N64 Vulkan ParaLLel crashes RetroArch

Libretro Cores
#1

Hi all

I have RetroArch installed on my retro gaming machine in the living room. It sports an old Core Duo E8400 (3GHz), and a Nvidia GT730 with the newest drivers. Therefore, I should be able to run applications using Vulkan. Whenever I try to set up the new N64 ParaLLel core, and switch the video driver to Vulkan, RetroArch crashes. I can set the video driver to Vulkan and save the config, but when I try to load it, RetroArch crashes. This also happens when I switch the video driver, and then try to set RetroArch to fullscreen. Any ideas?

#2

So, leaving ParaLLEl out of the equation for the moment, if you go to settings > driver and change ‘video’ from ‘gl’ to ‘vulkan’ and then quit retroarch, it insta-crashes when you try to re-launch?

Can you run nvidia’s threaded rendering test (the one with the fish from this page): https://developer.nvidia.com/gameworks-vulkan-and-opengl-samples

#3

Hm, it’s a strange thing. Apparently, my GT 730 from ASUS (model: 90YV06P0-M0NA00) is a Kepler card (there’s also Fermi models), and thus should be Vulkan ready. But when I install the newest Nvidia drivers, Vulkan is not installed, and when I run the fish demo I get an error “vulkan-1.dll not found”. So I installed Vulkan manually (the installer was in the Nvidia folder), and now I have a vulkan folder with all files. The chopper demo works fine, but the fish demo crashes on startup. So does RetroArch when the Vulkan driver is selected. It crashes right upon starting it.

#4

Sorry for barging right in but I have the same problem actually where RetroArch crashes immediately at start when Vulkan is selected, switch back to OpenGL and RetroArch works OK. I can’t use ParaLLEl for this reason which blows because I have a R9 380X which should be Vulkan compatible.

Is this thing GPU driver dependent? Because I use Crimson 16.3.2 which is the latest working driver release for me. Anything newer screw things up. 16.3.2 should be Vulkan compatible also, so I don’t know.

Would really like to try this out, but anything Vulkan related crashes for me despite all is installed.

#5

Did you try the fish demo?

I think that driver should be fine. I was using either it or one close to it on my R7 200 series with ParaLLEl.

#6

[QUOTE=hunterk;45651]Did you try the fish demo?

I think that driver should be fine. I was using either it or one close to it on my R7 200 series with ParaLLEl.[/QUOTE]

The only demo that came with Vulkan did not contain anything resembling a fish at all. It was just a command prompt going through a bunch of stuff I don’t even understood the half of. First I couldn’t even run that but after installing and re-installing several times it ran but it still complained about manifests missing from the registry.

At that point I gave up completely.

I don’t really know what to do next here honestly. Any game demo or something to try, or at least something that resembling an image instead of a wall of text in a command prompt?

#7

[QUOTE=hunterk;44925]Can you run nvidia’s threaded rendering test (the one with the fish from this page): https://developer.nvidia.com/gameworks-vulkan-and-opengl-samples[/QUOTE] This is the one I meant ^^

#8

I’m gonna try both this (Fish): http://developer.download.nvidia.com/mobile/shield/assets/ThreadedRenderingVk/ThreadedRenderingVk_20160707.zip

and this (Chopper):

https://nvidia.app.box.com/s/rj9nzxkpz21qu34h8zew301kray9urbf

Will report back if it worked or not and then we’ll take it from there.

#9

I’m back and I don’t have good news.

Both the Chopper and the Fish demo crashes upon launch with no further explanation or crash logs.

I have the hardware, I have the software but Vulkan doesn’t seem to care at all and have promptly decided not to work no matter what.

Either this API is way to young or my specs sucks ballz:

Windows 10 1607 Anniversary Update i7 4970K @ 4.0GHz (stock clock) R9 380X 4GB (Crimson 16.3.2 drivers) 16GB Corsair XMS3 DDR3

So now I’m even further away from experiencing the N64 glory.

Maybe it could have worked in a ParaLLEl universe? Nah jokes aside what else can I do?

#10

I think updating your GPU driver is pretty much your only option. And, yeah, the driver support from vendors is still spotty and inconsistent.

#11

Yeah and that’s a real shame because if I update GPU drivers to anything newer then 16.3.2, my Sony Bravia 48" TV starts to disconnect/re-connect the display connection constantly which is annoying as hell. AMD’s drivers have been quite unstable for me lately so it’s a shame I can’t update to anything newer.

#12

I’ve decided to wait and hold off with this for a year or so.

Maybe AMD have made better drivers and Vulkan have matured more then. I’m sticking with Project64 1.7.0.50 rev23 and the Mupen64 Libretro Core until then.