Running `phoronix-test-suite system-properties` over SSH detects GPUs as llvmpipe. Blocks all nvidia/CUDA tests unless run from local Wayland display.

[jboero]

I just burned half a day wondering why I could run the pts/llama-cpp CUDA backend yesterday but not today. I finally noticed actual dedicated GPUs aren't listed in system-properties over SSH and software rendering is the only option given. This seems like a pretty big oversite for benchmarking if system properties aren't showing actual GPUs which are clearly listed by other means. Shouldn't GPU detection be more thorough?

In order to force detection of CUDA devices for CUDA backend I had to manually hack pts_test_run_options.php, in case anyone else needs the workaround:

sudo sed -i "759s|stripos(phodevi::read_property('gpu', 'model'), 'NVIDIA') === false|stripos(phodevi::read_property('gpu', 'model'), 'NVIDIA') === false \&\& !pts_client::executable_in_path('nvidia-smi')|" /usr/share/phoronix-test-suite/pts-core/objects/pts_test_run_options.php
sudo sed -i "765s|stripos(phodevi::read_property('gpu', 'model'), 'NVIDIA') === false|stripos(phodevi::read_property('gpu', 'model'), 'NVIDIA') === false \&\& !pts_client::executable_in_path('nvidia-smi')|" /usr/share/phoronix-test-suite/pts-core/objects/pts_test_run_options.php

Nvidia-smi is always capable of finding the devices, so I'm surprised this isn't used directly, or a variant of clinfo:

jboero@z840 ~> nvidia-smi
Sun Mar 22 16:16:30 2026       
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| NVIDIA-SMI 580.126.18             Driver Version: 580.126.18     CUDA Version: 13.0     |
+-----------------------------------------+------------------------+----------------------+
| GPU  Name                 Persistence-M | Bus-Id          Disp.A | Volatile Uncorr. ECC |
| Fan  Temp   Perf          Pwr:Usage/Cap |           Memory-Usage | GPU-Util  Compute M. |
|                                         |                        |               MIG M. |
|=========================================+========================+======================|
|   0  Quadro GV100                   Off |   00000000:06:00.0 Off |                  Off |
| 40%   53C    P0             46W /  250W |     132MiB /  32768MiB |      0%      Default |
|                                         |                        |                  N/A |
+-----------------------------------------+------------------------+----------------------+
|   1  Quadro GV100                   Off |   00000000:84:00.0 Off |                  Off |
| 43%   57C    P0             52W /  250W |     140MiB /  32768MiB |      0%      Default |
|                                         |                        |                  N/A |
+-----------------------------------------+------------------------+----------------------+

+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Processes:                                                                              |
|  GPU   GI   CI              PID   Type   Process name                        GPU Memory |
|        ID   ID                                                               Usage      |
|=========================================================================================|
|    0   N/A  N/A          102771      G   /usr/libexec/Xorg                        64MiB |
|    0   N/A  N/A          102861      G   /usr/bin/sddm-greeter-qt6                63MiB |
|    1   N/A  N/A          102771      G   /usr/libexec/Xorg                        64MiB |
|    1   N/A  N/A          102861      G   /usr/bin/sddm-greeter-qt6                63MiB |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+

Properties improperly listing llvmpipe as display driver (this output remains the same after workaround):

jboero@z840 ~> phoronix-test-suite system-properties
....
GPU
     identifier = llvmpipe
     model = llvmpipe
     frequency = 
     stock-frequency = 
          0 = 0

          0 = 0
     memory-capacity = 32768
     oc-offset-string = 0
     aa-level = 
     af-level = 
     compute-cores = 
     available-modes = 
          0 = 800
          1 = 600

          0 = 1024
          1 = 768

          0 = 1280
          1 = 1024

          0 = 1600
          1 = 1200

          0 = 1920
          1 = 1080

          0 = 1920
          1 = 1200
     screen-resolution = 
          1920 = 1920

          1200 = 1200
     screen-resolution-string = 1920x1200
     2d-acceleration = 
     bar1-visible-vram = 256 MiB
     vbios-version = 88.00.3b.00.0c
     device-id =