zed-industries
Zed doesn't have graphical acceleration, and errors about this on startup - Tegra X1 L4T
Summary
Zed doesn't have graphical acceleration, and errors about this on startup on Tegra X1 L4T.
Steps to trigger the problem:
- Be using an NVIDIA Tegra X1-powered device, such as a Jetson Nano, Google Pixel C, NVIDIA Shield TV, or Nintendo Switch.
- Run Linux on it with the proprietary Tegra L4T BSP.
- Install and run Zed.
- It does not run with GPU acceleration, and complains about running in software rendering on start.
Actual Behavior: It does not run with GPU acceleration, and complains about running in software rendering on start.
Expected Behavior: It launches normally, with GPU acceleration.
I personally observed this issue running L4T Ubuntu Noble (24.04) on a Nintendo Switch, though I very highly suspect that it would occur on any Tegra X1 device with the proprietary NVIDIA Tegra BSP, which is what provides the Vulkan drivers. Note that the final branch of the Tegra BSP to support Tegra X1 (r32), is only going to recieve bugfixes and security updates from now on, and this has been the case for a while, so this lack of extension support will never be addressed by NVIDIA. Running nouveau is not a possibility on this hardware either, even if it could in theory make it supported by Zed. Here's the log file from Zed, if it helps. It shows the missing extension in this GPU driver, and tells me to update it. However, that's not a possibility here.
Is there any workaround possible here, and are there any plans to allow Zed to run on GPUs that do not support this extension? Thanks!
Zed Version and System Specs
Zed: v0.179.4 (Zed)
OS: Linux X11 ubuntu 24.04
Memory: 3.9 GiB
Architecture: aarch64
GPU: llvmpipe (LLVM 19.1.1, 128 bits) || llvmpipe || Mesa 24.2.8-1ubuntu1~24.04.1 (LLVM 19.1.1)
FWIW, nouveau/mesa do support the Tegra X1. I haven't tested it in a long time though and can see why going that way could be impractical.
We're currently using blade for rendering on Linux.
@kvark is it possible to use blade if "VK_KHR_timeline_semaphore" is not supported? (or would it be hypothetically possible to send PRs to work around it?)
I see "Tegra X1" supporting timeline semaphores on Linux, based on https://vulkan.gpuinfo.org/listreports.php?devicename=NVIDIA+Tegra+X1+%28nvgpu%29&extension=VK_KHR_timeline_semaphore&platform=linux There is one report from 2025 that doesn't though - https://vulkan.gpuinfo.org/displayreport.php?id=39240#properties_extensions
