The famous open-source platform MESA on Linux has pushed out CPU-based ray tracing for its Vulkan driver, opening new performance possibilities on the OS.
MESA's Latest Attempt To Improve Performance at Linux Now Features CPU-Based Ray Tracing Support
Well, CPU-based ray tracing isn't a term we hear every day, mainly because it is generally limited compared to those we see with GPUs. However, some CPUs, mostly the higher-end ones, work out perfectly fine for low-intensive RT tasks. Phoronix reports that the MESA Lavapipe driver has received support for CPU-based ray tracing, which means that Linux users will now have another way of implementing RT on their platform.
It is disclosed that CPU RT enablement has been done by "code porting" some parts from the RADV Vulkan ray-tracing support in older Radeon GPUs. For those unaware, the MESA team has recently pushed out new patches for open-source Mesa RADV Vulkan drivers, which brought in uplifted ray-tracing performance on the platform. This showed that the developers are serious about bringing ray-tracing capabilities onto Linux, and the CPU-based RT now offers a similar commitment, although we do await performance figures, which the developer Konstantin Seurer told us not to ask about.
You can see from the Quake RTX screenshot above that the CPU produces just 1 FPS at a load of 34% and it looks like the performance isn't as smooth as you'd expect from a modern-day GPU.
Linux is turning out to be a decent platform for users to resort to, as with open-source solutions existing in the markets, such as MESA's Vulkan, the OS doesn't lag behind the competition out there.
News Source: Phoronix
About the author: Muhammad Zuhair is a hardware and technology reporter for Wccftech, specializing in the semiconductor industry and the complex interplay between technology, manufacturing, and geopolitics. His coverage focuses on the corporate strategies and technological roadmaps of industry giants like TSMC, NVIDIA, Samsung, and Intel. Zuhair's expertise lies in deconstructing complex topics such as fabrication nodes (e.g., 2nm process), the economic impact of policies like the CHIPS Act, and the strategic development of AI infrastructure from NVIDIA, AMD and Intel.
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