Strata 0.2.1 Neueste

Update 0.2.1.1 (2026-10-20): Windows Terminal fix. On Windows with long paths off (the default), the Terminal could not install an AMD engine: "The engine could not be installed. local file operation failed (FileNotFoundError)". The engine is now unpacked into a much shorter folder and with paths Windows accepts at any length, and a path that is still too long gets a plain message. If you use the Terminal on Windows, install it again once with irm https://github.com/Niko1221/Strata/releases/latest/download/install.ps1 | iex (your models and settings stay); it installs Terminal 0.1.46.1, and strata launch works again. (strata update downloads 0.1.46.1 too, but the Terminal on your PATH keeps starting the old version; that is fixed in the next release.) A new install gets it straight away. The app and the engines are unchanged.

0.2.1: a task board in the app, pictures on the Mac and on Intel Arc cards, `strata bench run` with a fixed standard benchmark, faster downloads, Docker images, and your own engine settings are no longer overwritten. It also fixes the crashes, stuck downloads and GPU-choice bugs reported on 0.2.0-beta. Each new default below says what it was measured on and whether the answers are identical to 0.2.0. The engine packages are version 0.1.46 (0.2.0 had 0.1.45.3) and the update feed has sequence number 102. Update with strata update (Terminal), Settings > Update (app), or UPDATE.bat / ./update.sh (source installs).

Which file to download

| System | Your graphics card | File | | --- | --- | --- | | Windows 10 / 11 | NVIDIA RTX, driver 580 or newer | Strata-0.2.1-windows-cuda13.exe | | | NVIDIA, older card or driver older than 580 | Strata-0.2.1-windows-cuda12.exe | | | AMD Radeon RX 9000 series or Radeon AI PRO R9700 | Strata-0.2.1-windows-hip.exe | | | AMD Radeon RX 7000 series or Ryzen AI Max (Strix Halo) | Strata-0.2.1-windows-hip-rdna3.exe | | Linux | NVIDIA RTX, driver 580 or newer | Strata-0.2.1-linux-nvidia-cuda13.AppImage | | | NVIDIA, older card or driver older than 580 | Strata-0.2.1-linux-nvidia-cuda12.AppImage | | | AMD Radeon RX 9000 series or Radeon AI PRO R9700 | Strata-0.2.1-linux-amd-rx9070.AppImage | | | AMD Radeon RX 7000 series | Strata-0.2.1-linux-amd-rx7900.AppImage | | | AMD Ryzen AI Max (Strix Halo) | Strata-0.2.1-linux-amd-strixhalo.AppImage | | Mac | Apple silicon, macOS 15 or newer | Strata-0.2.1-mac.dmg (signed and notarised by Apple) |

The Terminal installs with one line and picks its engine by itself (curl -fsSL https://github.com/Niko1221/Strata/releases/latest/download/install.sh | sh, or irm https://github.com/Niko1221/Strata/releases/latest/download/install.ps1 | iex on Windows). The other files in this release are the engine and Terminal packages, the signed update feed and the in-app update files; you do not need to download them. Docker images are separate (below).

What is new

• A task board in the app. On the Tasks screen, a Schedule | Board switch shows your scheduled tasks and loops as a board: what is running, what is waiting for your approval (from every chat), and what failed. Each run has one plain line, only the newest problem of a task is shown, and a problem can be dismissed. The sidebar shows how many tasks need you. All eight app languages are translated.
• Pictures on the Mac. The Mac app and Terminal now read pictures by default. The reader runs on the Mac's GPU (Metal), built into strata-vision and signed with the app. Measured on an M4 Mac: a 260-token picture 0.45 s on the GPU reader against 50.7 s on the CPU, a 972-token picture 2.4 s against 194 s; the GPU reader takes about 1.2 GB of memory. On the 972-token picture 8 of 972 picture tokens differ from the CPU reader (cosine down to 0.48, in the text area); the answers were correct. --vision cpu is still there and warns that it takes about 50 seconds per picture.
• Pictures on Intel Arc cards. Alchemist cards (A-series) read pictures by default through the CPU reader; Battlemage (B-series) stays opt-in (see Known limits). A new GPU picture reader for SYCL (--vision gpu) takes 0.16 s per picture on an A750 against 1.73 s on the CPU (its picture embeddings equal the CPU reader's to a cosine of 0.9959 to 0.9999). Ten varied pictures and a multi-picture chat all passed on the A750.
• `strata bench run` runs the standard benchmark. The default suite is standard-v1: fixed request files (34 of them, with a checksum list) in the Terminal archive, a scorer, a validator and a report that leaves out personal data. The Terminal archive now carries its commit, because a run without one does not count. The protocol text in docs/BENCHMARK_PROTOCOL.md is still a draft. See docs/COMMUNITY_BENCHMARKS.md for how to send a result.
• Faster downloads. Big model files come over 16 connections with several pieces per request (0.2.0 used 8 connections and a new connection for every piece). On the test PC, from Hugging Face, three interleaved pairs: 68.6 / 65.9 / 70.6 MB/s before, 74.4 / 74.8 / 74.9 MB/s now (+9%; the line itself tops out near 75 to 85 MB/s). The fetch of the draft layer (MTP) went from 25.0 / 28.1 / 37.6 MB/s to 47.4 / 50.5 / 52.2 MB/s, and its file list from 28 s to 4.6 s. ModelScope downloads, whose server reports no file length, now use several connections too. The files are the same and are still checked against their pinned SHA-256.
• Docker images. Ready-made images for ghcr.io/niko1221/strata:0.2.1-<flavor>: cuda13, cuda12, rocm-gfx120x (RX 9000, R9700), rocm-gfx110x (RX 7000) and rocm-gfx1151 (Strix Halo). They are built from the signed release packages by the repository's workflow. The start-up test passed on an RTX A4000 (cuda13 and cuda12) and on a Radeon AI PRO R9700 (rocm-gfx120x); the gfx110x and gfx1151 images were built but not run on a card. There is no Intel image yet. See docs/DOCKER.md. The workflow starts after this release is published, because it reads the release's own files, so the images appear a few hours later.
• Your own engine settings stay. The app and setup used to rewrite the run config on every Load. Options you set by hand (--vram-reserve-mib, control vectors, any option setup does not choose itself) are now kept in user_args, and what you set wins over what the app generates. See Fixes.
• Draft layer (MTP) switch. Settings > Expert has a Draft layer (MTP) on/off per model, and strata launch --mtp on|off does the same. A picture-off choice and a custom context size stick across loads.
• Fit checks count the draft layer. With MTP on, the draft layer takes about 1 GB of graphics memory; the model fit check and the expert-cache sizing now count it.
• The model page shows the engine's own pick for your PC (the memory tiers of 0.2.0), with Gyro-M named as the other choice at 40 GB.
• The chat footer speed is the writing speed. It divides output tokens by decode time, so a tool-call turn no longer shows "632 tok/s" when the engine ran at 50 to 75.
• A wrong download says so. An installer for another make of graphics card (an AMD build on an NVIDIA PC) tells you in plain words which file to get and does not unpack its engine. An installed engine with no model loaded is no longer reported as "No Strata engine".
• Terminal. A model that is already on disk says "already downloaded". strata monitor finds a running strata launch without --url.
• The standard AMD packages carry the hipBLASLt tuning tables and the engine start picks the one for the card (see New defaults for when it is used).

New defaults, with what we measured

Speed numbers are medians of interleaved pairs on the same box, a fresh engine per run; "pairs faster" counts the pairs the new default won. Each default has an off switch.

• Mini PCs with a Radeon 780M (gfx1103), Linux: the matrix-core prompt set is on. Measured on a Ryzen 7 8745