 0 and 10 fps on the title screen of Kerbal Space Program. Other games are similarly functional but poorly performing.

Where do I start? How can I ensure my GPU is being leveraged? Is this as good as it gets?

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OP, I didn't see if you'd confirmed that you'd enable Steam Play, see this article: https://support.system76.com/articles/linux-gaming
Kerbal Space Program has a Linux native client and a windows client. By default, Steam will try to install the Linux native client, which is using OpenGL and, apparently, doing software rendering.
You could try to troubleshoot why OpenGL is broken, you probably are missing an environmental variable or something to tell it to use a specific device and so it defaults to software. However, this is kind of a moot point. Development stopped on OpenGL in 2017 and so bugs and weirdness will continue to crop up and fixing it won't resolve your core issue (Which may be that you're just not using Proton).
If you're going to game on this system then you should do what most people do and enable Steam Play and let Steam download the Windows version of KSP and run it through Proton (aka Steam's version of WINE). Often the Windows versions of games are more supported than the Linux native versions and WINE/Proton do an excellent job of translating the underlying windows system calls into Linux-ese. Proton is the primary reason why gaming on Linux works, because it lets you just play the Windows version of games.
Your logs indicate that your graphics card is the default device for Vulkan and so it should just work as soon as you enable Steam Play. If you have any problems with other games (once you verify that you're using your graphics card) you can look them up on Protondb (https://www.protondb.com/) and see if you need to make any setting changes. KSP looks to have a Gold rating and appears to work with Proton without any changes.
- So steam play was already enabled, it looks like it defaults to "steam Linux runtime 1.0 (scout). When I select different versions of proton runtime I get different behavior dependig on which one I select.
  Proton 9 says that it cannot switch to my monitors resolution,
  Proton experimental and hot fix launch the game (I can hear it!), but things are ... Weird. It only renders the windows behind it and the custom game cursor. When I alt enter to bring it into Windows mode, it's still just the windows/desktop that would be behind the game but now it's scaled differently.
  EDIT:
  It's hard to tell but the above screenshot is the game window
  
  Stay with experimental for now.
  Do other games show a similar behavior or is it limited to KSP?
  BG3 should work fine (was just playing it on Linux about 30m ago, but Arch, btw, etc).
  You can get some extra logging from steam, if you exit completely and the, in a terminal, run:
  
  steam -d
  It'll start Steam but output a lot of info to the terminal. The bit we're interested in isn't the stuff that it generates while Steam is starting. We want the bit that happens when you press play on a game. It'll output the information about the important bits (like the Vulkan device, driver versions, monitors, etc )
  Make sure there's no obvious account info in the logs (there shouldn't be, but always check) and post that.
  I'm off to bed but I'll check in with you tomorrow
  
  Well I've installed BG3 just for the sake of testing and the DX11 launch results in a black screen. The Vulkan launch options crashing immediately...
  Here is my steam logs when launching KSP I think the only thing of interest is this:
  
  pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: W: "opt/amdgpu/share/libdrm" is unlikely to appear in "/run/host" pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: W: "opt/amdgpu/share/drirc.d" is unlikely to appear in "/run/host"
  
  Adding process 42106 for gameID 220200 Adding process 42107 for gameID 220200 pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: pv_runtime_provide_container_access: Setting up runtime without using bwrap pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: EGL ICD #0 at /usr/share/glvnd/egl_vendor.d/50_mesa.json: libEGL_mesa.so.0 pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Vulkan ICD #0 at /usr/share/vulkan/icd.d/intel_hasvk_icd.i686.json: /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libvulkan_intel_hasvk.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Vulkan ICD #1 at /usr/share/vulkan/icd.d/radeon_icd.x86_64.json: /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libvulkan_radeon.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Vulkan ICD #2 at /usr/share/vulkan/icd.d/intel_icd.x86_64.json: /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libvulkan_intel.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Vulkan ICD #3 at /usr/share/vulkan/icd.d/virtio_icd.i686.json: /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libvulkan_virtio.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Vulkan ICD #4 at /usr/share/vulkan/icd.d/intel_icd.i686.json: /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libvulkan_intel.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Vulkan ICD #5 at /usr/share/vulkan/icd.d/radeon_icd.i686.json: /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libvulkan_radeon.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Vulkan ICD #6 at /usr/share/vulkan/icd.d/intel_hasvk_icd.x86_64.json: /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libvulkan_intel_hasvk.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Vulkan ICD #7 at /usr/share/vulkan/icd.d/lvp_icd.i686.json: /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libvulkan_lvp.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Vulkan ICD #8 at /usr/share/vulkan/icd.d/virtio_icd.x86_64.json: /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libvulkan_virtio.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Vulkan ICD #9 at /usr/share/vulkan/icd.d/lvp_icd.x86_64.json: /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libvulkan_lvp.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Vulkan explicit layer #0 at /usr/share/vulkan/explicit_layer.d/VkLayer_INTEL_nullhw.json: libVkLayer_INTEL_nullhw.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Vulkan explicit layer #1 at /usr/share/vulkan/explicit_layer.d/VkLayer_MESA_overlay.json: libVkLayer_MESA_overlay.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Vulkan implicit layer #0 at /home/zamithal/.local/share/vulkan/implicit_layer.d/steamfossilize_i386.json: /home/zamithal/.steam/debian-installation/ubuntu12_32/libVkLayer_steam_fossilize.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Vulkan implicit layer #1 at /home/zamithal/.local/share/vulkan/implicit_layer.d/steamfossilize_x86_64.json: /home/zamithal/.steam/debian-installation/ubuntu12_64/libVkLayer_steam_fossilize.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Vulkan implicit layer #2 at /home/zamithal/.local/share/vulkan/implicit_layer.d/steamoverlay_i386.json: /home/zamithal/.steam/debian-installation/ubuntu12_32/steamoverlayvulkanlayer.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Vulkan implicit layer #3 at /home/zamithal/.local/share/vulkan/implicit_layer.d/steamoverlay_x86_64.json: /home/zamithal/.steam/debian-installation/ubuntu12_64/steamoverlayvulkanlayer.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Vulkan implicit layer #4 at /usr/share/vulkan/implicit_layer.d/VkLayer_MESA_device_select.json: libVkLayer_MESA_device_select.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Capturing glvnd loadable module #0: /usr/share/glvnd/egl_vendor.d/50_mesa.json pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Checking for implementation on x86_64-linux-gnu: libEGL_mesa.so.0 pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Captured glvnd loadable module #0: /usr/share/glvnd/egl_vendor.d/50_mesa.json pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Implementation on x86_64-linux-gnu: SONAME pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Capturing vulkan loadable module #0: /usr/share/vulkan/icd.d/intel_hasvk_icd.i686.json pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Checking for implementation on x86_64-linux-gnu: /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libvulkan_intel_hasvk.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Capturing vulkan loadable module #1: /usr/share/vulkan/icd.d/radeon_icd.x86_64.json pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Checking for implementation on x86_64-linux-gnu: /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libvulkan_radeon.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Capturing vulkan loadable module #2: /usr/share/vulkan/icd.d/intel_icd.x86_64.json pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Checking for implementation on x86_64-linux-gnu: /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libvulkan_intel.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Capturing vulkan loadable module #3: /usr/share/vulkan/icd.d/virtio_icd.i686.json pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Checking for implementation on x86_64-linux-gnu: /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libvulkan_virtio.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Capturing vulkan loadable module #4: /usr/share/vulkan/icd.d/intel_icd.i686.json pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Checking for implementation on x86_64-linux-gnu: /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libvulkan_intel.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Capturing vulkan loadable module #5: /usr/share/vulkan/icd.d/radeon_icd.i686.json pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Checking for implementation on x86_64-linux-gnu: /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libvulkan_radeon.so pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Capturing vulkan loadable module #6: /usr/share/vulkan/icd.d/intel_hasvk_icd.x86_64.json pressure-vessel-wrap[42106]: I: Checking for implementation on x86_64-linux-gnu: /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libvulkan_intel_hasvk.so
  
  No errors, that's good and also not useful :/
  As an aside, this is likely not the problem, but a good tip in general, is to use protonup to install GE-Proton (https://github.com/GloriousEggroll/proton-ge-custom). It is a community fork which essentially Proton Experimental + community fixes. The System76 article I linked above has the instructions (TL;DR, install protonup (terminal) or protonup-qt (GUI) and they'll grab it for you and put it in the right directory, restart Steam and select the new version from the Compatibility menu either globally or per-game).
  You essentially always want to be using the latest version of Proton unless something that was working breaks in a newer version.
  So, next step, more logs:
  You can enable proton logging by setting PROTON_LOG=1 as an environmental variable. You can do this per-game by right clicking a game -> Properties -> General and editing the launch options to say
  
  PROTON_LOG=1 %command%
  Launch the game and let it crash or whatever. There will be a steam-$APPID.log in your home directory.
  
  Well, back at it again. Tried ProtonGE with the same results. But the vulkan logs are interesting!
  cat ~/steam-220200.log | grep err
  
  err: Presenter: Failed to create Vulkan swapchain: VK_ERROR_INITIALIZATION_FAILED err: Presenter: Failed to create Vulkan swapchain: VK_ERROR_INITIALIZATION_FAILED err: Presenter: Failed to create Vulkan swapchain: VK_ERROR_INITIALIZATION_FAILED err: Presenter: Failed to create Vulkan swapchain: VK_ERROR_INITIALIZATION_FAILED err: Presenter: Failed to create Vulkan swapchain: VK_ERROR_INITIALIZATION_FAILED err: Presenter: Failed to create Vulkan swapchain: VK_ERROR_INITIALIZATION_FAILED
  EDIT: more context
  
  info: Presenter: Actual swapchain properties: info: Format: VK_FORMAT_B8G8R8A8_SRGB info: Color space: VK_COLOR_SPACE_SRGB_NONLINEAR_KHR info: Present mode: VK_PRESENT_MODE_IMMEDIATE_KHR (dynamic: no) info: Buffer size: 1920x1080 info: Image count: 4 err: Presenter: Failed to create Vulkan swapchain: VK_ERROR_INITIALIZATION_FAILED
  It's filled with this error. The entire log is massive I cant even upload it to pastebin. If you want me to search for something specific lmk or how I can supply the entire log.
  EDIT2: also found:
  
  99664.262:00d4:00d8:err:xrandr:xrandr14_get_adapters Failed to get adapters 99670.682:0180:0184:err:ole:com_get_class_object class {82c5ab54-c92c-4d52-aac5-27e25e22604c} not registered 99670.683:00e8:033c:warn:threadname:NtSetInformationThread Thread renamed to L"wine_rpcrt4_io" 99670.683:0180:0184:err:ole:create_server class {82c5ab54-c92c-4d52-aac5-27e25e22604c} not registered 99670.684:0180:0184:fixme:ole:com_get_class_object CLSCTX_REMOTE_SERVER not supported 99670.684:0180:0184:err:ole:com_get_class_object no class object {82c5ab54-c92c-4d52-aac5-27e25e22604c} could be created for context 0x15
  
  99664.262:00d4:00d8:err:xrandr:xrandr14_get_adapters Failed to get adapters
  Hmmm, this gets some hits. It seems like it isn't able to figure out which driver to use.
  You can specify the driver that Vulkan should use by adding an environmental variable VK_ICD_FILENAME set the the json file for your card.
  Try editing a game and changing the launch options to:
  
  VK_ICD_FILENAMES=/usr/share/vulkan/icd.d/radeon_icd.x86_64.json %command%
  
  This removes that "Failed to get adapters" error from the proton log but the behavior remains the same and the VK_ERROR_INITIALIZATION_FAILED still persists
  
  I just noticed my reply from my phone didn't go through x.x
  This seems a lot like you're missing some 32bit libraries. There isn't a /usr/share/vulkan/icd.d/radeon_icd.i386.json listed in the vulkan logs.
  I have no idea how they'd be named in PopOS, but I'd look into vulkan first. You may have the vulkan-radeon 64bit drivers , but not the 32bit. Wine needs the 32bit libraries for the time being.
  Check
  
  dpkg -l | grep vulkan
  (or post all of dkpg -l if it isn't too long)
  to see if you have the i386 version of the vulkan radeon drivers (for reference, in arch this is lib32-vulkan-radeon, possibly the same in PopOS)
  If not install them (apt search vulkan and look for something with vulkan, radeon and i386 in the file name)
  
  looks like it is.
  
  ii libvulkan1:amd64 1.3.280.0-1pop1~1722439676~22.04~a41a7d6 amd64 Vulkan loader library ii libvulkan1:i386 1.3.280.0-1pop1~1722439676~22.04~a41a7d6 i386 Vulkan loader library ii mesa-vulkan-drivers:amd64 24.0.3-1pop1~1711635559~22.04~7a9f319 amd64 Mesa Vulkan graphics drivers ii mesa-vulkan-drivers:i386 24.0.3-1pop1~1711635559~22.04~7a9f319 i386 Mesa Vulkan graphics drivers ii vulkan-tools 1.3.204.0+dfsg1-1 amd64 Miscellaneous Vulkan utilities ➜ ~
  The whole log is too large for lemmy, but here is a pastebin link: https://pastebin.com/sxU2QYTc
  System76 is advising I go full nuclear and reinstall from recovery partition, which I don't really think would fix anything and I'm hesitant to do.
  
  Yeah, you have Vulkan and Mesa and the GPU drivers are in the kernel. That's the whole stack (along with Proton).
  Before reinstalling completely, run a full system upgrade, I took this from system76s support page:
  
  sudo apt update # configure any packages partially setup sudo dpkg --configure -a # fix any missing package dependency sudo apt install -f # upgrade all packages and dependencies to newest in release sudo apt full-upgrade # make sure the `pop-desktop` meta package is installed sudo apt install pop-desktop
  You're also likely using some flatpak applications, so:
  
  flatpak update
  Then reboot.
  They want you to reinstall because walking you through a fresh install is just more time efficient for their support staff than trying to troubleshoot system configuration problems (imagine the possible things a random user could change x.x).

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