SteamVR Release Notes and Known Issues
This is a development release. It is intended to allow developers to start creating SteamVR content for Linux platforms. Limited hardware support is provided.
SteamVR and VR apps require a special build of the 64-bit Vulkan loader, which is included in the Steam Runtime. Make sure a system copy of libvulkan isn't being picked up by SteamVR or the games, which might involve disabling STEAM_RUNTIME_PREFER_HOST_LIBRARIES if you have a libvulkan installed on your system.
For discussions and questions, please use the SteamVR for Linux forum at http://steamcommunity.com/app/250820/discussions/5/.
For bugs, please file an issue on this github issue tracker. https://github.com/ValveSoftware/SteamVR-for-Linux/issues
GRAPHICS DRIVER REQUIREMENTS
SteamVR is built on top of the Vulkan API and requires the latest Vulkan drivers.
NVIDIA cards require version 381.26.13 of the NVIDIA Driver or above; current mainline driver, 381.22 does not have the needed extensions. An Ubuntu-packaged version of this driver can be found in the "NVIDIA Development Drivers" PPA at https://launchpad.net/~mamarley/+archive/ubuntu/nvidia-dev/+packages, courtesy of Michael Marley.
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:mamarley/nvidia-dev
The NVIDIA driver supports direct mode, meaning the HMD will not appear on your desktop, or if it does, the display will have to be turned off in xrandr before being able to use VR.
AMD graphics require the radv driver from Mesa 17.3 or above or mainline mesa after this commit. For proper VK_KHR_external_semaphore_fd and EXT_memory_object_fd support Linux 4.13-rc1 or newer is required. It doesn't support direct mode currently, so the HMD display will have to be positioned on your desktop in extended mode, and your system compositor disabled while using VR.
Intel graphics are not currently supported.
USB DEVICE REQUIREMENTS
SteamVR needs to be able to access the HTC Vive's USB devices. On most Linux distributions this is not allowed by default. The latest version (1.0.0.54) of the Steam package available on http://store.steampowered.com will automatically install udev rules that allow this. However, many distributions repackage Steam. If you have installed one of those packages, you may not have the latest Steam udev rules. Your udev rules should be in the file /lib/udev/rules.d/60-HTC-Vive-perms.rules and contain the following rules:
# HTC Vive HID Sensor naming and permissioning
KERNEL=="hidraw*", SUBSYSTEM=="hidraw", ATTRS{idVendor}=="0bb4", ATTRS{idProduct}=="2c87", TAG+="uaccess"
KERNEL=="hidraw*", SUBSYSTEM=="hidraw", ATTRS{idVendor}=="28de", ATTRS{idProduct}=="2101", TAG+="uaccess"
KERNEL=="hidraw*", SUBSYSTEM=="hidraw", ATTRS{idVendor}=="28de", ATTRS{idProduct}=="2000", TAG+="uaccess"
KERNEL=="hidraw*", SUBSYSTEM=="hidraw", ATTRS{idVendor}=="28de", ATTRS{idProduct}=="1043", TAG+="uaccess"
KERNEL=="hidraw*", SUBSYSTEM=="hidraw", ATTRS{idVendor}=="28de", ATTRS{idProduct}=="2050", TAG+="uaccess"
KERNEL=="hidraw*", SUBSYSTEM=="hidraw", ATTRS{idVendor}=="28de", ATTRS{idProduct}=="2011", TAG+="uaccess"
KERNEL=="hidraw*", SUBSYSTEM=="hidraw", ATTRS{idVendor}=="28de", ATTRS{idProduct}=="2012", TAG+="uaccess"
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTRS{idVendor}=="0bb4", ATTRS{idProduct}=="2c87", TAG+="uaccess"
# HTC Camera USB Node
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTRS{idVendor}=="114d", ATTRS{idProduct}=="8328", TAG+="uaccess"
# HTC Mass Storage Node
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTRS{idVendor}=="114d", ATTRS{idProduct}=="8200", TAG+="uaccess"
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTRS{idVendor}=="114d", ATTRS{idProduct}=="8a12", TAG+="uaccess"
NATIVE DEVELOPMENT
Version 1.0.7 of the OpenVR SDK has full support for Linux platforms: https://github.com/ValveSoftware/openvr
RUNTIME REQUIREMENTS
SteamVR applications must run within the Steam runtime which supplies all the required shared libraries.
~/.steam/steam/ubuntu12_32/steam-runtime/run.sh ./my_steamvr_app
will launch the application in the correct environment. See https://github.com/ValveSoftware/steam-runtime for more information about the Steam Runtime.
UNREAL ENGINE
Unreal Engine 4.16 will have support for SteamVR on Linux. The 4.16 branch is currently available in the UE4 GitHub repository for preview access: https://github.com/EpicGames (requires free Epic Games account).
UNITY DEVELOPMENT
Unity development is not currently supported.
KNOWN ISSUES
- OpenGL applications are currently too slow to use interactively; only the Vulkan Submit path is optimal. See: https://github.com/ValveSoftware/openvr/wiki/Vulkan
- Even with Vulkan applications, performance issues are still being worked on on both the runtime and the game engine side
Desktop view in the dashboard currently doesn't work(fixed in May 8 Steam client beta)- Power management of base stations is not currently implemented
- Headset audio device switching is not currently implemented
- The VR status window isn't currently aware of direct mode being enabled or not, so the "enable direct mode" and "disable direct mode" buttons should not be used; direct mode is automatically enabled where supported
- Firmware update of base stations is not supported (both USB and Bluetooth connections)