chore(release): bump workspace version to 0.26.0

47 commits since v0.25.0, most of them from field reports on 0.25.0 itself,
plus Wave 2 of the PyroWave Linux host-performance program.

Nothing breaks: the wire protocol stays at 2 and the C ABI stays at 17, so
this release adds no call, no message and no capability bit. pf-driver-proto
is byte-for-byte identical to v0.25.0 and to v0.24.0.

Four new environment variables (PUNKTFUNK_OVERLAY_MASK,
PUNKTFUNK_GAMESCOPE_REFRESH_RATES, PUNKTFUNK_PYROWAVE_CHUNK_KIB,
PUNKTFUNK_PYROWAVE_STREAMED_AU), verified new by git grep at the v0.25.0 tag
rather than assumed. plugin-kit goes 0.3.2 -> 0.4.0 for the `plugin` launch
kind; the SDK goes 0.1.2 -> 0.1.4; gamescope patch level +pfhdr2 -> +pfhdr4.

Two behaviour changes make a client advertise LESS than it used to, both
deliberate: VIDEO_CAP_444 is now probed against the driver rather than ridden
off the setting alone (every Steam Deck with "Full chroma" on was losing HEVC
entirely, not crispness — no AMD silicon decodes HEVC 4:4:4), and the Decky
client-update check now reports a failure instead of dressing it up as
"up to date".

Bump is the same four files as 0.25.0: Cargo.toml, Cargo.lock,
docs/releases/v0.26.0.md, docs/releases/whatsnew/v0.26.0.txt — plus the
CHANGELOG.md section, which the split at 0.25.0 made part of the ritual.

Gates run locally, all green:
  * cargo fmt --all --check          clean
  * cargo metadata --locked          resolves
  * Cargo.lock diff                  versions-only, 70/70 changed lines, 35 crates
  * Play whatsnew gate               398/500 chars, not byte-identical to any other release
  * notes voice check                0 internal-vocabulary hits above "## For developers"

Notes are 66 lines against 0.25.0's 83, covering 47 commits.

Still owed on glass and recorded in the CHANGELOG's verification table:
iPhone + Bluetooth listen, Apple TV stats overlay, MacBook audio listen, the
Deck HEVC/4:4:4 retest, a Windows wake-from-sleep cycle, and the
PyroWave-under-game-load A/B with CAP_SYS_NICE actually granted.

CHANGELOG.md

@@ -12,6 +12,412 @@ with the version table of the release you are moving to, then read **Breaking ch
 
 ---
 
+## v0.26.0
+
+47 commits since v0.25.0.
+
+### Versions
+
+| | v0.25.0 | v0.26.0 | Notes |
+|---|---|---|---|
+| Wire protocol | 2 | **2** | unchanged |
+| C ABI | 17 | **17** | unchanged — no symbol added, removed or changed |
+| Workspace crate dirs | 26 | **26** | unchanged (40 workspace members) |
+| Virtual-display driver protocol | 6 | **6** | unchanged (minimum accepted still 3) |
+| Windows virtual-gamepad channel | 3 | **3** | unchanged |
+| Plugin index schema | 1 | **1** | unchanged |
+| `api/openapi.json` | 0.24.0 | **0.25.0** | tracks API edits, lags one release by convention |
+| gamescope patch level (`+pfhdrN`) | 2 | **4** | 3 patches → 6; `pkgrel` 1 → 2 |
+| `@punktfunk/host` (SDK) | 0.1.2 | **0.1.4** | |
+| `@punktfunk/plugin-kit` | 0.3.2 | **0.4.0** | the `plugin` launch kind |
+
+`crates/pf-driver-proto` is byte-for-byte identical to v0.25.0 and to v0.24.0 — if you ship the
+virtual-display driver or the gamepad channel, the last two releases have not touched you.
+
+### ⚠ Breaking changes
+
+**None.** This is a fixes release. Every embedder, packager and plugin that works against v0.25.0
+works against v0.26.0 unchanged. Two behaviour changes are worth knowing about anyway, because both
+make a client advertise *less* than it used to — see **Capability advertisement** below.
+
+### Capability advertisement
+
+- **`VIDEO_CAP_444` is now probed, not asserted.** It rode the "Full chroma" setting alone. That was
+  safe while a software HEVC decoder sat underneath it; M8 removed one (there is no permissively
+  licensed HEVC CPU decoder, so `software_decodable_codecs()` is `H264|AV1`). The host grants 4:4:4
+  on HEVC **only** and answers the resolved chroma in the `Welcome` *before* the client builds a
+  decoder — so on a device with no 4:4:4 decode the toggle did not cost crispness, it cost the whole
+  codec: the Vulkan rung refuses the shape at construction, VAAPI refuses it too, there is no CPU
+  rung, and the session reconnects on H.264. No AMD silicon has HEVC 4:4:4 decode, so every Steam
+  Deck with that switch on lost HEVC. Per-profile and default-off, which is why it read as
+  intermittent.
+
+  Now gated on `hevc_444_hardware_decodable`, which asks the driver through the same code the rung
+  uses at construction (`VkH265Decoder::probe_stream_support`). **Both depths are required**, not
+  either: with HDR the host may resolve 4:4:4 10-bit, and a device offering `YUV444_8` but not
+  `YUV444_10` lands in the same hole. Answering from the Vulkan rung alone is exact rather than
+  approximate — it is the only rung in this build that implements 4:4:4 at all
+  (`pf_vaadec::profile_for` errors on `chroma_format_idc 3`, pf-dxvadec refuses anything but 4:2:0,
+  the CPU rung is 8-bit 4:2:0).
+
+  ⚠ Deliberately **not** extended to `VIDEO_CAP_10BIT`/HDR: all three rungs implement 10-bit 4:2:0,
+  so a Vulkan-only probe there would withdraw HDR from boxes whose VAAPI/DXVA rung decodes it
+  perfectly — a regression against a case never observed.
+
+  The bit arithmetic moved into `video::video_caps_for` so the part that was wrong is testable
+  without a GPU, a host or a `Hello`; the test is verified non-vacuous against the planted defect.
+
+### Host and client environment variables
+
+Four new, one clarified. Verified new by `git grep` at the v0.25.0 tag, not assumed —
+`PUNKTFUNK_JUMBO`, `PUNKTFUNK_WIRE_MTU`, `PUNKTFUNK_STREAMED_AU`, `PUNKTFUNK_LIBRARY_ART_ROOTS`,
+`PUNKTFUNK_RECOVER_SESSION_CMD`, `PUNKTFUNK_GAMESCOPE_SDR_NITS`, `PUNKTFUNK_MAX_FPS` and
+`PUNKTFUNK_ON_CONNECT_CMD` all already existed.
+
+- **`PUNKTFUNK_OVERLAY_MASK`** *(new, client)* — controls the Steam-overlay input mask below.
+- **`PUNKTFUNK_PYROWAVE_CHUNK_KIB`** *(new)* and **`PUNKTFUNK_PYROWAVE_STREAMED_AU`** *(new)* —
+  PyroWave AU chunking and the streamed-AU path.
+- **`PYROWAVE_QUEUE_PRIORITY`** *(existed, but was inert on Linux — see below)* — grammar: unset →
+  realtime, ASCII-lowercased, `off` alone disables, `high` asks for HIGH only, junk falls back to
+  the ladder rather than to off. ⚠ **One env var must not mean two things on two platforms**, so
+  the Rust grammar is unit-tested against the C patch's, including where both are deliberately
+  un-clever (neither trims).
+- **`PUNKTFUNK_GAMESCOPE_REFRESH_RATES=60,90,120`** *(new)* — widens the set a gamescope session
+  offers in Steam's in-session display settings. The rate the session actually runs at is always
+  included, so it can only add options; junk entries are skipped rather than failing the host.
+  Requires gamescope patch level 3+.
+- **`PUNKTFUNK_COMPOSITOR`** *(behaviour clarified, not changed)* — documented as "which backend to
+  drive", it also silently discarded `game_session=dedicated`: `resolve_compositor` gated the
+  dedicated route on `!overridden` and logged nothing either way. The pin still wins — it is the
+  operator's explicit knob — but it now says so and names itself. Two further holes closed with it:
+  the pin put its backend into `available()` unconditionally *and* skipped `apply_session_env`'s
+  `XDG_CURRENT_DESKTOP` scrub, so `pick_compositor` could never return `None` — the one call site of
+  `try_recover_session()`, which left `PUNKTFUNK_RECOVER_SESSION_CMD` unreachable behind that arm.
+  Liveness is now read on both paths. `needs_live_session()` exempts gamescope, which stands up its
+  own session, so pinning it on a headless box stays supported.
+
+### Client settings keys
+
+All additive; an older client ignores what it does not know, and a newer value can never trap an
+older client.
+
+- **`gamepad_ui_mode`** — `"connected"` (default, and exactly what the previous lone Bool meant) or
+  `"always"`. Splits *whether* the controller UI is offered from *when* it appears.
+  `GamepadUIEnvironment.isActive` takes the mode with **no default argument** on purpose: a call
+  site that forgot it would silently strand everyone who chose Always. An unrecognized value waits
+  for a controller.
+- **`ui_palette`** gains `oled` at **index 1**, directly after the brand default — keeping
+  `PALETTES[0]` the unknown-id fallback and the dark-to-pale cycling order intact. Hand-mirrored in
+  three languages (`pf-console-ui`'s `library.rs`, `GamepadPalette.swift`, `GamepadPalette.kt`); each
+  port carries an `oled_is_actually_black` test that measures the claim (mean cell luminance 0.019
+  against Violet's 0.254) rather than restating the table.
+- **`library-hidden.json`** — per-title hide list, mirroring how `library-scanners.json` holds
+  disabled sources. Deliberately **not** stored on the entry: a scanner's and a plugin's titles are
+  rebuilt from scratch on every scan and reconcile, so a flag written onto one would be erased
+  minutes later. Applied in `all_games`, the single funnel every play surface already goes through
+  (client grid, native clients, the GameStream app list, launch resolution).
+
+### gamescope patches
+
+Three → six, and the marker patch moves last so the banner is stamped after the capabilities it
+advertises.
+
+- **0003 — headless: advertise the virtual display's mode and refresh rates.** `CHeadlessConnector`
+  returned empty spans from `GetModes()` and `GetValidDynamicRefreshRates()` and reported
+  `GAMESCOPE_SCREEN_TYPE_INTERNAL`, so `update_mode_atoms` **deleted** the mode-list atom and
+  wlserver fell through to a one-entry refresh list built from `g_nOutputRefresh` — which, with
+  `--nested-refresh` absent, is `Init()`'s 60 Hz default. That is why a 1920x1080@120 client saw
+  "gamescope only shows 60hz" and Overwatch capped itself to 60 while the stream ran at 120. Now
+  populates both from the resolved mode, reports `EXTERNAL`, and adds `--custom-refresh-rates`.
+  gamescope-session-plus has probed for that flag for years; upstream never had it, so the
+  `CUSTOM_REFRESH_RATES` env it plumbs was a no-op everywhere.
+- **0004 — pipewire: optionally composite the external overlay into the capture stream.** That layer
+  is mangoapp. `paint_pipewire` has never referenced it on any version. Behind
+  `--pipewire-composite-external-overlay`, off by default.
+- **0006 — never destroy the Vulkan device or output.** `g_device` (`CVulkanDevice`) and `g_output`
+  (`VulkanOutput_t`) were plain globals, so glibc ran their destructors from `__run_exit_handlers`
+  once `main()` returned — calling back into an ICD that had already been torn down and unloaded.
+  Faulting address equalling the instruction pointer is the signature. Reproducible with
+  `gamescope --backend headless -W 1280 -H 720 -r 60 --xwayland-count 1 -- true` (exit 139, every
+  time). Both globals get storage constructed exactly as before but never destroyed; pinning only
+  the device relocated the fault into `~VulkanOutput_t`, hence a shared `CNoDestroy<T>`.
+
+  ⚠ **`+pfhdrN` deliberately does not move for 0006.** The marker is a capability tier the host
+  probes via `gamescope_patch_level()` *before* it spawns; this patch adds no capability, so bumping
+  it would advertise a tier that does not exist. Ships as a `pkgrel` bump instead.
+
+⚠ gamescope CI legs are best-effort — a broken patch is a **missing package**, not a red run.
+
+### Virtual-display handle ownership (Windows)
+
+The control-device sharing contract was "bare `HANDLE` copies, never closed for the process
+lifetime": retired handles were kept alive because pinger/linger threads and capture closures held
+raw copies whose soundness depended on no-close. An open control handle is exactly what vetoes the
+PnP disable — and can wedge the `pnputil` restart — that wake-from-sleep recovery leans on, so every
+post-wake adapter reload came back REFUSED. `reset-pf-vdisplay.ps1` stops the whole host service
+precisely to get those handles closed; the in-process recovery could not.
+
+Ownership is now `Arc` all the way out: `ensure_device` / `device_handle` / `control_device_handle`
+hand out `Arc<OwnedHandle>` clones, every consumer holds its clone across its IOCTLs (ending the
+`isize` smuggling — `Arc<OwnedHandle>` is `Send + Sync`), and retiring drops only the manager's
+reference. `DeviceSlot::retired` is gone.
+
+⚠ **Nothing may store a bare control `HANDLE` again.** The whole fix is that the handle closes when
+the last in-flight user drains.
+
+### Presenter — points are not pixels
+
+`SDL_GetDesktopDisplayMode` reports a mode in **screen coordinates** and hands the pixels-per-point
+ratio back separately as `pixel_density`; `m.w`/`m.h` were read raw. KDE advertises a 2560x1600 panel
+at 150 % as 1707x1067 points with a density of ~1.4997, `render_scale::apply` even-floors both odd
+axes, and 1706x1066 went on the wire. Multiplying by the density recovers 2560x1600 to the pixel.
+
+⚠ Inert on X11 and Windows: SDL never sets a density there and `SDL_video.c` normalizes the unset
+0.0 to 1.0. **This bug needed a compositor doing fractional scaling.**
+
+Second, independent defect: the SDL window was created without `HIGH_PIXEL_DENSITY`, so the Wayland
+surface stayed at buffer scale 1 and the swapchain was built at 1707x1067 for KWin to upscale. That
+one also silently shrank "Match window", which asks the host for `size_in_pixels()`.
+
+### Apple audio session
+
+`micEnabled` and `echoCancel` both default to `true`, so the **default** iOS session is
+`.playAndRecord` — and that branch set `.defaultToSpeaker`. That option is an output **override**,
+not a preference, and it outranks an A2DP route. ⚠ **Wired headphones beat it, Bluetooth does not**,
+so testing with a cable returns the wrong answer — which is what the comment sitting on it asserted.
+
+Now solved against the route actually given: after activation, if the current output is
+`.builtInReceiver`, override to speaker; anything external (Bluetooth, wired, CarPlay, AirPlay) is
+left strictly alone. The override is a property of the current route — iOS drops it on every route
+change, which is what lets a newly-connected headset win — so it is re-applied per route via an
+observer, registered only for `.playAndRecord`, removed in `stop()` before deactivate, `deinit` as
+backstop. Without it, dropping Bluetooth mid-stream lands on the earpiece.
+
+⚠ Deliberately **not** adding `.allowBluetooth`: it would make a headset's mic usable but drag the
+whole route onto HFP/SCO and collapse game audio to narrowband.
+
+### Audio jitter policy
+
+`JitterPolicy` (`punktfunk-core/src/audio.rs`, used by Linux/Windows/Android) and its mirror in
+Swift `AudioRing`. The policy learned exclusively from audible failures on both sides: growth needed
+**three** audible underruns; the A/V sync loop re-tested a shallower ring every five quiet seconds
+and paid an audible starvation event every time it was wrong, forever; and a grown target was never
+re-banked (growth raises a threshold — only a re-prime deepens the ring), so a bunching link rode
+the knife edge with the "grown" target sitting inert.
+
+Three mechanisms: **near-miss** (a read served with less than one protocol frame left over is the
+same evidence as an underrun, heard by no one — grows one step per window, *before* the click);
+**shrink probes** (every shrink armed for 5 s, undone on the spot if answered by an underrun or
+near-miss, with a doubling backoff 60 s → 8 min on a failed sync-driven shrink; a surviving probe
+resets it); **hollow re-prime** (an underrun while the depth *average* runs more than a step below
+target re-primes immediately — the average, not the instant, separates a hollow ring from one late
+packet, and it is seeded on prime so a fresh ring is never spuriously hollow).
+
+Measured on a ten-minute simulation of the Wi-Fi power-save pattern (25 ms gaps / 300 ms, −50 ppm
+skew): **~2000 audible events → 9.**
+
+### Plugins, SDK and the runner
+
+- **`category` never shipped.** The console correctly keeps `category: "library"` plugins out of the
+  nav; the host reported no category for them at all. `defineLibraryPlugin` sets it and
+  `sdk/src/ui.ts` forwards it — what shipped did not: `@punktfunk/host` was bumped to 0.1.2 on
+  2026-07-20 and `category` landed 2026-08-05 without a bump, so the registry's 0.1.2 is the
+  pre-category build. ⚠ **Inert until published.** `serveUi` now reads its own directory entry back
+  and warns once when a requested category did not land.
+- **Local art sync failed on a `file://` disagreement.** `local_art_bytes` decodes a `file://` value
+  before testing containment; `validate_art_paths` handed the raw value to `Path::new`. Same defect
+  produced both the unreachable settings and `sync (startup) failed: HostRequestError`.
+- **The runner now carries SDK updates.** The copy each installed plugin runs was pinned at install
+  time, so an SDK fix could never reach it.
+- **`bun publish` runs `prepare`, and `prepare` needs bun2nix** — the SDK could not be published at
+  all. Also fixed: a corrupt committed `bun.lock` in plugin-kit.
+- **Decky client update.** `flatpak remote-info punktfunk-origin io.unom.Punktfunk` names no branch;
+  the remote publishes `stable` **and** `canary`, so the ref is ambiguous and flatpak refuses it —
+  ⚠ one branch being *installed* does not disambiguate, the ambiguity is on the remote. The call
+  failed on every box, every time, and returned `available=False`, which the panel rendered as good
+  news. Every query now names the ref in full via `_flatpak_ref()` (no subprocess), carrying the
+  **scope** too, so a system-wide install is no longer invisible to a check that hardcoded `--user`.
+  A check that cannot run now reports `client_error`.
+
+### Packaging
+
+- **The `punktfunk` group is created everywhere the udev rule needs it.** `60-punktfunk.rules`
+  chgrp's the usbip vhci attach/detach nodes to a dedicated group (security review 2026-08-05 M-4:
+  writing `attach` materialises an arbitrary emulated USB device, so it must not ride on `input`).
+  **Four of six install paths shipped that rule in 0.25.0 without creating the group** — chgrp
+  failed, nodes stayed `root:root 0644`, the virtual Deck pad silently never attached, and
+  `usermod -aG punktfunk` failed outright. Fixed in arch `post_upgrade()` (only `post_install` was
+  correct, so every box that reached 0.25.0 by `pacman -Syu` missed it), nix (`users.groups.punktfunk`
+  did not exist), the bazzite sysext (a group is host state and cannot ride an image), and the Steam
+  Deck scripts. deb and rpm were correct throughout.
+- **`punktfunk-gamescope` now builds for RPM and apt**, not Arch only.
+- **Arch release-rebuild prune** called a helper that cannot exist in a release rebuild. Together
+  with the FFmpeg 9 repackage this closes the 0.25.0-1 → 0.25.0-2 episode in the pipeline rather
+  than by hand.
+- **Steam Deck `update.sh` / `install.sh`.** The web step ran `bun install --frozen-lockfile` with
+  no `--ignore-scripts`, so web's `postinstall` (`bun2nix -o bun.nix`) rewrote a **tracked** file on
+  every update; the SDK step below it had always passed `--ignore-scripts`, and that asymmetry is
+  the whole bug. Now `--ignore-scripts` plus an explicit `bun run codegen` — provably equivalent,
+  since web's `prepare` is literally `"bun run codegen"` and `src/api/gen`, `src/paraglide` and
+  `src/routeTree.gen.ts` are gitignored. `--pull` restores `web/bun.nix` and `sdk/bun.nix` before
+  pulling, which is lossless by construction. ⚠ Deliberately **not** `git reset --hard`: `$SRC`
+  defaults to the operator's own checkout. Also: `web.env` secret hygiene — `chmod 600` sat inside
+  the create-only branch, so an install set up once and only updated since kept it world-readable.
+  ⚠ `packaging/debian/build-web-deb.sh`, `packaging/arch/PKGBUILD` and `packaging/rpm/punktfunk.spec`
+  still lack `--ignore-scripts` for web — harmless (throwaway build trees), left as follow-up.
+
+### Triage tooling
+
+**`--probe-decode` described a different device from the one that streams.** The RADV
+video-decode opt-in sat *after* the `--list-adapters` / `--probe-decode` / `--list-audio` / `--pair`
+early exits, so the triage tool never had it. Measured on a Deck, same binary back to back: bare
+`--probe-decode` printed "vulkan video decode: no", "driver decode ops: none (0x0)", "no queue
+family advertises VIDEO_DECODE"; with `RADV_PERFTEST=video_decode` in the environment, "YES" and
+"H.264, H.265, AV1, VP9". ⚠ **Any Deck triage that consulted it reached the opposite of the truth.**
+Hoisted to the top of `run`, ahead of every early exit.
+
+### PyroWave on Linux — Wave 2
+
+The program's own measurement, from patch 0005's header: `encode_gpu_synchronous` goes from ~2 ms
+to **15–18 ms at 95 % game load**, with the stream frame rate collapsing. PyroWave encodes on the
+same shader cores a game saturates; NVENC is immune because it has its own ASIC.
+
+- **PW1 — the GPU-priority lever had never fired on Linux.** The vendored patch requests an elevated
+  global-priority queue, gated `if (!inherit_info)` — and **only Windows leaves `inherit_info` null**
+  (`pyrowave_create_device_by_compat`, where Granite builds the device itself). Linux passes its own
+  create-infos, Granite's `get_existing_create_info()` hands them back, `create_device` takes the
+  inherit branch, and the whole block is skipped. Now wired natively in `open_inner`'s `DeviceHold`,
+  ladder REALTIME → HIGH → no-priority, stepping only on refusal; a refused class can never fail the
+  open. The extension probe reuses the `dev_ext_props` already fetched for `queue_family_foreign` and
+  takes KHR or the EXT alias — the same spelling pf-zerocopy probes, so the two cannot disagree.
+  ⭐ **Needs `CAP_SYS_NICE`**, which the packaging now grants; without it the lever does nothing.
+- **PW5 — two encoder handles.** `Encoder::Impl` owns exactly one each of `wavelet_img_high_res`,
+  `bucket_buffer`, `meta_buffer`, `block_stat_buffer`, `payload_data`, `quant_buffer`, and
+  `Impl::encode` *opens* by discarding them (an image barrier with `VK_IMAGE_LAYOUT_UNDEFINED` as the
+  old layout, plus three `fill_buffer` clears). Two encodes submitted to one queue have **no**
+  execution dependency in Vulkan — submission order orders the start, not the completion — so N+1's
+  DWT would overwrite N's wavelet bands while N's block packing still reads them. Content-dependent
+  and silent. Overlap therefore means two handles alternated, one per slot. ⚠⚠ **The landmine:**
+  `sequence_count` also lives on `Impl`, and it is the **3-bit** counter stamped into every block
+  header. Two handles each counting 1,2,3… put 1,1,2,2,3,3… on the wire, and the decoder restarts a
+  frame only when the value *changes* — so a repeat reads as more blocks of the same frame. Depth is
+  **still 1**; the handles alternate with one in flight.
+- **PW3 — the fence wait moved out of submit.** PyroWave was the one backend waiting its fence inside
+  `submit`.
+- **PW7a — the jumbo leg was dead code.** quinn caps a peer's MTU-discovery search at
+  `min(MtuDiscoveryConfig::upper_bound, the other side's advertised max_udp_payload_size)`, and
+  `EndpointConfig::max_udp_payload_size` **defaults to 1472**. Nothing in the repo had ever touched
+  `EndpointConfig`, so raising the host's probe ceiling could never make discovery settle above 1472
+  — and the shipped mid-session grow's `settled >= sealed_datagram_bytes(target)` gate was
+  unreachable on **every path that has ever existed**. Two smaller contributors fixed with it: the
+  watcher stopped sampling the moment `settled >= 1472`, discarding the very climb the proof needs;
+  and a session sealed above the 1500-byte default was never checked against the path at all.
+
+  The advertisement is raised on the **client** endpoint under the same `jumbo_wire_mtu()` opt-in,
+  because it is not free: quinn sizes its endpoint receive buffer
+  `max_udp_payload_size × max_receive_segments × BATCH_SIZE` — on a GRO-capable Linux/Android client
+  that is ~2.9 MiB at the default and **~18 MiB at jumbo** (47 KiB → 288 KiB on Apple/Windows).
+  PyroWave is the codec that most wants this: it can never be re-keyed mid-stream (its client parses
+  chunk-aligned AUs in windows of the `Welcome` value, read once over the C ABI), so it should
+  *start* at the big shard. At an 8908-byte shard that is ~6× fewer datagrams per frame — **~49k → ~8k
+  pps at 550 Mb/s**.
+
+### Zero-copy capture
+
+- **The dmabuf latch conflated two causes with different lifetimes.** One `AtomicBool` served both
+  "the encoder repeatedly failed to import what this compositor allocates" (unrecoverable, a driver
+  fact) and "the dmabuf-only capture offer never negotiated" (which can just mean the compositor was
+  mid-restart). Sharing it made the second as permanent as the first: **one timeout, and every later
+  session on that host captured CPU frames until the process restarted** — including sessions against
+  a different compositor and a different node that had never failed at anything, with nothing said.
+  Now a `RawDmabufLatch` owning both: import failures stay sticky (unchanged 3-consecutive threshold);
+  negotiation timeouts get a retry budget of **2** — deliberately small, since each failure costs a
+  ~10 s stall the user pays in dead air; a capture that negotiates credits the budget back; and both
+  are keyed to a capture identity (node id + portal bit).
+- **The zero-copy path never asked for buffer headroom.** `build_dmabuf_buffers` set
+  `SPA_PARAM_BUFFERS_dataType` and stopped — no `SPA_PARAM_BUFFERS_buffers` at all, so the pool depth
+  every zero-copy safety argument rests on was entirely the producer's choice and we never expressed
+  a preference. Now asks for 8 (min 2, max 16) as a **Choice Range, deliberately not a fixed count**:
+  SPA intersects consumer and producer params, so a fixed 8 against a producer that can only afford 4
+  empties the intersection and the link stalls in "negotiating" with no error anywhere — ⚠ the exact
+  trap that once cost this codebase the entire Linux cursor channel, when a 256² cursor-meta max
+  failed to intersect Mutter's fixed 384². 8 buffers is ~133 ms of pool at 60 Hz and ~33 ms at 240 Hz;
+  16 is a ceiling, not a request (a 4K 4:4:4 buffer is ~25 MB).
+- **A PyroWave session could drop to CPU capture and log nothing.** The CPU-fallback warning was gated
+  on `backend_is_vaapi`, which reads the **host-global** encoder pref — but a PyroWave session is
+  negotiated **per session**, so on an NVIDIA/auto host that gate is false and the session fell out of
+  every arm of the negotiation log chain while paying a full-resolution CPU pixel touch every frame.
+  A degraded host and a healthy one produced identical logs. Now asks the per-session question
+  (`consumer_kind`), widened to every GPU consumer and excluding only the software encoder, whose
+  native input *is* CPU frames. ⚠ `pyrowave_session` must outrank `backend_is_vaapi`, because a
+  PyroWave pref flips `backend_is_vaapi` on too.
+
+### Steam-overlay input masking (Steam Deck)
+
+On a Deck in Gaming Mode the Steam menu and the QAM are driven by the **same physical controller** the
+client forwards, so opening either moved the game on the host as well — a second, invisible player.
+Steam Input masks a normal game here; it cannot mask us, because masking happens on Steam Input's
+virtual pad and we deliberately forward the **real** one (the virtual pad has no gyro, trackpads or
+paddles).
+
+⚠ **SDL's own gate cannot fire on a Deck.** SDL drops presses while a process has windows but no
+keyboard focus, and it is on by default — but gamescope resolves focus per Xwayland ctx and the client
+sits alone in its own, so the Steam overlay (which lives in the root ctx) never takes our X focus and
+no `FocusOut` is ever generated. Measured on glass: with the QAM open, X input focus inside the
+client's ctx stayed on its window for the whole 4 s while `GAMESCOPE_FOCUSED_APP` flipped to 769
+(Steam) and `GAMESCOPE_FOCUSED_APP_GFX` stayed on the app. **That pair of atoms is the signal.**
+
+⚠ `overlay_focus` watches them on the gamescope **root** ctx, which is *not* our own `$DISPLAY` under
+`--xwayland-count 2` — hence the socket-directory walk and the flatpak filesystem line.
+
+⚠⚠ Masking is deliberately **not** `set_forwarding`: that closes the slot and sends `GamepadRemove`,
+so the game would see a controller **unplug** every time somebody opened the QAM. Every slot stays
+open and only transitions stop, after flushing what the host believes is held (so a stick deflected at
+overlay-open stops steering instead of freezing at its last value). On the way back, held buttons are
+**adopted rather than replayed** — the A that picked a QAM row must not fire in the game as it closes
+— while axes *are* re-sent, since a stick has no press to ghost and SDL only speaks on change.
+
+### The `plugin` launch kind
+
+The 2026-08-05 review made `launch.kind = "command"` operator-only, and a reconcile refuses on the
+**first** offending entry — so rom-manager, whose every ROM is `<emulator> <args> <rom>`, stopped
+putting anything in the library at all. Playnite hit the same wall and was rescued with a typed kind
+the host resolves itself; there is no fixed scheme for "whichever emulator the operator configured,
+with the core and flags they chose", so that trick does not generalise.
+
+The entry now carries an **opaque key and nothing executable**, and the host asks the owning plugin
+what to run at launch time, over the loopback UI port and per-boot secret it already registered.
+⭐ **A stolen plugin token stops being command execution:** planting an entry is not enough, because
+the live plugin answers 404 for a key it never published. Nothing executable is persisted or served to
+a client, and an emulator that moved is picked up on the next launch rather than leaving a dead tile
+(same reasoning as `xbox` resolving its AUMID at launch time).
+
+⚠ **The host still spawns it**, because only the host can put the process where the stream can see it:
+on Linux that is either gamescope's own argv or a spawn carrying the session's compositor env, and the
+returned child is what session-game-lifetime tracks to know the game exited. A plugin spawning the
+emulator itself would land it outside both.
+
+### Verification status
+
+| | |
+|---|---|
+| gamescope 0006 | 6/6 exit 0 on a release build at the real spawn shape (`2752x2064@120 --steam --xwayland-count 1`); distro control SIGSEGVs |
+| Decky client update | on the Deck against the real install — pre-fix `available=False remote=''`, post-fix `available=True remote=ca010668` |
+| `--probe-decode` | on a Deck, same binary back to back, with and without the RADV opt-in |
+| Apple audio | builds on arm64-apple-ios17.0 (the triple that compiles the `#if os(iOS)` blocks — a plain `swift build` is macOS and skips them), arm64-apple-tvos17.0, macOS; 257 Swift tests |
+| Audio jitter | 10-minute Wi-Fi power-save simulation, ~2000 → 9 audible events |
+| 4:4:4 gate | test verified non-vacuous against the planted original defect |
+| Steam Deck scripts | `bash -n` + shellcheck 0.11.0 clean at `-S warning`; exec bits preserved |
+| Steam-overlay masking | on glass on a Deck — atom flip and X-focus non-flip both measured over a 4 s QAM open |
+| PyroWave depth 2 | exercised on real hardware **without shipping depth 2** (dedicated test, shipped depth stays 1) |
+| PW6 streamed AU | the trap is real, and at 2 % loss it costs exactly nothing |
+
+⏳ **Owed on glass:** iPhone + Bluetooth listen, Apple TV stats overlay, MacBook audio listen, the
+Deck HEVC/4:4:4 retest, a Windows wake-from-sleep cycle, and the PyroWave-under-game-load A/B on a
+Linux host with `CAP_SYS_NICE` actually granted — the number this whole wave is aimed at.
+
+---
+
 ## v0.25.0
 
 407 commits since v0.24.0.

Cargo.lock

@@ -994,7 +994,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "cursor-probe"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "anyhow",
  "pf-capture",
@@ -1114,7 +1114,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "display-disturb"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "windows 0.62.2 (registry+https://github.com/rust-lang/crates.io-index)",
 ]
@@ -2358,7 +2358,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "latency-probe"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 
 [[package]]
 name = "lazy_static"
@@ -2463,7 +2463,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "libvpl-sys"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "bindgen",
  "cmake",
@@ -2498,7 +2498,7 @@ checksum = "0ceec5bc11778974d1bcb055b18002eba7f4b3518b6a0081b3af5f21666da9ad"
 
 [[package]]
 name = "loss-harness"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "punktfunk-core",
 ]
@@ -2988,7 +2988,7 @@ checksum = "9b4f627cb1b25917193a259e49bdad08f671f8d9708acfd5fe0a8c1455d87220"
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-bitstream"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "cros-codecs",
  "tracing",
@@ -2996,7 +2996,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-capture"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "anyhow",
  "ashpd",
@@ -3017,7 +3017,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-client-core"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "anyhow",
  "ash",
@@ -3047,11 +3047,12 @@ dependencies = [
  "wasapi",
  "windows 0.62.2 (git+https://github.com/microsoft/windows-rs?rev=acb5a1a7441033d9312b16842af02eb0c2b403dc)",
  "winreg",
+ "x11rb",
 ]
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-clipboard"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "anyhow",
  "ashpd",
@@ -3069,7 +3070,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-console-ui"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "anyhow",
  "ash",
@@ -3090,7 +3091,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-dxvadec"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "cros-codecs",
  "pf-bitstream",
@@ -3100,7 +3101,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-encode"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "anyhow",
  "ash",
@@ -3124,7 +3125,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-frame"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "anyhow",
  "libc",
@@ -3136,7 +3137,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-gpu"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "anyhow",
  "pf-host-config",
@@ -3150,11 +3151,11 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-host-config"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-inject"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "anyhow",
  "ashpd",
@@ -3183,14 +3184,14 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-paths"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "tracing",
 ]
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-presenter"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "anyhow",
  "ash",
@@ -3205,7 +3206,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-update"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "serde",
  "serde_json",
@@ -3213,7 +3214,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-update-check"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "anyhow",
  "base64",
@@ -3225,7 +3226,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-vaadec"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "cros-codecs",
  "pf-bitstream",
@@ -3234,7 +3235,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-vdisplay"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "anyhow",
  "ashpd",
@@ -3267,7 +3268,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-vkdecode"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "ash",
  "cros-codecs",
@@ -3278,7 +3279,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-win-display"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "anyhow",
  "pf-paths",
@@ -3290,7 +3291,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pf-zerocopy"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "anyhow",
  "ash",
@@ -3513,7 +3514,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "punktfunk-cli"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "pf-client-core",
  "punktfunk-core",
@@ -3524,7 +3525,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "punktfunk-client-android"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "android_logger",
  "jni",
@@ -3542,7 +3543,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "punktfunk-client-linux"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "anyhow",
  "async-channel",
@@ -3559,7 +3560,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "punktfunk-client-session"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "anyhow",
  "pf-client-core",
@@ -3574,7 +3575,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "punktfunk-client-windows"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "async-channel",
  "mdns-sd",
@@ -3593,7 +3594,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "punktfunk-core"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "aes-gcm",
  "bytes",
@@ -3625,7 +3626,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "punktfunk-host"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "aes",
  "aes-gcm",
@@ -3710,7 +3711,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "punktfunk-probe"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "anyhow",
  "mdns-sd",
@@ -3724,7 +3725,7 @@ dependencies = [
 
 [[package]]
 name = "punktfunk-tray"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "anyhow",
  "ksni",
@@ -3747,7 +3748,7 @@ checksum = "d55d956fa96f5ec02be2e13af0e20391a5aa83d6a074e3ad368959d0fab299ea"
 
 [[package]]
 name = "pyrowave-sys"
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 dependencies = [
  "bindgen",
  "cmake",

Cargo.toml

@@ -57,7 +57,7 @@ exclude = [
 ndk = { path = "clients/android/native/vendor/ndk" }
 
 [workspace.package]
-version = "0.25.0"
+version = "0.26.0"
 edition = "2021"
 rust-version = "1.82"
 license = "MIT OR Apache-2.0"

crates/pf-capture/src/linux/mod.rs

@@ -168,6 +168,10 @@ pub struct PortalCapturer {
     /// downgrade ([`pf_zerocopy::note_raw_dmabuf_negotiation_failed`]) so the pipeline rebuild
     /// retries on the CPU offer instead of failing identically forever.
     vaapi_dmabuf: bool,
+    /// PW3: this capture's dmabuf offer has been confirmed to negotiate (a frame arrived), so the
+    /// negotiation retry budget has already been credited back. One-shot — the credit is per
+    /// capture, not per frame.
+    negotiation_confirmed: bool,
     /// This capture ran the HDR (10-bit PQ/BT.2020 dmabuf) offer — see [`Self::open`]'s
     /// `want_hdr`. Read by the negotiation-timeout diagnosis (a failed HDR offer latches the
     /// process-wide SDR downgrade) and by [`hdr_meta`](Capturer::hdr_meta).
@@ -412,6 +416,7 @@ impl PwHandles {
             signals: self.signals,
             stall_since: None,
             vaapi_dmabuf: self.vaapi_dmabuf,
+            negotiation_confirmed: false,
             hdr_offer: self.hdr_offer,
             hdr_source,
             node_id,
@@ -468,6 +473,13 @@ fn spawn_pipewire(
     } else {
         want_hdr
     };
+    // PW3: tell the raw-dmabuf latch which capture this is BEFORE reading its verdict below. A
+    // different node id is a different question — a fresh virtual output, a compositor restart,
+    // the Bazzite Gaming↔Desktop switch — and inheriting "dmabuf does not work here" from an
+    // unrelated capture is how one transient timeout used to cost a host CPU capture until it was
+    // restarted. The portal bit is in the key because a portal-fd capture and a virtual-output
+    // capture with the same node number are genuinely different sources.
+    pf_zerocopy::note_raw_dmabuf_capture(u64::from(node_id) | (u64::from(fd.is_some()) << 32));
     // THE negotiation decision, resolved once here and handed to the thread — no mirror (L3/F1).
     // Every environment/latch read the decision depends on happens at this single point.
     let plan = pipewire::negotiation_plan(pipewire::NegotiationInputs {
@@ -705,6 +717,7 @@ impl PortalCapturer {
             // The slot before the wakeup: a publish that coalesced its edge (or landed while we were
             // not waiting) is still visible here.
             if let Some(f) = self.take_frame() {
+                self.note_negotiation_confirmed();
                 return Ok(f);
             }
             let slice = Duration::from_millis(500)
@@ -728,6 +741,16 @@ impl PortalCapturer {
         self.slot.lock().ok().and_then(|mut s| s.take())
     }
 
+    /// PW3: a frame arrived, so this capture's dmabuf-only offer DID negotiate — credit the
+    /// negotiation retry budget back. Only meaningful for a capture that actually made that offer,
+    /// and only once per capture (the budget counts consecutive failed BUILDS, not frames).
+    fn note_negotiation_confirmed(&mut self) {
+        if self.vaapi_dmabuf && !self.negotiation_confirmed {
+            self.negotiation_confirmed = true;
+            pf_zerocopy::note_raw_dmabuf_negotiation_ok();
+        }
+    }
+
     /// The [`frame_within`](Self::frame_within) budget expired (or the thread ended) — turn it
     /// into the diagnosis-bearing error. Split out of the slicing loop above; behavior unchanged.
     fn next_frame_timed_out(

crates/pf-capture/src/linux/pw_pods.rs

@@ -288,16 +288,57 @@ pub(super) fn build_shm_only_buffers() -> Result<Vec<u8>> {
     })
 }
 
-/// Build a Buffers param requesting dmabuf-only buffers.
+/// PW5 stage 2: the buffer-pool depth we ASK for on the zero-copy path, as a Choice range.
+///
+/// The zero-copy path hands the SPA buffer back to the producer at `.process` return, while the
+/// encode thread still holds a dup of its dmabuf fd and has not yet imported, let alone read, the
+/// contents. Nothing bounds that window — see the `queue_raw_buffer` comment in `pipewire.rs` — so
+/// the only thing that keeps capture untorn is the producer round-robining a pool deeper than our
+/// import+encode latency. Until PW5 stage 1 nobody had ever counted what that pool was; we never
+/// even asked for a size (`build_dmabuf_buffers` set `dataType` and nothing else).
+///
+/// A **range**, deliberately, not a fixed count: SPA intersects the consumer's and producer's
+/// Buffers params, so a fixed 8 against a producer that can only afford 4 empties the intersection
+/// and the link silently stalls in "negotiating" — the exact failure mode the cursor-meta `size`
+/// property already cost this codebase once (see `build_cursor_meta_param`). With a range the
+/// producer clamps into it and negotiation still succeeds.
+///
+/// The numbers: `min` stays at 2 so nothing that works today stops working; `default` 8 is ~133 ms
+/// of buffer at 60 Hz and ~33 ms at 240 Hz, comfortably past the ~3-4 ms capture→fence latency
+/// measured in PW3/PW4 even with a second frame in flight; `max` 16 is a ceiling, not a request
+/// (a 4K 4:4:4 buffer is ~25 MB, so 16 is ~400 MB of compositor allocation and worth capping).
+/// **What the producer actually picks is logged by the stage-1 census — trust that line, not
+/// these constants.**
+const POOL_MIN: i32 = 2;
+const POOL_DEFAULT: i32 = 8;
+const POOL_MAX: i32 = 16;
+
+/// Build a Buffers param requesting dmabuf-only buffers, with pool headroom (see [`POOL_DEFAULT`]).
 pub(super) fn build_dmabuf_buffers() -> Result<Vec<u8>> {
     serialize_pod(pw::spa::pod::Object {
         type_: pw::spa::utils::SpaTypes::ObjectParamBuffers.as_raw(),
         id: pw::spa::param::ParamType::Buffers.as_raw(),
-        properties: vec![pw::spa::pod::Property {
-            key: pw::spa::sys::SPA_PARAM_BUFFERS_dataType,
-            flags: pw::spa::pod::PropertyFlags::empty(),
-            value: pw::spa::pod::Value::Int(1i32 << pw::spa::sys::SPA_DATA_DmaBuf),
-        }],
+        properties: vec![
+            pw::spa::pod::Property {
+                key: pw::spa::sys::SPA_PARAM_BUFFERS_dataType,
+                flags: pw::spa::pod::PropertyFlags::empty(),
+                value: pw::spa::pod::Value::Int(1i32 << pw::spa::sys::SPA_DATA_DmaBuf),
+            },
+            pw::spa::pod::Property {
+                key: pw::spa::sys::SPA_PARAM_BUFFERS_buffers,
+                flags: pw::spa::pod::PropertyFlags::empty(),
+                value: pw::spa::pod::Value::Choice(pw::spa::pod::ChoiceValue::Int(
+                    pw::spa::utils::Choice(
+                        pw::spa::utils::ChoiceFlags::empty(),
+                        pw::spa::utils::ChoiceEnum::Range {
+                            default: POOL_DEFAULT,
+                            min: POOL_MIN,
+                            max: POOL_MAX,
+                        },
+                    ),
+                )),
+            },
+        ],
     })
 }
 
@@ -512,4 +553,47 @@ mod tests {
             "libspa renumbered spa_video_transfer_function — update the hardcoded PQ id"
         );
     }
+
+    /// PW5 stage 2: the pool request must be a **Choice Range**, never a fixed Int.
+    ///
+    /// This is the whole safety argument for asking at all: SPA intersects the two sides' Buffers
+    /// params, so a fixed count a producer cannot afford empties the intersection and the link
+    /// stalls in "negotiating" with no error anywhere — the same trap that cost this codebase the
+    /// entire Linux cursor channel once (see `build_cursor_meta_param`). Asserting the pod shape
+    /// is what keeps a later "simplify" from turning the range back into a number.
+    #[test]
+    fn the_dmabuf_pool_request_is_a_range_not_a_fixed_count() {
+        let pod = build_dmabuf_buffers().unwrap();
+        let key = spa::sys::SPA_PARAM_BUFFERS_buffers.to_ne_bytes();
+        let at = pod
+            .windows(4)
+            .position(|w| w == key)
+            .expect("the dmabuf Buffers pod must carry a buffers count");
+        let word = |off: usize| u32::from_ne_bytes(pod[off..off + 4].try_into().unwrap());
+        // Property = { key, flags, value_pod }; value_pod = { size, type, body }. A Choice body
+        // is { type: u32, flags: u32, child_size: u32, child_type: u32, values… }.
+        assert_eq!(
+            word(at + 12),
+            spa::sys::SPA_TYPE_Choice,
+            "the buffers count must be a Choice, not a bare Int — a fixed count can fail \
+             negotiation outright"
+        );
+        assert_eq!(
+            word(at + 16),
+            spa::sys::SPA_CHOICE_Range,
+            "the Choice must be a Range (default, min, max)"
+        );
+        assert_eq!(word(at + 24), 4, "Choice child pods are 4-byte Ints");
+        assert_eq!(word(at + 28), spa::sys::SPA_TYPE_Int, "…of type Int");
+        let vals: Vec<i32> = (0..3)
+            .map(|i| i32::from_ne_bytes(pod[at + 32 + i * 4..at + 36 + i * 4].try_into().unwrap()))
+            .collect();
+        assert_eq!(
+            vals,
+            vec![POOL_DEFAULT, POOL_MIN, POOL_MAX],
+            "Range values are serialized default-first"
+        );
+        // The minimum must not exceed what producers already serve, or the ask becomes a demand.
+        const { assert!(POOL_MIN <= 2) };
+    }
 }

crates/pf-client-core/Cargo.toml

@@ -134,6 +134,12 @@ pf-vaadec = { path = "../pf-vaadec" }
 # container can then compile and clippy the whole rung without `libva-dev`, and a machine
 # without a VAAPI runtime gets a clean refusal instead of a packaging dependency.
 libloading = "0.8"
+# The gamescope overlay watcher (`overlay_focus`): read two CARDINAL properties off a
+# gamescope root window and block on PropertyNotify. `default-features = false` keeps the
+# pure-Rust `RustConnection` — no libxcb link, so no new C dependency on any client package
+# — the same stance pf-capture and pf-vdisplay already take on this crate. No extension
+# features: root-window properties and an event mask are core X11.
+x11rb = { version = "0.13", default-features = false }
 
 [target.'cfg(windows)'.dependencies]
 wasapi = "0.23"

crates/pf-client-core/src/gamepad.rs

@@ -381,6 +381,7 @@ enum Ctl {
     PadAudioPrefs(u8),
     MenuMode(bool),
     MenuRumble(MenuPulse),
+    Mask(bool),
 }
 
 #[derive(Clone)]
@@ -548,6 +549,31 @@ impl GamepadService {
         let _ = self.ctl.send(Ctl::Forwarding(on));
     }
 
+    /// A system overlay owns the controller right now — hold every forwarded pad NEUTRAL
+    /// until it closes. This is the Steam Input behaviour a streaming client has to
+    /// reproduce by hand: while the Deck's Steam menu or QAM is up, the same physical
+    /// sticks and buttons drive Steam's UI, and anything we keep forwarding lands in the
+    /// game underneath as a second, invisible player.
+    ///
+    /// **Masking is not [`set_forwarding`](Self::set_forwarding).** Forwarding-off closes the
+    /// slot and sends the host a [`GamepadRemove`](InputKind::GamepadRemove) — the game sees a
+    /// controller *unplug*, which is a hardware event with real in-game consequences (pause
+    /// menus, "reconnect your controller", player-slot churn). Opening the QAM must not look
+    /// like that. Masking keeps every slot open and merely stops the transitions, after
+    /// flushing what the host believes is held so a stick held at overlay-open stops steering
+    /// instead of freezing at its last value.
+    ///
+    /// SDL has this gate of its own — it drops presses while the process has windows but no
+    /// keyboard focus — and on a desktop it fires. It CANNOT fire on a Deck in Gaming Mode:
+    /// gamescope resolves focus per Xwayland ctx, and the client sits alone in its own ctx, so
+    /// its X input focus never moves when the overlay takes over (measured). That is why this
+    /// exists as an explicit lever rather than something inherited for free.
+    ///
+    /// Held state is adopted, not replayed, on the way back — see [`Ctl::Mask`]'s handling.
+    pub fn set_masked(&self, on: bool) {
+        let _ = self.ctl.send(Ctl::Mask(on));
+    }
+
     /// The session's system-button policy, resolved from
     /// [`Settings::system_buttons_forward`] × [`Settings::guide_gesture_enabled`]:
     /// `forward_raw` gates the physical guide/QAM presses onto the wire (off = they stay
@@ -1069,6 +1095,9 @@ struct Worker {
     menu_mode: bool,
     menu_nav: MenuNav,
     menu_tx: async_channel::Sender<MenuEvent>,
+    /// A system overlay owns input ([`GamepadService::set_masked`]): forwarded pads are held
+    /// neutral and menu translation is paused, with every slot still OPEN.
+    masked: bool,
 }
 
 impl Worker {
@@ -1519,6 +1548,87 @@ impl Worker {
         }
     }
 
+    /// Re-adopt what the pads are physically holding when an overlay mask lifts.
+    ///
+    /// Buttons are taken back into `held_buttons` **without** a wire press: a button pressed
+    /// inside the overlay (the A that picked a QAM row) must not fire in the game the instant it
+    /// closes — releasing it and pressing again is what arms it. Same rule menu mode already
+    /// applies across a screen handoff ([`MenuNav::reset`]), for the same reason.
+    ///
+    /// Axes ARE re-sent, because a stick has no press semantics to ghost — it is deflected or it
+    /// is not. The mask flushed them to zero, and SDL only speaks on *change*, so a stick still
+    /// held when the overlay closes would stay dead host-side until the user happened to move it.
+    ///
+    /// Neither half can run against a pad that is gone: this only walks open slots, and every SDL
+    /// read here is a state query on a handle the slot owns.
+    fn readopt_held(&mut self) {
+        use sdl3::gamepad::{Axis, Button};
+        // Every button `button_bit` maps — the same surface the press path forwards.
+        const BUTTONS: [Button; 21] = [
+            Button::South,
+            Button::East,
+            Button::West,
+            Button::North,
+            Button::Back,
+            Button::Start,
+            Button::Guide,
+            Button::LeftStick,
+            Button::RightStick,
+            Button::LeftShoulder,
+            Button::RightShoulder,
+            Button::DPadUp,
+            Button::DPadDown,
+            Button::DPadLeft,
+            Button::DPadRight,
+            Button::Touchpad,
+            Button::RightPaddle1,
+            Button::LeftPaddle1,
+            Button::RightPaddle2,
+            Button::LeftPaddle2,
+            Button::Misc1,
+        ];
+        const AXES: [Axis; 6] = [
+            Axis::LeftX,
+            Axis::LeftY,
+            Axis::RightX,
+            Axis::RightY,
+            Axis::TriggerLeft,
+            Axis::TriggerRight,
+        ];
+        // Copied out: the slot walk below borrows `self` mutably.
+        let system_forward = self.system_forward;
+        let attached = self.attached.clone();
+        for slot in &mut self.slots {
+            slot.held_buttons.clear();
+            for b in BUTTONS {
+                let Some(bit) = button_bit(b) else {
+                    continue;
+                };
+                // The press path returns before `held_buttons` for un-forwarded system
+                // buttons; tracking them here would invent state it never keeps.
+                if !system_forward && matches!(bit, wire::BTN_GUIDE | wire::BTN_MISC1) {
+                    continue;
+                }
+                if slot.pad.button(b) {
+                    slot.held_buttons.push(bit);
+                }
+            }
+            let Some(c) = &attached else {
+                continue;
+            };
+            for a in AXES {
+                let (id, v) = axis_value(a, slot.pad.axis(a));
+                if slot.last_axis[id as usize] != v {
+                    slot.last_axis[id as usize] = v;
+                    send(c, InputKind::GamepadAxis, id, v, slot.index);
+                }
+            }
+        }
+        // The chord latch was cleared on the way in; drop it again if what we just adopted
+        // doesn't actually hold it.
+        self.rearm_escape();
+    }
+
     /// True when any one forwarded pad holds the entire escape chord (any player can leave).
     fn chord_held(&self) -> bool {
         self.slots
@@ -1785,6 +1895,34 @@ impl Worker {
                             .push((pad, bit, Instant::now() + TAP_PRESS));
                     }
                 }
+                Ok(Ctl::Mask(on)) => {
+                    if self.masked == on {
+                        continue;
+                    }
+                    self.masked = on;
+                    if on {
+                        // Neutral NOW, and while the slots stay open: a stick held when the
+                        // overlay opened must stop steering, but the host must not see the pad
+                        // unplug (that is `close_slot_at`'s job, and a game reacts to it).
+                        if let Some(c) = self.attached.clone() {
+                            for slot in &mut self.slots {
+                                Self::flush_slot(&c, slot);
+                            }
+                        }
+                        // Nothing can be mid-chord across the flip: the transitions that would
+                        // complete or break it are about to be dropped.
+                        self.reset_chord();
+                    } else {
+                        // Coming back. Whatever is still physically held was never delivered —
+                        // adopt it silently rather than replay it as a fresh press, the same
+                        // rule menu mode uses across a screen handoff (`MenuNav::reset`). A
+                        // button you pressed *inside* the overlay must not fire in the game the
+                        // instant it closes; releasing and pressing again is what arms it.
+                        self.readopt_held();
+                        self.menu_nav.reset();
+                    }
+                    tracing::info!(masked = on, "overlay input mask");
+                }
                 Ok(Ctl::Forwarding(on)) => {
                     if self.forwarding == on {
                         continue;
@@ -1846,6 +1984,28 @@ impl Worker {
     /// "is a session live".
     fn handle_event(&mut self, event: sdl3::event::Event) {
         use sdl3::event::Event;
+        // A system overlay owns the controller ([`GamepadService::set_masked`]): drop every
+        // input transition. The pads were flushed neutral when the mask went on, so dropping
+        // the ups as well as the downs is what keeps the two in agreement — `readopt_held`
+        // rebuilds the held set from the hardware when it lifts.
+        //
+        // Device add/remove deliberately still count: a controller genuinely plugged in or
+        // pulled out behind an overlay is a fact about the world, not an input, and losing it
+        // would leave the slot table lying about what exists.
+        if self.masked
+            && matches!(
+                event,
+                Event::ControllerButtonDown { .. }
+                    | Event::ControllerButtonUp { .. }
+                    | Event::ControllerAxisMotion { .. }
+                    | Event::ControllerTouchpadDown { .. }
+                    | Event::ControllerTouchpadMotion { .. }
+                    | Event::ControllerTouchpadUp { .. }
+                    | Event::ControllerSensorUpdated { .. }
+            )
+        {
+            return;
+        }
         match event {
             Event::ControllerDeviceAdded { which, .. } => {
                 if !self.order.contains(&which) {
@@ -2074,7 +2234,9 @@ impl Worker {
     /// on and no session is attached (attach supersedes; SDL events merely wake the loop,
     /// so a press is translated the iteration it arrives).
     fn menu_poll(&mut self) {
-        if !self.menu_mode || self.attached.is_some() {
+        // Masked covers the launcher too: with the Deck's Steam menu up over our console, the
+        // same stick that scrolls Steam's UI would otherwise also be scrolling ours behind it.
+        if !self.menu_mode || self.attached.is_some() || self.masked {
             return;
         }
         let Some((_, pad)) = self.menu_open.as_ref() else {
@@ -2301,6 +2463,7 @@ impl Worker {
             menu_mode: false,
             menu_nav: MenuNav::new(),
             menu_tx,
+            masked: false,
         }
     }
 }

crates/pf-client-core/src/lib.rs

@@ -46,6 +46,10 @@ pub mod orchestrate;
 // The host's OS-identity chain (mDNS `os=` TXT): sanitize + icon-walk order. Pure string
 // logic, built everywhere (the Apple/Android ports mirror it rather than link it).
 pub mod os;
+// "A system overlay owns the controller" for gamescope Gaming Mode — the signal behind the
+// gamepad input mask, which SDL's own focus gate structurally cannot provide there.
+#[cfg(target_os = "linux")]
+pub mod overlay_focus;
 // Client settings profiles: the override catalog + the one connect-time resolver
 // (design/client-settings-profiles.md §4). Sits beside `trust`, which owns the host records
 // the bindings live on.

crates/pf-client-core/src/overlay_focus.rs

@@ -0,0 +1,284 @@
+//! "A system overlay owns the controller right now" — the gamescope half of the input mask.
+//!
+//! On a Steam Deck in Gaming Mode the Steam menu and the QAM are drawn by Steam and driven by
+//! the *same physical controller* the client is forwarding. Steam does not mask us the way it
+//! masks a normal game: masking happens on Steam Input's virtual pad, and the client
+//! deliberately forwards the REAL pad instead (28DE:1205 — the virtual one has no gyro,
+//! trackpads or paddles). So while the QAM is up, one thumbstick drives Steam's UI *and* the
+//! game on the host. This watcher is what tells [`crate::gamepad::GamepadService::set_masked`]
+//! to stop that.
+//!
+//! **Why the free mechanism can't do it.** SDL already drops gamepad presses while the process
+//! has windows but no keyboard focus (`SDL_PrivateJoystickShouldIgnoreEvent`, on by default —
+//! we never set `SDL_JOYSTICK_ALLOW_BACKGROUND_EVENTS`), and on a desktop that fires. It cannot
+//! fire here: gamescope resolves focus **per Xwayland ctx** (`determine_and_apply_focus` scans
+//! only that ctx's window list), the Steam overlay lives in the root ctx, and the client sits
+//! alone in its own. Measured on a Deck 2026-08-08: with the QAM open, X input focus inside the
+//! client's ctx never moved off its window, so no `FocusOut` is ever generated. Hence an
+//! explicit signal.
+//!
+//! **The signal.** gamescope publishes two CARDINALs on the ROOT ctx's root window (Steam mode
+//! only, i.e. `gamescope -e` — which is what Gaming Mode runs):
+//!
+//! * `GAMESCOPE_FOCUSED_APP` — appid of the window holding **input** focus
+//! * `GAMESCOPE_FOCUSED_APP_GFX` — appid of the window being **displayed**
+//!
+//! They are equal in normal play and diverge exactly while something else has taken input over
+//! the running app. Measured, both for the Steam menu and for the QAM:
+//!
+//! ```text
+//! app=3856846079 gfx=3856846079   ← streaming, we own input
+//! app=769        gfx=3856846079   ← overlay open (769 = Steam)
+//! ```
+//!
+//! Note `app != gfx` rather than "app is Steam": anything that takes input away from the
+//! displayed app is a thing we should stop forwarding through, and comparing to our own appid
+//! would need us to know it (a non-Steam shortcut's appid is assigned by Steam at creation).
+//!
+//! **Which display.** Not necessarily ours. Gaming Mode runs `gamescope --xwayland-count 2`:
+//! Steam and the atoms live on the first server, the app is given the second, and the client's
+//! own `$DISPLAY` therefore has none of these properties. So discovery walks candidates — our
+//! `$DISPLAY` first (correct for a single-server gamescope), then every socket in
+//! `/tmp/.X11-unix` — and keeps the first whose root actually carries both atoms. gamescope's
+//! Xwayland accepts unauthenticated local connections (verified: `xprop` against it succeeds
+//! with no `.Xauthority` at all), so no cookie plumbing is needed.
+//!
+//! Everything here is best-effort by construction: no gamescope, no X, a sandbox that cannot
+//! see the other socket, or a session that restarts underneath us all end in "no signal", which
+//! degrades to exactly the behaviour that shipped before this module existed.
+
+use std::sync::atomic::{AtomicBool, Ordering};
+use std::sync::Arc;
+use std::time::Duration;
+use x11rb::connection::Connection;
+use x11rb::protocol::xproto::{
+    Atom, AtomEnum, ChangeWindowAttributesAux, ConnectionExt, EventMask, Window,
+};
+use x11rb::protocol::Event;
+use x11rb::rust_connection::RustConnection;
+
+/// How long to wait before rebuilding everything after the X connection drops. Gaming Mode
+/// recreates its Xwayland servers across a session restart, so "gone" is not permanent — but it
+/// is also not worth a hot retry loop.
+const RECONNECT_DELAY: Duration = Duration::from_secs(3);
+
+/// Live "an overlay owns input" flag, updated by a background thread.
+///
+/// Cheap to poll (one relaxed atomic load), which is what the presenter's event loop wants — it
+/// checks once per iteration and only talks to the gamepad service on an edge.
+pub struct OverlayFocus {
+    open: Arc<AtomicBool>,
+}
+
+impl OverlayFocus {
+    /// Start watching, or return `None` when this isn't a gamescope Steam session (the common
+    /// case — every desktop client) or the user opted out with `PUNKTFUNK_OVERLAY_MASK=0`.
+    ///
+    /// Returning `None` is not a failure: the caller keeps its window-focus path, which is the
+    /// right signal everywhere the compositor actually moves focus.
+    pub fn start() -> Option<OverlayFocus> {
+        if std::env::var("PUNKTFUNK_OVERLAY_MASK").is_ok_and(|v| v == "0" || v == "false") {
+            tracing::info!("overlay input mask disabled by PUNKTFUNK_OVERLAY_MASK");
+            return None;
+        }
+        if !gamescope_session() {
+            return None;
+        }
+        let open = Arc::new(AtomicBool::new(false));
+        let flag = open.clone();
+        std::thread::Builder::new()
+            .name("punktfunk-overlay-focus".into())
+            .spawn(move || watch(&flag))
+            .map_err(|e| tracing::warn!(error = %e, "overlay focus watcher failed to start"))
+            .ok()?;
+        Some(OverlayFocus { open })
+    }
+
+    /// Does something other than the displayed app own input right now?
+    pub fn is_open(&self) -> bool {
+        self.open.load(Ordering::Relaxed)
+    }
+}
+
+/// Gaming Mode / any gamescope session — the only place this signal exists. Mirrors the same
+/// env checks the shells already use to detect Gaming Mode.
+fn gamescope_session() -> bool {
+    std::env::var_os("GAMESCOPE_WAYLAND_DISPLAY").is_some()
+        || std::env::var_os("SteamDeck").is_some()
+        || std::env::var("XDG_CURRENT_DESKTOP").is_ok_and(|d| d.eq_ignore_ascii_case("gamescope"))
+}
+
+/// Displays worth trying, in order: ours first (a single-server gamescope publishes the atoms on
+/// the display the app is already on), then every other socket present. `/tmp/.X11-unix` is
+/// listed rather than probing `:0..:N` blindly so we never connect to a display that isn't there.
+fn candidate_displays() -> Vec<String> {
+    let mut out = Vec::new();
+    if let Ok(d) = std::env::var("DISPLAY") {
+        if !d.is_empty() {
+            out.push(d);
+        }
+    }
+    if let Ok(entries) = std::fs::read_dir("/tmp/.X11-unix") {
+        let mut found: Vec<String> = entries
+            .flatten()
+            .filter_map(|e| {
+                let name = e.file_name().into_string().ok()?;
+                let n = name.strip_prefix('X')?;
+                n.parse::<u32>().ok().map(|n| format!(":{n}"))
+            })
+            .collect();
+        found.sort();
+        for d in found {
+            if !out.contains(&d) {
+                out.push(d);
+            }
+        }
+    }
+    out
+}
+
+/// The two atoms on a root that carries them, or `None` for a display that isn't gamescope's
+/// root ctx. `only_if_exists` keeps this from interning atoms into unrelated X servers.
+fn gamescope_atoms(conn: &RustConnection) -> Option<(Atom, Atom)> {
+    let app = conn
+        .intern_atom(true, b"GAMESCOPE_FOCUSED_APP")
+        .ok()?
+        .reply()
+        .ok()?
+        .atom;
+    let gfx = conn
+        .intern_atom(true, b"GAMESCOPE_FOCUSED_APP_GFX")
+        .ok()?
+        .reply()
+        .ok()?
+        .atom;
+    (app != 0 && gfx != 0).then_some((app, gfx))
+}
+
+/// Read one CARDINAL appid. gamescope writes these with a length of ZERO when the appid is 0
+/// (`focusedAppId != 0 ? 1 : 0`), so "present but empty" is a real state meaning "no app" — it
+/// must read as `None`, not as `Some(0)` that would then compare unequal to everything.
+fn read_appid(conn: &RustConnection, root: Window, atom: Atom) -> Option<u32> {
+    let reply = conn
+        .get_property(false, root, atom, AtomEnum::CARDINAL, 0, 1)
+        .ok()?
+        .reply()
+        .ok()?;
+    // Bound rather than returned inline: the iterator borrows `reply`, and as a tail
+    // expression its temporary would outlive it.
+    let id = reply.value32()?.next();
+    id
+}
+
+/// The whole decision, separated from X so it can be tested: an overlay is up exactly when
+/// input focus and the displayed app are both known and DIFFER.
+///
+/// Absence is never an overlay. A missing value means "no app focused" (gamescope's zero-length
+/// write) or "this display stopped answering" — and a mask that latched on when the signal went
+/// away would silently kill the controller for the rest of the session, which is a far worse
+/// failure than not masking at all.
+fn overlay_open_from(app: Option<u32>, gfx: Option<u32>) -> bool {
+    matches!((app, gfx), (Some(a), Some(g)) if a != g)
+}
+
+/// True when input focus and the displayed app have diverged — an overlay is up.
+fn overlay_open(conn: &RustConnection, root: Window, app: Atom, gfx: Atom) -> bool {
+    overlay_open_from(read_appid(conn, root, app), read_appid(conn, root, gfx))
+}
+
+/// Connect, find the root ctx, then block on PropertyNotify for the two atoms. Returns on any X
+/// error so the outer loop can rebuild after a session restart.
+fn watch(flag: &Arc<AtomicBool>) {
+    loop {
+        if let Some((conn, root, app, gfx)) = connect() {
+            // Seed before the first event: the overlay may already be up when we start.
+            flag.store(overlay_open(&conn, root, app, gfx), Ordering::Relaxed);
+            loop {
+                match conn.wait_for_event() {
+                    Ok(Event::PropertyNotify(e)) if e.atom == app || e.atom == gfx => {
+                        let open = overlay_open(&conn, root, app, gfx);
+                        if flag.swap(open, Ordering::Relaxed) != open {
+                            tracing::debug!(open, "gamescope overlay focus changed");
+                        }
+                    }
+                    Ok(_) => {}
+                    Err(e) => {
+                        tracing::info!(error = %e, "gamescope focus watcher disconnected");
+                        break;
+                    }
+                }
+            }
+            // A dropped connection tells us nothing about the controller — unmask, or a
+            // gamescope restart mid-overlay would leave the pad dead with nothing to revive it.
+            flag.store(false, Ordering::Relaxed);
+        }
+        std::thread::sleep(RECONNECT_DELAY);
+    }
+}
+
+/// The first candidate display whose root carries both atoms, with PropertyNotify selected.
+fn connect() -> Option<(RustConnection, Window, Atom, Atom)> {
+    for dpy in candidate_displays() {
+        // `dpy`, not `display`: `display` is one of tracing's own value helpers, and a field
+        // named after it resolves to the helper inside the macro rather than to this string.
+        let Ok((conn, screen_num)) = RustConnection::connect(Some(&dpy)) else {
+            continue;
+        };
+        let Some((app, gfx)) = gamescope_atoms(&conn) else {
+            continue;
+        };
+        let root = conn.setup().roots[screen_num].root;
+        // Both atoms must actually be PRESENT on this root, not merely interned: a second
+        // gamescope Xwayland knows the atom names (they are per-server strings) but only the
+        // root ctx publishes the values.
+        if read_appid(&conn, root, gfx).is_none() {
+            continue;
+        }
+        // Checked rather than fire-and-forget: an event mask that silently failed to apply
+        // would leave the watcher blocked forever on a display that never speaks to it.
+        let selected = match conn.change_window_attributes(
+            root,
+            &ChangeWindowAttributesAux::new().event_mask(EventMask::PROPERTY_CHANGE),
+        ) {
+            Ok(cookie) => cookie.check().is_ok(),
+            Err(_) => false,
+        };
+        if !selected {
+            continue;
+        }
+        tracing::info!(dpy, "watching gamescope focus for overlay input masking");
+        return Some((conn, root, app, gfx));
+    }
+    None
+}
+
+#[cfg(test)]
+mod tests {
+    use super::*;
+
+    /// The measured Deck states, both directions (2026-08-08, Steam menu and QAM alike):
+    /// equal appids while we own input, divergent while the overlay does.
+    #[test]
+    fn divergent_appids_are_an_overlay() {
+        assert!(!overlay_open_from(Some(3856846079), Some(3856846079)));
+        assert!(overlay_open_from(Some(769), Some(3856846079)));
+    }
+
+    /// gamescope writes these properties with a length of ZERO when the appid is 0, so "no app"
+    /// arrives as a missing value rather than `Some(0)`. Reading it as `Some(0)` would make it
+    /// differ from every real appid and mask the pad on an empty Gaming Mode home screen.
+    #[test]
+    fn a_missing_appid_is_never_an_overlay() {
+        assert!(!overlay_open_from(None, Some(3856846079)));
+        assert!(!overlay_open_from(Some(769), None));
+        assert!(!overlay_open_from(None, None));
+    }
+
+    /// The safety property that outranks the feature: if the signal is unreadable we forward as
+    /// before. A latched mask would leave a streaming session with a dead controller and no way
+    /// back short of restarting it.
+    #[test]
+    fn absence_fails_open_not_closed() {
+        assert!(!overlay_open_from(None, None));
+    }
+}

crates/pf-encode/src/enc/pyrowave_wire.rs

@@ -53,6 +53,24 @@ pub(crate) fn stamp_color_bits(bitstream: &mut [u8], seq_offset: usize, bt2020_p
     }
 }
 
+/// Read the 3-bit wire sequence counter out of a pyrowave block header.
+///
+/// Every block header is `{ u16 ballot; u16 payload_words:12, sequence:3, extended:1; u32 ... }`
+/// (`pyrowave_common.hpp`, `static_assert(sizeof == 8)`), so the counter is bits 12..14 of the
+/// little-endian half-word at `packet_offset + 2` — the same word `stamp_color_bits` reaches into
+/// from the other end.
+///
+/// This field is the entire frame-boundary signal on the wire: the decoder restarts a frame only
+/// when the value CHANGES (`diff = (hdr.sequence - last_seq) & 0x7; restart = diff != 0`), so a
+/// repeated value is read as more blocks of the same frame. That is why PW5's alternating encoder
+/// handles need `pyrowave_encoder_set_next_sequence`, and why a test asserts this reader sees
+/// +1 mod 8 across the pair.
+pub(crate) fn wire_sequence(bitstream: &[u8], packet_offset: usize) -> Option<u8> {
+    let lo = *bitstream.get(packet_offset + 2)?;
+    let hi = *bitstream.get(packet_offset + 3)?;
+    Some(((u16::from_le_bytes([lo, hi]) >> 12) & 0x7) as u8)
+}
+
 /// The wavelet block space's total 32x32-block count for a mode — the exact counting walk of
 /// upstream `WaveletBuffers::init_block_meta` (also ported to the Apple `WaveletLayout`, whose
 /// golden tests pin it against real host AUs). Needed because the vendored RDO pass packs the
@@ -201,6 +219,193 @@ pub(crate) fn build_au(
     au
 }
 
+// ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
+// Streamed-AU chunk cutting (PW6 — latency plan §T3.4, wave-2 plan PW6)
+// ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+/// Default per-chunk target — ~3–4 chunks for a 400 Mb/s 60 fps AU (~833 KB). Deliberately coarse,
+/// because the SEALER, not this size, sets how early bytes actually leave:
+///
+/// * Toward a plain `VIDEO_CAP_STREAMED_AU` client, `Packetizer::push_streamed` flushes only when
+///   its pending buffer exceeds one FEC block — `fec.max_data_per_block × shard_payload`, which is
+///   200 × 1408 = 281 600 B on the shipped 1500-MTU IPv4 geometry. Anything smaller than that is
+///   simply buffered. (256 KiB sits just under one block, so the first flush lands on the SECOND
+///   chunk; the win is intact either way — the whole-AU path seals all ~3 blocks before its first
+///   datagram may leave.) Only a client that ALSO negotiated `VIDEO_CAP_MULTI_SLICE` gets the
+///   finer `MIN_STREAM_BLOCK_SHARDS` floor (16 shards ≈ 22 KB), where the chunk size does set the
+///   flush granularity directly. pf-encode is not told the session's FEC geometry, so this is a
+///   fixed byte target rather than a block-derived one.
+/// * Chunks are not free: the send thread paces each sealed batch on its own
+///   (`stream.rs::pace_sealed`), and every call grants a fresh `max(bytes/4, 128 KiB)` microburst
+///   allowance. Cutting an AU into dozens of chunks therefore erodes the pacing this host does to
+///   stop line-rate bursts from overrunning the NIC — the failure mode the pacer exists for.
+const STREAM_CHUNK_TARGET_BYTES: usize = 256 * 1024;
+/// Clamp on the `PUNKTFUNK_PYROWAVE_CHUNK_KIB` override (see [`stream_chunk_step`]).
+const STREAM_CHUNK_MIN_KIB: usize = 4;
+const STREAM_CHUNK_MAX_KIB: usize = 8192;
+
+/// Whether streamed-AU output is armed for this host process.
+///
+/// **Default OFF, and deliberately so.** The streamed wire shape costs one PyroWave-specific
+/// regression that has not been measured: an UNPINNED streamed frame (its final block never
+/// arrived, so `frame_bytes` is still the 0 sentinel) is excluded from partial delivery
+/// (`reassemble.rs`, 2026-07 security-review finding 10) — where today's whole-AU path hands the
+/// consumer a usable blurred partial, a streamed frame that loses its final block delivers
+/// NOTHING. PyroWave clients opt into partial delivery unconditionally
+/// (`client/pump/handshake.rs`), so this is a live behaviour change for every one of them. The
+/// netem loss-harness leg (2 % on `lo`, FEC pinned off — the Phase-4 recipe) comparing
+/// partial-delivery rates streamed vs whole-AU is the prerequisite for flipping the default;
+/// until it has run, `PUNKTFUNK_PYROWAVE_STREAMED_AU=1` is how you get it.
+///
+/// The client's `VIDEO_CAP_STREAMED_AU` and the host's `PUNKTFUNK_STREAMED_AU` remain the outer
+/// gates (`stream.rs`) — this only decides whether the ENCODER offers chunks at all.
+fn stream_armed() -> bool {
+    static ARMED: std::sync::OnceLock<bool> = std::sync::OnceLock::new();
+    // Latched once: `supports_chunked_poll` is re-queried per AU, and a knob that could change
+    // mid-session would flip the wire shape under an open `StreamedAu`.
+    *ARMED.get_or_init(|| {
+        matches!(
+            std::env::var("PUNKTFUNK_PYROWAVE_STREAMED_AU").as_deref(),
+            Ok("1")
+        )
+    })
+}
+
+/// Bytes per streamed chunk, rounded DOWN to a whole number of `window`-sized windows (never
+/// below one). The rounding is the whole point — see [`AuChunker`].
+fn chunk_step(window: usize, target: usize) -> usize {
+    (target / window.max(1)).max(1) * window.max(1)
+}
+
+/// The streamed-AU chunk size for a backend whose wire chunking is `wire_chunk`, or `None` when
+/// this session must stay on the whole-AU path — which is the answer whenever the feature is not
+/// armed ([`stream_armed`]) or the encoder is in DENSE mode.
+///
+/// Dense mode is excluded on purpose: there the AU is ONE atomic pyrowave packet with no window
+/// framing, so a cut is neither shard-aligned nor a framing boundary. Every real PyroWave session
+/// runs datagram-aligned (`stream.rs` sets `plan.wire_chunk = Some(session.shard_payload())`), so
+/// nothing is lost — but the invariant this file promises stays true instead of nearly true.
+///
+/// `PUNKTFUNK_PYROWAVE_CHUNK_KIB` overrides the target (clamped to
+/// [`STREAM_CHUNK_MIN_KIB`]..=[`STREAM_CHUNK_MAX_KIB`]); garbage falls back to the default.
+pub(crate) fn stream_chunk_step(wire_chunk: Option<usize>) -> Option<usize> {
+    let window = wire_chunk.filter(|&w| w > 0)?;
+    if !stream_armed() {
+        return None;
+    }
+    static TARGET: std::sync::OnceLock<usize> = std::sync::OnceLock::new();
+    let target = *TARGET.get_or_init(|| {
+        std::env::var("PUNKTFUNK_PYROWAVE_CHUNK_KIB")
+            .ok()
+            .and_then(|v| v.trim().parse::<usize>().ok())
+            .filter(|k| (STREAM_CHUNK_MIN_KIB..=STREAM_CHUNK_MAX_KIB).contains(k))
+            .map(|k| k * 1024)
+            .unwrap_or(STREAM_CHUNK_TARGET_BYTES)
+    });
+    Some(chunk_step(window, target))
+}
+
+/// Hands a **finished** datagram-aligned AU out in window-aligned pieces for the streamed-AU wire
+/// ([`crate::Encoder::poll_chunk`], `punktfunk_core::quic::VIDEO_CAP_STREAMED_AU`). Shared by both
+/// pyrowave backends so the cut rule cannot drift between Linux and Windows — the Windows backend
+/// cannot even be compiled from a Linux/macOS dev box, so logic written into it directly ships
+/// unverified.
+///
+/// ## What this does NOT buy (read before quoting PW6 as a latency win)
+///
+/// pyrowave's `encode_frame` is **synchronous**: `submit` returns only once the whole AU sits in
+/// `pending`, so by the time the host can poll a chunk the encode is over. `poll_chunk` is
+/// therefore NOT "emit slices as the encoder produces them" — it is "hand the finished AU out in
+/// pieces so the wire work pipelines with itself". Concretely, what moves:
+///
+/// * whole-AU path: `Session::seal_frame_at` FEC-protects, packetizes and AEAD-seals the ENTIRE
+///   ~830 KB AU before its first datagram may leave the socket;
+/// * streamed path: each FEC block seals and paces as it completes, so the first byte reaches the
+///   wire after one block's seal, and the remaining seal work overlaps its own transmission.
+///
+/// There is NO encode/send overlap here — unlike the H.26x sub-frame slice path, where chunks
+/// genuinely appear while the encoder is still working. PW6 and PW5 (encode overlap) are
+/// independent packages, not sequential ones.
+///
+/// It also does **not** give the client decode-while-arriving: the reassembler completes a
+/// streamed AU exactly like a whole one (`reassemble.rs` — `block_count != 0 && blocks_ok ==
+/// block_count`) and hands up ONE `Frame`. Client-side prefix decode is the separate
+/// `Session::set_deliver_frame_parts` opt-in, which PyroWave's newest-wins frame channel cannot
+/// take — see the PW6 section of `design/linux-host-performance-wave2-pyrowave.md`.
+///
+/// ## The cut rule
+///
+/// A chunk is a whole number of `chunk`-sized WINDOWS. [`build_au`] gives every window exactly ONE
+/// `kind` in its 4-byte prefix (`WIN_PACKED` or one link of a `WIN_FRAG_*` chain), so a cut inside
+/// a window would split a unit the clients parse atomically. Whole windows are `shard_payload`
+/// multiples by construction, which is what makes the sealer's sentinel block bases shard-aligned
+/// for free (plan §4.4) — the streamed path's placement contract.
+pub(crate) struct AuChunker {
+    au: Vec<u8>,
+    /// Bytes already handed out.
+    cursor: usize,
+    /// Bytes per chunk — a whole number of windows ([`chunk_step`]).
+    step: usize,
+    pts_ns: u64,
+    keyframe: bool,
+    recovery_anchor: bool,
+    chunk_aligned: bool,
+    /// Set once anything has been emitted, so the degenerate EMPTY AU still owes exactly one
+    /// chunk and not an infinite stream of them.
+    emitted: bool,
+}
+
+impl AuChunker {
+    pub(crate) fn new(frame: crate::EncodedFrame, step: usize) -> AuChunker {
+        AuChunker {
+            au: frame.data,
+            cursor: 0,
+            step: step.max(1),
+            pts_ns: frame.pts_ns,
+            keyframe: frame.keyframe,
+            recovery_anchor: frame.recovery_anchor,
+            chunk_aligned: frame.chunk_aligned,
+            emitted: false,
+        }
+    }
+
+    /// The next piece, or `None` once the AU is spent. The pieces concatenate to exactly the bytes
+    /// [`crate::Encoder::poll`] would have returned; `first` opens the wire frame and `last` closes
+    /// it (the host's `handle_chunk` keys its `begin`/`finish` off precisely those two).
+    pub(crate) fn next(&mut self) -> Option<crate::AuChunk> {
+        if self.cursor >= self.au.len() {
+            // A zero-byte AU is not reachable through `build_au` (it always emits at least one
+            // window), but the host would leak its open `StreamedAu` if a chunked poll returned
+            // nothing at all — so the degenerate case still owes one self-closing chunk.
+            if self.emitted {
+                return None;
+            }
+            self.emitted = true;
+            return Some(self.chunk(Vec::new(), true, true));
+        }
+        let first = self.cursor == 0;
+        let end = (self.cursor + self.step).min(self.au.len());
+        let data = self.au[self.cursor..end].to_vec();
+        self.cursor = end;
+        self.emitted = true;
+        Some(self.chunk(data, first, end == self.au.len()))
+    }
+
+    /// AU-level metadata rides every chunk (the `AuChunk` contract only makes it authoritative on
+    /// `first`, but a truthful copy on each one costs nothing and keeps a mid-AU log honest).
+    fn chunk(&self, data: Vec<u8>, first: bool, last: bool) -> crate::AuChunk {
+        crate::AuChunk {
+            data,
+            pts_ns: self.pts_ns,
+            keyframe: self.keyframe,
+            recovery_anchor: self.recovery_anchor,
+            chunk_aligned: self.chunk_aligned,
+            first,
+            last,
+        }
+    }
+}
+
 #[cfg(test)]
 mod tests {
     use super::*;
@@ -362,4 +567,119 @@ mod tests {
         stamp_color_bits(&mut bs, 0, true);
         assert_eq!(bs[7], 0x78);
     }
+
+    // --- streamed-AU chunk cutting (PW6) ------------------------------------
+    // Appended at module END per the wave plan's ownership rule.
+
+    fn frame(data: Vec<u8>) -> crate::EncodedFrame {
+        crate::EncodedFrame {
+            data,
+            pts_ns: 1_234_567,
+            keyframe: true,
+            recovery_anchor: false,
+            chunk_aligned: true,
+        }
+    }
+
+    /// Drain a chunker into `(concatenated bytes, per-chunk lengths, first flags, last flags)`.
+    fn drain(mut c: AuChunker) -> (Vec<u8>, Vec<usize>, Vec<bool>, Vec<bool>) {
+        let (mut bytes, mut lens, mut firsts, mut lasts) = (Vec::new(), Vec::new(), vec![], vec![]);
+        while let Some(ch) = c.next() {
+            lens.push(ch.data.len());
+            firsts.push(ch.first);
+            lasts.push(ch.last);
+            bytes.extend_from_slice(&ch.data);
+            assert_eq!(ch.pts_ns, 1_234_567, "AU metadata rides every chunk");
+            assert!(ch.keyframe && ch.chunk_aligned && !ch.recovery_anchor);
+        }
+        (bytes, lens, firsts, lasts)
+    }
+
+    /// The invariant PW6 rests on: chunks concatenate to EXACTLY the AU, every cut lands on a
+    /// whole-window boundary (so no window's single `kind` is split across two wire frames), and
+    /// the reassembled stream still walks back to the same codec packets. A cut inside a window
+    /// would hand the client a 4-byte prefix whose body arrives in a different chunk — the
+    /// framing is one-kind-per-window, so there is no way to express that.
+    #[test]
+    fn stream_chunks_tile_the_au_on_window_boundaries() {
+        let bs: Vec<u8> = (0..4000u32).map(|i| (i % 251) as u8).collect();
+        let packets = [(0, 20), (20, 300), (320, 55), (375, 900), (1275, 40)];
+        let chunk = 64;
+        let au = build_au(&packets, &bs, Some(chunk));
+        assert!(au.len() / chunk > 4, "need several windows to cut between");
+        let step = chunk_step(chunk, 3 * chunk);
+        assert_eq!(step, 3 * chunk);
+        let (bytes, lens, firsts, lasts) = drain(AuChunker::new(frame(au.clone()), step));
+        assert_eq!(bytes, au, "chunks concatenate to exactly the AU");
+        assert!(
+            lens.iter().all(|l| l % chunk == 0),
+            "every chunk is a whole number of windows: {lens:?}"
+        );
+        assert!(
+            lens[..lens.len() - 1].iter().all(|&l| l == step),
+            "only the tail chunk may be short: {lens:?}"
+        );
+        assert_eq!(
+            firsts,
+            (0..lens.len()).map(|i| i == 0).collect::<Vec<_>>(),
+            "exactly one opening chunk"
+        );
+        assert_eq!(
+            lasts,
+            (0..lens.len())
+                .map(|i| i + 1 == lens.len())
+                .collect::<Vec<_>>(),
+            "exactly one closing chunk"
+        );
+        // And the client's parse is unchanged by the cutting.
+        let mut expect = Vec::new();
+        for &(o, s) in &packets {
+            expect.extend_from_slice(&bs[o..o + s]);
+        }
+        assert_eq!(walk(&bytes, chunk), expect);
+    }
+
+    /// The step always rounds DOWN to whole windows and never to zero — a target below one window
+    /// degenerates to one window per chunk rather than an empty chunk (which would spin forever).
+    #[test]
+    fn chunk_step_rounds_down_to_whole_windows() {
+        // 262144 / 1408 = 186.2 → 186 whole windows (261 888 B), never the 262 144 asked for.
+        assert_eq!(chunk_step(1408, 256 * 1024), 186 * 1408);
+        assert_eq!(chunk_step(1408, 1408), 1408);
+        assert_eq!(chunk_step(1408, 1407), 1408); // below one window → one window
+        assert_eq!(chunk_step(1408, 0), 1408);
+        assert_eq!(chunk_step(0, 4096), 4096); // defensive: never divides by zero
+    }
+
+    /// An AU that fits one chunk is a single `first && last` piece — the shape the host's
+    /// `handle_chunk` turns into begin+finish on one message, and byte-identical on the wire to
+    /// what the whole-AU path would have sealed.
+    #[test]
+    fn single_chunk_au_opens_and_closes_itself() {
+        let au = vec![7u8; 512];
+        let (bytes, lens, firsts, lasts) = drain(AuChunker::new(frame(au.clone()), 4096));
+        assert_eq!(bytes, au);
+        assert_eq!(lens, vec![512]);
+        assert_eq!(firsts, vec![true]);
+        assert_eq!(lasts, vec![true]);
+    }
+
+    /// The degenerate empty AU still owes exactly ONE self-closing chunk: a chunked poll that
+    /// returned nothing would leave the host's `StreamedAu` open forever (its `begin` fires on
+    /// `first`, its `finish` on `last`).
+    #[test]
+    fn empty_au_still_emits_one_self_closing_chunk() {
+        let mut c = AuChunker::new(frame(Vec::new()), 4096);
+        let ch = c.next().expect("one chunk");
+        assert!(ch.first && ch.last && ch.data.is_empty());
+        assert!(c.next().is_none(), "and never a second one");
+    }
+
+    /// Dense (non-windowed) AUs never stream: there is no window framing to cut on, so a chunk
+    /// boundary would be neither shard-aligned nor a parse boundary.
+    #[test]
+    fn dense_mode_never_streams() {
+        assert!(stream_chunk_step(None).is_none());
+        assert!(stream_chunk_step(Some(0)).is_none());
+    }
 }

crates/pf-encode/src/enc/windows/pyrowave.rs

@@ -128,6 +128,11 @@ pub struct PyroWaveEncoder {
     wire_budget: pyrowave_wire::WireBudget,
     bitstream: Vec<u8>,
     pending: VecDeque<EncodedFrame>,
+    /// The AU currently being handed out in streamed chunks (PW6 — `Some` strictly between a
+    /// `first` chunk and its `last`). See [`pyrowave_wire::AuChunker`]: this backend's encode is
+    /// synchronous, so the AU is COMPLETE before the first chunk leaves — the split is for the
+    /// send side, never an encode/send overlap.
+    chunker: Option<pyrowave_wire::AuChunker>,
 }
 
 // SAFETY: used only from the single encode thread; the pyrowave handles are owned and only touched
@@ -255,6 +260,7 @@ impl PyroWaveEncoder {
                 wire_budget: pyrowave_wire::WireBudget::new(),
                 bitstream: Vec::new(),
                 pending: VecDeque::new(),
+                chunker: None,
             })
         }
     }
@@ -676,10 +682,55 @@ impl Encoder for PyroWaveEncoder {
     }
 
     fn poll(&mut self) -> Result<Option<EncodedFrame>> {
+        // Trait contract: each AU is drained through ONE method. Erroring beats double-emitting
+        // the bytes the chunk cursor already handed out (which would reach the wire twice, under
+        // the same frame index, and fail the receiver's retro-validation).
+        if self.chunker.is_some() {
+            bail!("pyrowave: poll() on an AU already being drained through poll_chunk");
+        }
         Ok(self.pending.pop_front())
     }
 
+    // --- streamed AU (PW6) — see `pyrowave_wire::AuChunker` for what this does and does NOT buy.
+    // Byte-identical to the Linux twin BY CONSTRUCTION: all of the cutting lives in the shared
+    // helper, which compiles and unit-tests on every platform. This file cannot be compiled from
+    // a Linux/macOS dev box, so anything written here directly would ship unverified.
+    fn supports_chunked_poll(&self) -> bool {
+        pyrowave_wire::stream_chunk_step(self.wire_chunk).is_some()
+    }
+
+    fn poll_chunk(&mut self) -> Result<Option<crate::AuChunk>> {
+        // Finish the AU already in flight before opening the next one — the host's `handle_chunk`
+        // keys begin/finish off `first`/`last` and cannot interleave two AUs.
+        if let Some(c) = self.chunker.as_mut() {
+            if let Some(chunk) = c.next() {
+                return Ok(Some(chunk));
+            }
+            self.chunker = None;
+        }
+        let Some(f) = self.pending.pop_front() else {
+            return Ok(None);
+        };
+        // No blocking wait here (the trait allows one): `submit` already ran the whole encode
+        // synchronously, so an AU in `pending` is complete by construction.
+        match pyrowave_wire::stream_chunk_step(self.wire_chunk) {
+            Some(step) => Ok(self
+                .chunker
+                .insert(pyrowave_wire::AuChunker::new(f, step))
+                .next()),
+            // Unarmed / dense: the trait's own default shape, so a host that polls chunks anyway
+            // still gets whole AUs.
+            None => Ok(Some(crate::AuChunk::whole(f))),
+        }
+    }
+
     fn reset(&mut self) -> bool {
+        // A rebuild forfeits every in-flight frame — including an AU only half-handed-out through
+        // `poll_chunk`. Dropping the cursor here (ahead of every `pending.clear()` arm below) is
+        // what keeps the next `poll_chunk` from splicing the tail of a dead AU onto a fresh one;
+        // the host sees a `first` without the previous `last`, logs "streamed AU abandoned
+        // mid-flight" and lets the client age that frame out.
+        self.chunker = None;
         // Cheap in-place rebuild: recreate only the pyrowave encoder object (no rate-control /
         // reference state to preserve). The device, imported textures and fence survive.
         // SAFETY: encode is synchronous (no work in flight); the device outlives the swapped encoder.

crates/pf-presenter/src/run.rs

@@ -646,6 +646,18 @@ fn run_inner(mut opts: SessionOpts, mut mode: ModeCtl) -> Result<Option<Outcome>
         // translation automatically — the GTK launcher never turned it off either).
         gamepad.set_menu_mode(true);
     }
+    // Gaming Mode's Steam menu / QAM drive the SAME physical pad we forward, and gamescope
+    // never takes our X focus away (it resolves focus per Xwayland ctx, and we are alone in
+    // ours), so SDL's own background-input gate cannot fire there. `None` everywhere else,
+    // where window focus IS the signal — see the FocusLost/FocusGained arms below.
+    #[cfg(target_os = "linux")]
+    let overlay_focus = pf_client_core::overlay_focus::OverlayFocus::start();
+    // Two independent reasons the pad is not ours — window focus and the gamescope overlay —
+    // OR'd into ONE value that is pushed to the service on an edge. Kept as separate inputs
+    // rather than one flag each source writes: either would otherwise clear the other's mask
+    // (a focus-loss mask undone by the next overlay poll saying "no overlay", and vice versa).
+    let mut focus_lost = false;
+    let mut mask_applied = false;
 
     // The native display mode — the `0 = native` fallback for the requested stream mode
     // (the GTK client reads the monitor under its window; same idea).
@@ -758,8 +770,17 @@ fn run_inner(mut opts: SessionOpts, mut mode: ModeCtl) -> Result<Option<Outcome>
                                 tracing::info!("focus lost — input released");
                             }
                         }
+                        // Controllers go with the keyboard and mouse. SDL already stops
+                        // delivering their PRESSES here, but nothing zeroed what the host
+                        // still believes is held — so a stick deflected at the moment focus
+                        // went away kept steering. Masking flushes it neutral.
+                        focus_lost = true;
                     }
                     WindowEvent::FocusGained => {
+                        // Unlike capture, the controller mask has no "the user meant it"
+                        // variant to respect — it exists only to mirror who owns the pad —
+                        // so regaining focus always lifts its half.
+                        focus_lost = false;
                         // An auto-release (Alt-Tab) undoes itself; a chord release
                         // stays released until the user opts back in.
                         if let Some(cap) = stream.as_mut().and_then(|s| s.capture.as_mut()) {
@@ -1070,6 +1091,18 @@ fn run_inner(mut opts: SessionOpts, mut mode: ModeCtl) -> Result<Option<Outcome>
                 other => pump.handle_event(other),
             }
         }
+        // Who owns the pad right now: window focus, plus Gaming Mode's overlay signal where it
+        // exists (one relaxed atomic load; `None` off gamescope). Edge-triggered — the service
+        // hears only about CHANGES, so an open QAM doesn't re-flush the pads every iteration.
+        #[cfg(target_os = "linux")]
+        let overlay_now = overlay_focus.as_ref().is_some_and(|of| of.is_open());
+        #[cfg(not(target_os = "linux"))]
+        let overlay_now = false;
+        let want_mask = focus_lost || overlay_now;
+        if want_mask != mask_applied {
+            mask_applied = want_mask;
+            gamepad.set_masked(want_mask);
+        }
         pump.tick();
         // One coalesced MouseMove per iteration — pure motion must reach the host
         // without waiting for a click/key to flush it.

crates/pf-zerocopy/src/imp/mod.rs

@@ -19,7 +19,7 @@ pub mod vkslot;
 pub mod vulkan;
 pub mod worker;
 
-use std::sync::atomic::{AtomicBool, AtomicU32, Ordering};
+use std::sync::atomic::{AtomicBool, AtomicU32, AtomicU64, Ordering};
 
 pub use cuda::DeviceBuffer;
 pub use egl::{DmabufPlane, EglImporter};
@@ -261,56 +261,223 @@ pub fn gpu_import_disabled() -> bool {
 /// operator found `PUNKTFUNK_ZEROCOPY=0` by hand. The host already knows how to encode that
 /// machine — capture just has to stop handing it dmabufs. Latching here is what makes the next
 /// session negotiate CPU frames on its own.
-static RAW_DMABUF_FAILURE_STREAK: AtomicU32 = AtomicU32::new(0);
-static RAW_DMABUF_DISABLED: AtomicBool = AtomicBool::new(false);
 /// Below the encoder's own rebuild budget, so the latch is set before the session it doomed ends.
 const RAW_DMABUF_FAILURE_LATCH: u32 = 3;
 
-/// Record an encoder-side raw-dmabuf import failure. Latches the process-wide disable after
-/// `RAW_DMABUF_FAILURE_LATCH` consecutive failures.
+/// Consecutive capture rebuilds whose dmabuf-only offer never negotiated before the passthrough is
+/// latched off. **2 = one retry**, deliberately: each failed negotiation costs a ~10 s stall, so a
+/// larger budget is paid by the user in dead air. One retry is enough to survive a compositor
+/// caught mid-restart, which is the transient this exists for; a compositor that genuinely never
+/// accepts keeps the same capture identity, so its streak accumulates and it latches on the second
+/// try — one extra stall versus the old behaviour, once per host lifetime.
+const RAW_DMABUF_NEGOTIATION_LATCH: u32 = 2;
+
+/// The raw-dmabuf passthrough's off-switch — **two causes with two different lifetimes**, which is
+/// the whole point of this type.
+///
+/// They used to share one `AtomicBool`, so the cheap recoverable cause (a negotiation that timed
+/// out, possibly because the compositor was mid-restart) was as permanent as the expensive
+/// unrecoverable one (an encoder that cannot import what this compositor allocates). Once either
+/// fired, EVERY later session on the host captured CPU frames until the process was restarted —
+/// including sessions against a completely different compositor and node, which had never failed
+/// at anything.
+///
+/// * **Import failures stay sticky.** A driver that will not take what the compositor allocates
+///   refuses identically on every retry, and the encode-stall recovery above cannot tell that from
+///   a transient — it rebuilt the same failing encoder five times and then ended the session, on
+///   every connection, forever. That is what this latch was born to stop, and it must keep
+///   stopping it.
+/// * **Negotiation timeouts get a retry budget** ([`RAW_DMABUF_NEGOTIATION_LATCH`]).
+/// * **Both are keyed to a capture identity.** A new node id — a fresh virtual output, the
+///   Bazzite Gaming↔Desktop switch, a compositor restart — is a genuinely different question, so
+///   it earns a fresh dmabuf attempt instead of inheriting a verdict about something else.
+///
+/// Atomics rather than a lock because [`note_import_ok`](Self::note_import_ok) is on the per-frame
+/// import path; everything else here runs at pipeline build or on failure.
+#[derive(Debug)]
+pub struct RawDmabufLatch {
+    import_streak: AtomicU32,
+    import_latched: AtomicBool,
+    negotiation_streak: AtomicU32,
+    negotiation_latched: AtomicBool,
+    /// The capture identity the counters above describe. `u64::MAX` = nothing observed yet (a real
+    /// identity is a node id, so it can never collide with the sentinel).
+    identity: AtomicU64,
+}
+
+/// Nothing observed yet — distinct from any real capture identity.
+const NO_IDENTITY: u64 = u64::MAX;
+
+impl RawDmabufLatch {
+    pub const fn new() -> Self {
+        RawDmabufLatch {
+            import_streak: AtomicU32::new(0),
+            import_latched: AtomicBool::new(false),
+            negotiation_streak: AtomicU32::new(0),
+            negotiation_latched: AtomicBool::new(false),
+            identity: AtomicU64::new(NO_IDENTITY),
+        }
+    }
+
+    /// Whether the raw-dmabuf passthrough is currently off, for either cause.
+    pub fn disabled(&self) -> bool {
+        self.import_latched.load(Ordering::Relaxed)
+            || self.negotiation_latched.load(Ordering::Relaxed)
+    }
+
+    /// Tell the latch which capture is about to be built. A DIFFERENT capture from the one the
+    /// current verdict was formed against clears every counter and both latches, so the new
+    /// pipeline earns a fresh dmabuf attempt.
+    ///
+    /// Returns `true` only when that clear actually **re-armed something** — i.e. the identity
+    /// changed *and* a latch was set. Deliberately not "the identity changed": every session on a
+    /// fresh virtual output changes it, and a caller that logged on that would print a re-arm line
+    /// on every healthy session open, which is noise. `true` means "this capture would have been
+    /// forced to CPU by an earlier capture's verdict, and no longer is".
+    ///
+    /// Call this BEFORE reading [`disabled`](Self::disabled) for a negotiation decision, or the
+    /// decision is made against the previous capture's verdict.
+    pub fn observe_capture(&self, identity: u64) -> bool {
+        if self.identity.swap(identity, Ordering::Relaxed) == identity {
+            return false;
+        }
+        let was_latched = self.disabled();
+        self.import_streak.store(0, Ordering::Relaxed);
+        self.import_latched.store(false, Ordering::Relaxed);
+        self.negotiation_streak.store(0, Ordering::Relaxed);
+        self.negotiation_latched.store(false, Ordering::Relaxed);
+        was_latched
+    }
+
+    /// Record an encoder-side raw-dmabuf import failure. Returns `true` if this failure is the one
+    /// that latched the passthrough off.
+    pub fn note_import_failure(&self) -> Option<u32> {
+        let streak = self.import_streak.fetch_add(1, Ordering::Relaxed) + 1;
+        (streak >= RAW_DMABUF_FAILURE_LATCH && !self.import_latched.swap(true, Ordering::Relaxed))
+            .then_some(streak)
+    }
+
+    /// Record a raw dmabuf that imported and encoded — resets the failure streak. The per-frame
+    /// hot path, hence a single relaxed store.
+    ///
+    /// Deliberately does NOT clear `import_latched`: once the latch fires, capture has already
+    /// moved to CPU frames, so there are no more dmabuf imports to succeed. Only a new capture
+    /// identity clears it.
+    pub fn note_import_ok(&self) {
+        self.import_streak.store(0, Ordering::Relaxed);
+    }
+
+    /// Record a capture rebuild whose dmabuf-only offer never negotiated. Returns `Some(streak)`
+    /// if this is the failure that latched the passthrough off, `None` while retries remain.
+    pub fn note_negotiation_timeout(&self) -> Option<u32> {
+        let streak = self.negotiation_streak.fetch_add(1, Ordering::Relaxed) + 1;
+        (streak >= RAW_DMABUF_NEGOTIATION_LATCH
+            && !self.negotiation_latched.swap(true, Ordering::Relaxed))
+        .then_some(streak)
+    }
+
+    /// Record a capture whose dmabuf offer DID negotiate — the retry budget is per consecutive
+    /// run of failures, so a success spends none of it.
+    pub fn note_negotiation_ok(&self) {
+        self.negotiation_streak.store(0, Ordering::Relaxed);
+    }
+
+    /// Diagnostic for the session-open line: which cause (if any) currently holds it off.
+    pub fn state(&self) -> &'static str {
+        match (
+            self.import_latched.load(Ordering::Relaxed),
+            self.negotiation_latched.load(Ordering::Relaxed),
+        ) {
+            (true, true) => "latched: encoder-import + negotiation",
+            (true, false) => "latched: encoder-import failures",
+            (false, true) => "latched: negotiation timeouts",
+            (false, false) => "live",
+        }
+    }
+}
+
+impl Default for RawDmabufLatch {
+    fn default() -> Self {
+        Self::new()
+    }
+}
+
+static RAW_DMABUF: RawDmabufLatch = RawDmabufLatch::new();
+
+/// Record an encoder-side raw-dmabuf import failure. Latches the passthrough off after
+/// `RAW_DMABUF_FAILURE_LATCH` consecutive failures, until the capture identity changes.
 pub fn note_raw_dmabuf_import_failure(reason: &str) {
-    let streak = RAW_DMABUF_FAILURE_STREAK.fetch_add(1, Ordering::Relaxed) + 1;
-    if streak >= RAW_DMABUF_FAILURE_LATCH && !RAW_DMABUF_DISABLED.swap(true, Ordering::Relaxed) {
+    if let Some(streak) = RAW_DMABUF.note_import_failure() {
         tracing::error!(
             streak,
             reason,
-            "zero-copy raw-dmabuf passthrough disabled for this host process: the encoder failed \
-             to import the compositor's dmabuf {streak} times in a row — captures fall back to the \
-             CPU path (slower, but this host could not stream at all otherwise)"
+            "zero-copy raw-dmabuf passthrough disabled: the encoder failed to import the \
+             compositor's dmabuf {streak} times in a row — captures fall back to the CPU path \
+             (slower, but this host could not stream at all otherwise). A new capture (different \
+             node / compositor) clears this."
         );
     }
 }
 
 /// Record a raw dmabuf that imported and encoded — resets the failure streak.
 pub fn note_raw_dmabuf_import_ok() {
-    RAW_DMABUF_FAILURE_STREAK.store(0, Ordering::Relaxed);
+    RAW_DMABUF.note_import_ok();
 }
 
 /// Latch the raw-dmabuf passthrough off because its dmabuf-only *offer never negotiated* — the
-/// CAPTURE-side counterpart to [`note_raw_dmabuf_import_failure`]'s encoder-side streak. One
-/// timeout is conclusive for this offer (a compositor that cannot allocate the requested
-/// LINEAR/modifier BGRx dmabuf refuses it identically on every retry), so there is no streak to
-/// count: the next capture skips the passthrough and negotiates SHM/CPU instead of re-running the
-/// same 10 s timeout on every reconnect.
+/// CAPTURE-side counterpart to [`note_raw_dmabuf_import_failure`]'s encoder-side streak.
+///
+/// Unlike the import streak this gets a retry budget: the offer can time out because the
+/// compositor was mid-restart rather than because it will never accept, and the old behaviour
+/// (one timeout = CPU capture for the rest of the host's life, for every compositor and every
+/// node) turned a transient into a permanent downgrade nobody could see.
 ///
 /// Scoped deliberately. This used to be `note_vaapi_dmabuf_failed`, which fed [`enabled`] and so
-/// disabled ALL zero-copy host-wide — see [`enabled`]. `RAW_DMABUF_DISABLED` gates only the
-/// raw-passthrough decision, so the EGL→CUDA importer that a later NVENC session builds is
-/// untouched.
+/// disabled ALL zero-copy host-wide — see [`enabled`]. It gates only the raw-passthrough decision,
+/// so the EGL→CUDA importer that a later NVENC session builds is untouched.
 pub fn note_raw_dmabuf_negotiation_failed() {
-    if !RAW_DMABUF_DISABLED.swap(true, Ordering::Relaxed) {
-        tracing::warn!(
-            "zero-copy raw-dmabuf passthrough disabled for this host process: the compositor never \
-             accepted the dmabuf-only capture offer, so later captures negotiate the CPU path \
-             instead of repeating that timeout (the EGL→CUDA import path is NOT affected)"
-        );
+    match RAW_DMABUF.note_negotiation_timeout() {
+        Some(streak) => tracing::warn!(
+            streak,
+            "zero-copy raw-dmabuf passthrough disabled: the compositor did not accept the \
+             dmabuf-only capture offer {streak} builds in a row, so later captures negotiate the \
+             CPU path instead of repeating that timeout (the EGL→CUDA import path is NOT \
+             affected). A new capture (different node / compositor) clears this."
+        ),
+        None => tracing::warn!(
+            "the compositor did not accept the dmabuf-only capture offer — retrying dmabuf on the \
+             next capture build before giving up on it"
+        ),
     }
 }
 
-/// True once repeated encoder import failures latched the raw-dmabuf passthrough off (see
-/// [`note_raw_dmabuf_import_failure`]).
+/// Record a capture whose dmabuf offer negotiated — spends none of the retry budget.
+pub fn note_raw_dmabuf_negotiation_ok() {
+    RAW_DMABUF.note_negotiation_ok();
+}
+
+/// Tell the latch which capture is about to be built, so a verdict formed against a DIFFERENT
+/// compositor/node is not inherited. Returns `true` if a latch was cleared by the change.
+pub fn note_raw_dmabuf_capture(identity: u64) -> bool {
+    let cleared = RAW_DMABUF.observe_capture(identity);
+    if cleared {
+        tracing::info!(
+            identity,
+            "zero-copy raw-dmabuf passthrough re-armed: this is a different capture from the one \
+             that failed, so it gets a fresh dmabuf attempt"
+        );
+    }
+    cleared
+}
+
+/// True while either cause holds the raw-dmabuf passthrough off (see [`RawDmabufLatch`]).
 pub fn raw_dmabuf_import_disabled() -> bool {
-    RAW_DMABUF_DISABLED.load(Ordering::Relaxed)
+    RAW_DMABUF.disabled()
+}
+
+/// Which cause holds the passthrough off, for the session-open diagnostic line.
+pub fn raw_dmabuf_latch_state() -> &'static str {
+    RAW_DMABUF.state()
 }
 
 /// The EGL→CUDA twin of the raw-passthrough negotiation latch: the capture advertised the GPU
@@ -564,4 +731,131 @@ mod tests {
         note_gpu_import_death(); // third consecutive death
         assert!(gpu_import_disabled());
     }
+
+    // ---- PW3: the raw-dmabuf latch's two lifetimes ------------------------------------------
+    //
+    // Against a LOCAL `RawDmabufLatch`, never the process-wide static: these assertions are about
+    // the state machine, and sharing one global across a test binary's threads is how a latch test
+    // becomes order-dependent.
+
+    /// The expensive cause stays sticky. A driver that cannot import what this compositor
+    /// allocates refuses identically every time, and the encode-stall recovery cannot tell that
+    /// from a transient — this latch is what stops it rebuilding the same doomed encoder forever.
+    #[test]
+    fn import_failures_latch_and_stay_latched() {
+        let l = RawDmabufLatch::new();
+        assert!(!l.disabled());
+        assert_eq!(l.note_import_failure(), None); // 1
+        assert_eq!(l.note_import_failure(), None); // 2
+        assert!(!l.disabled(), "must not latch before the streak completes");
+        assert_eq!(l.note_import_failure(), Some(3));
+        assert!(l.disabled());
+        // Only the FIRST crossing reports, so the error line cannot repeat per frame.
+        assert_eq!(l.note_import_failure(), None);
+        // A success resets the streak but must NOT unlatch: once capture moved to CPU frames there
+        // are no more dmabuf imports, so an "ok" here would be about something else entirely.
+        l.note_import_ok();
+        assert!(l.disabled());
+    }
+
+    /// A run of failures broken by a success spends none of the budget — the streak is
+    /// consecutive-only, which is what makes an occasional failure survivable.
+    #[test]
+    fn a_success_breaks_the_import_streak() {
+        let l = RawDmabufLatch::new();
+        l.note_import_failure();
+        l.note_import_failure();
+        l.note_import_ok();
+        assert_eq!(l.note_import_failure(), None, "streak restarted at 1");
+        assert_eq!(l.note_import_failure(), None);
+        assert!(!l.disabled());
+        assert_eq!(l.note_import_failure(), Some(3));
+    }
+
+    /// The cheap cause gets a retry. This is the behaviour change PW3 exists for: one timeout used
+    /// to mean CPU capture for the rest of the host's life, on every compositor and every node.
+    #[test]
+    fn a_negotiation_timeout_is_retried_before_it_latches() {
+        let l = RawDmabufLatch::new();
+        assert_eq!(l.note_negotiation_timeout(), None, "first one retries");
+        assert!(
+            !l.disabled(),
+            "the next capture build must still be allowed to try dmabuf"
+        );
+        assert_eq!(l.note_negotiation_timeout(), Some(2));
+        assert!(l.disabled());
+        assert_eq!(l.note_negotiation_timeout(), None, "reports once");
+    }
+
+    /// A capture that negotiates credits the budget back, so a compositor that fails once and then
+    /// works never accumulates its way to a latch across an evening of reconnects.
+    #[test]
+    fn a_negotiated_capture_credits_the_retry_budget() {
+        let l = RawDmabufLatch::new();
+        for _ in 0..10 {
+            assert_eq!(l.note_negotiation_timeout(), None);
+            l.note_negotiation_ok();
+        }
+        assert!(!l.disabled());
+    }
+
+    /// A different capture is a different question. New node id (fresh virtual output, compositor
+    /// restart, the Bazzite Gaming↔Desktop switch) clears BOTH causes — the same capture does not.
+    #[test]
+    fn a_new_capture_identity_clears_the_latch_and_the_same_one_does_not() {
+        let l = RawDmabufLatch::new();
+        // Nothing is latched yet, so observing a new capture re-arms NOTHING — that is what the
+        // return value means, and it is why a healthy session open logs no re-arm line.
+        assert!(
+            !l.observe_capture(7),
+            "nothing was latched, nothing re-armed"
+        );
+        assert!(!l.observe_capture(7), "same capture, no clear");
+        for _ in 0..RAW_DMABUF_FAILURE_LATCH {
+            l.note_import_failure();
+        }
+        assert!(l.disabled());
+        assert!(
+            !l.observe_capture(7),
+            "the SAME capture must keep its verdict — this is the 10s-stall hazard the latch exists for"
+        );
+        assert!(l.disabled());
+        assert!(l.observe_capture(9), "a different node re-arms it");
+        assert!(!l.disabled());
+        // ...and the streaks reset with it, so the fresh attempt gets a full budget.
+        assert_eq!(l.note_import_failure(), None);
+    }
+
+    /// The negotiation latch is keyed the same way — a compositor restart must not inherit the
+    /// previous one's timeout verdict.
+    #[test]
+    fn a_new_capture_identity_clears_the_negotiation_latch_too() {
+        let l = RawDmabufLatch::new();
+        l.observe_capture(1);
+        l.note_negotiation_timeout();
+        l.note_negotiation_timeout();
+        assert!(l.disabled());
+        assert!(l.observe_capture(2));
+        assert!(!l.disabled());
+    }
+
+    /// The session-open line has to name WHICH cause holds it off — "cpu because nothing here
+    /// does dmabuf" and "cpu because something failed earlier" are different bugs.
+    #[test]
+    fn latch_state_names_the_cause() {
+        let l = RawDmabufLatch::new();
+        assert_eq!(l.state(), "live");
+        l.note_negotiation_timeout();
+        l.note_negotiation_timeout();
+        assert_eq!(l.state(), "latched: negotiation timeouts");
+        let l = RawDmabufLatch::new();
+        for _ in 0..RAW_DMABUF_FAILURE_LATCH {
+            l.note_import_failure();
+        }
+        assert_eq!(l.state(), "latched: encoder-import failures");
+        for _ in 0..RAW_DMABUF_NEGOTIATION_LATCH {
+            l.note_negotiation_timeout();
+        }
+        assert_eq!(l.state(), "latched: encoder-import + negotiation");
+    }
 }

crates/punktfunk-core/src/client/frame_channel.rs

@@ -353,6 +353,18 @@ impl FrameChannel {
     /// all-intra stream ([`Self::set_all_intra`]) a multi-deep queue drains to the NEWEST AU
     /// instead — the skipped ones are already superseded and decode independently, so showing
     /// them only adds latency.
+    ///
+    /// ⚠ **The all-intra drain counts QUEUE ENTRIES and assumes one entry == one AU.** That holds
+    /// today only because slice-progressive delivery is refused on PyroWave
+    /// (`client/pump/handshake.rs`; see [`crate::session::Session::set_deliver_frame_parts`]).
+    /// Turn parts on for an all-intra stream and one AU pushes several entries, at which point
+    /// `len > 1` no longer means "the consumer is behind": this fires mid-AU, hands back a SUFFIX
+    /// and `clear()`s that AU's own prefixes — a headerless frame, every frame. Anyone making the
+    /// two composable must skip whole SUPERSEDED AUs (drop up to the newest entry whose
+    /// `part.first` is set, never split an AU), give `push`'s `FRAME_QUEUE_HARD_CAP` eviction the
+    /// same rule, and count `skipped_total` in AUs. Host-side streamed AUs
+    /// ([`crate::quic::VIDEO_CAP_STREAMED_AU`]) are NOT affected — they still arrive as one
+    /// completed `Frame` per AU.
     pub(crate) fn pop(&self, timeout: Duration) -> FramePop {
         let mut st = self.inner.lock().unwrap();
         if st.q.is_empty() && !st.closed {

crates/punktfunk-core/src/client/pump/handshake.rs

@@ -229,7 +229,10 @@ pub(super) async fn connect_and_handshake(args: &WorkerArgs) -> Result<Handshake
         }
         // Slice-progressive delivery (the embedder's opt-in): AU prefixes hand up as
         // `Frame::part` pieces while the tail is still on the wire. Never on PyroWave — its
-        // all-intra frame channel drains newest-wins, which assumes whole AUs.
+        // all-intra frame channel drains newest-wins per QUEUE ENTRY, so parts of one AU read as
+        // separate AUs and the drain shreds the AU it is mid-way through (`FrameChannel::pop`
+        // spells out the mechanism and what a fix would take). Unrelated to the host's streamed-AU
+        // wire (`VIDEO_CAP_STREAMED_AU`), which still completes one whole `Frame` per AU.
         if args.frame_parts && welcome.codec != crate::quic::CODEC_PYROWAVE {
             session.set_deliver_frame_parts(true);
         }

crates/punktfunk-core/src/quic/endpoint.rs

@@ -82,6 +82,49 @@ fn stream_transport_idle(idle: std::time::Duration) -> Arc<quinn::TransportConfi
     Arc::new(t)
 }
 
+/// Endpoint config for the CLIENT endpoint — the half of the jumbo opt-in that lives on the
+/// receiving side, and without which the whole jumbo leg is unreachable.
+///
+/// `EndpointConfig::max_udp_payload_size` is the QUIC transport parameter this endpoint
+/// advertises: "the largest UDP payload I accept". quinn defaults it to **1472** (a 1500-byte
+/// Ethernet MTU), and a peer's MTU-discovery search is upper-bounded by
+/// `min(MtuDiscoveryConfig::upper_bound, the value the OTHER side advertised)`
+/// (`quinn_proto::connection::mtud::SearchState::new`). So raising the host's probe ceiling
+/// alone — which is all [`stream_transport_idle`] did — can never make a host's discovery
+/// settle above 1472: the *client's* default advertisement caps it, and the host's
+/// settled-at-jumbo proof (`native/wire_mtu.rs`, both the mid-session grow and the
+/// session-start one) could never fire. This raises the advertisement to the sealed jumbo
+/// datagram size so the proof is obtainable at all.
+///
+/// Gated on the SAME operator opt-in as the probe ceiling ([`crate::config::jumbo_wire_mtu`],
+/// i.e. `PUNKTFUNK_JUMBO=1` / `PUNKTFUNK_WIRE_MTU` > 1500) because it is not free: quinn sizes
+/// its endpoint receive buffer as `max_udp_payload_size × max_receive_segments × BATCH_SIZE`,
+/// which on a GRO-capable Linux/Android client is 64 × 32 segments — ~2.9 MiB at the 1472
+/// default, ~18 MiB at jumbo. A jumbo LAN is a deliberate deployment; every other client keeps
+/// today's buffer to the byte. Without the opt-in this returns the stock config, so the
+/// advertisement, the wire, and the memory are all unchanged.
+fn endpoint_config() -> quinn::EndpointConfig {
+    let mut cfg = quinn::EndpointConfig::default();
+    if let Some(mtu) = crate::config::jumbo_wire_mtu() {
+        // Derived exactly like the probe ceiling above (IPv4 overhead — a v6 peer's sealed
+        // target is smaller, so this covers it), and clamped into quinn's accepted range.
+        let shard = crate::config::jumbo_shard_payload_for(
+            mtu,
+            std::net::IpAddr::V4(std::net::Ipv4Addr::UNSPECIFIED),
+        );
+        let accept = crate::config::sealed_datagram_bytes(shard).clamp(1200, 65_527) as u16;
+        if cfg.max_udp_payload_size(accept).is_ok() {
+            tracing::info!(
+                max_udp_payload_size = accept,
+                wire_mtu = mtu,
+                "jumbo opt-in: this endpoint advertises a jumbo QUIC receive ceiling, so the \
+                 peer's MTU discovery can prove a jumbo path (it is capped by this value)"
+            );
+        }
+    }
+    cfg
+}
+
 /// Server endpoint with a fresh self-signed certificate (tests/dev — production hosts
 /// persist an identity and use [`server_with_identity`] so clients can pin it).
 pub fn server(addr: std::net::SocketAddr) -> anyhow_result::Result<quinn::Endpoint> {
@@ -238,7 +281,15 @@ pub fn client_pinned_with_identity(
             .map_err(|e| anyhow_result::Error::msg(format!("quic client config: {e}")))?;
         let mut client_cfg = quinn::ClientConfig::new(Arc::new(quic_cfg));
         client_cfg.transport_config(stream_transport()); // keep-alive — see stream_transport
-        let mut ep = quinn::Endpoint::client("0.0.0.0:0".parse().unwrap())?;
+
+        // `Endpoint::client` hardcodes `EndpointConfig::default()`, whose 1472-byte
+        // `max_udp_payload_size` caps the HOST's MTU discovery (see `endpoint_config`), so the
+        // endpoint is built by hand to carry the jumbo opt-in. Same bind as before
+        // (`0.0.0.0:0`, v4 — no dual-stack flag to reproduce) and the same default runtime.
+        let socket = std::net::UdpSocket::bind("0.0.0.0:0")?;
+        let runtime = quinn::default_runtime()
+            .ok_or_else(|| anyhow_result::Error::msg("no async runtime found".into()))?;
+        let mut ep = quinn::Endpoint::new(endpoint_config(), None, socket, runtime)?;
         ep.set_default_client_config(client_cfg);
         Ok(ep)
     })();
@@ -348,4 +399,80 @@ mod tests {
         let _ = super::stream_transport_idle(std::time::Duration::MAX);
         let _ = super::stream_transport_idle(std::time::Duration::ZERO);
     }
+
+    /// Where a connection's MTU discovery is allowed to climb to, measured rather than argued
+    /// (PW7a). Loopback's own MTU is 64 KiB, so the ONLY thing that can stop the search here is
+    /// configuration — which makes this a clean instrument for the two ceilings:
+    ///
+    /// * **leg A** — server opted in, client NOT: the search stalls at the client's default
+    ///   `max_udp_payload_size` advertisement (1472) no matter how high the server's probe
+    ///   ceiling is. This is why the shipped jumbo grow could never fire: `wire_mtu.rs` waits
+    ///   for a settle at the sealed jumbo size and the peer's transport parameter forbids it.
+    /// * **leg B** — both opted in: the search reaches the sealed jumbo datagram, and the
+    ///   elapsed time is what the `Welcome`'s bounded proof-wait has to cover.
+    ///
+    /// `#[ignore]`d: it sets process-wide env (each endpoint reads the opt-in at construction,
+    /// which is exactly how the two legs are built) and spends seconds of wall clock.
+    /// Run it alone: `cargo test -p punktfunk-core --features quic mtu_discovery -- --ignored
+    /// --nocapture --test-threads=1`.
+    #[tokio::test]
+    #[ignore = "measurement: sets process env and takes ~15 s of wall clock"]
+    async fn mtu_discovery_climbs_only_as_high_as_the_peer_advertises() {
+        async fn climb(server_jumbo: bool, client_jumbo: bool) -> (u16, u128) {
+            let set = |on: bool| {
+                if on {
+                    std::env::set_var("PUNKTFUNK_JUMBO", "1");
+                } else {
+                    std::env::remove_var("PUNKTFUNK_JUMBO");
+                }
+            };
+            set(server_jumbo);
+            let server = endpoint::server("127.0.0.1:0".parse().unwrap()).unwrap();
+            let addr = server.local_addr().unwrap();
+            set(client_jumbo);
+            let client = endpoint::client_insecure().unwrap();
+            set(false);
+            let accept = tokio::spawn(async move {
+                let incoming = server.accept().await.expect("incoming");
+                let conn = incoming.await.expect("host side connects");
+                (server, conn)
+            });
+            let client_conn = client.connect(addr, "punktfunk").unwrap().await.unwrap();
+            let (_server_ep, host_conn) = accept.await.unwrap();
+            // A stream write gives the driver something to transmit, which is what starts the
+            // search (probes ride `poll_transmit`); after that each probe's ack drives the next.
+            let mut s = host_conn.open_uni().await.unwrap();
+            s.write_all(b"go").await.unwrap();
+            let want = crate::config::sealed_datagram_bytes(crate::config::jumbo_shard_payload_for(
+                9000,
+                std::net::IpAddr::V4(std::net::Ipv4Addr::UNSPECIFIED),
+            )) as u16;
+            let t0 = std::time::Instant::now();
+            let mut mtu = host_conn.stats().path.current_mtu;
+            while t0.elapsed() < std::time::Duration::from_secs(6) && mtu < want {
+                tokio::time::sleep(std::time::Duration::from_millis(5)).await;
+                mtu = host_conn.stats().path.current_mtu;
+            }
+            let elapsed = t0.elapsed().as_millis();
+            drop(client_conn);
+            drop(client);
+            (mtu, elapsed)
+        }
+
+        let (capped, _) = climb(true, false).await;
+        println!("leg A (server opted in, client not): settled at {capped} B UDP payload");
+        assert_eq!(
+            capped, 1472,
+            "a peer that advertises the stock max_udp_payload_size caps the search at 1472 — \
+             the whole point of raising it on the client endpoint"
+        );
+
+        let (grown, ms) = climb(true, true).await;
+        println!("leg B (both opted in): reached {grown} B UDP payload in {ms} ms");
+        assert!(
+            grown >= 8972,
+            "both sides opted in, loopback MTU is 64 KiB — discovery should reach the sealed \
+             jumbo datagram, got {grown}"
+        );
+    }
 }

crates/punktfunk-core/src/session.rs

@@ -677,8 +677,21 @@ impl Session {
     /// [`Frame::part`]` = Some` while the rest is still on the wire, instead of one whole-AU
     /// delivery (the slice-progressive decode path — [`crate::packet::USER_FLAG_SLICE_STREAM`]).
     /// With it on, EVERY video frame delivery carries `part: Some` (a frame with no early
-    /// parts arrives as the degenerate `{offset: 0, first, last}` whole). Do not combine with
-    /// an all-intra (PyroWave) stream: its newest-wins draining assumes whole AUs.
+    /// parts arrives as the degenerate `{offset: 0, first, last}` whole).
+    ///
+    /// **Do not combine with an all-intra (PyroWave) stream**, and the reason is sharper than
+    /// "newest-wins draining assumes whole AUs" (2026-08-08, PW6): the drain
+    /// (`client::frame_channel::FrameChannel::pop`) counts QUEUE ENTRIES and takes one entry to be
+    /// one AU. With parts on, a single AU pushes K entries, so `len > 1` stops meaning "the consumer
+    /// is behind" — the drain fires mid-AU, returns the newest entry (a SUFFIX) and clears that
+    /// same AU's prefixes. For PyroWave that is unrecoverable rather than lossy: the sequence
+    /// header lives in window 0 of every AU, so every frame would arrive headerless. Making the
+    /// two composable means teaching the drain to skip whole superseded AUs (never to split one)
+    /// — see the PW6 section of `design/linux-host-performance-wave2-pyrowave.md`.
+    ///
+    /// Note this is a DIFFERENT axis from the host's streamed-AU wire
+    /// ([`crate::quic::VIDEO_CAP_STREAMED_AU`]): a streamed AU still completes as ONE `Frame`
+    /// here, so it is unaffected by any of the above.
     pub fn set_deliver_frame_parts(&mut self, on: bool) {
         self.reassembler.set_deliver_parts(on);
     }

crates/punktfunk-host/src/main.rs

@@ -844,6 +844,7 @@ fn parse_spike(args: &[String]) -> Result<Options> {
     let mut bitrate_mbps = 20u64;
     let mut out: Option<PathBuf> = None;
     let mut loopback = true;
+    let mut wire_chunk: Option<usize> = None;
 
     let mut i = 0;
     while i < args.len() {
@@ -890,7 +891,13 @@ fn parse_spike(args: &[String]) -> Result<Options> {
                     "h264" => Codec::H264,
                     "h265" | "hevc" => Codec::H265,
                     "av1" => Codec::Av1,
-                    other => bail!("unknown --codec '{other}' (h264|h265|av1)"),
+                    // The spike is the only way to drive a PyroWave capture→encode pass without
+                    // a client, which is what the Linux-host PyroWave work measures against.
+                    // Needs the `pyrowave` feature (default-on) and pairs with
+                    // `PUNKTFUNK_ENCODER=pyrowave`, which is what puts the CAPTURE side on the
+                    // raw-dmabuf passthrough.
+                    "pyrowave" => Codec::PyroWave,
+                    other => bail!("unknown --codec '{other}' (h264|h265|av1|pyrowave)"),
                 }
             }
             "--bitrate" => {
@@ -900,6 +907,12 @@ fn parse_spike(args: &[String]) -> Result<Options> {
             }
             "--out" => out = Some(PathBuf::from(next()?)),
             "--no-loopback" => loopback = false,
+            "--wire-chunk" => {
+                let v: usize = next()?
+                    .parse()
+                    .map_err(|_| anyhow::anyhow!("bad --wire-chunk (bytes)"))?;
+                wire_chunk = (v > 0).then_some(v);
+            }
             "-h" | "--help" => {
                 print_usage();
                 std::process::exit(0);
@@ -934,6 +947,7 @@ fn parse_spike(args: &[String]) -> Result<Options> {
         bitrate_bps: bitrate_mbps.saturating_mul(1_000_000),
         out,
         loopback,
+        wire_chunk,
     })
 }
 
@@ -1007,11 +1021,18 @@ SPIKE OPTIONS:
                                  KWin virtual output at --width x --height and captures it
     --seconds <N>                capture duration in seconds (default: 5)
     --fps <N>                    target frame rate (default: 60)
-    --codec <h264|h265|av1>      NVENC codec (default: h265)
+    --codec <h264|h265|av1|pyrowave>
+                                 encode codec (default: h265). 'pyrowave' also wants
+                                 PUNKTFUNK_ENCODER=pyrowave so capture takes the passthrough
     --bitrate <MBPS>             target bitrate in Mbps (default: 20)
     --width <W> --height <H>     synthetic source size (default: 1920x1080)
     --out <PATH>                 raw Annex-B output (default: /tmp/punktfunk-spike.<ext>)
     --no-loopback                skip the punktfunk_core round-trip verification
+    --wire-chunk <BYTES>         PyroWave datagram-aligned packetization at this shard payload
+                                 (a real session passes its negotiated shard_payload, e.g. 1408).
+                                 With PUNKTFUNK_PYROWAVE_STREAMED_AU=1 also armed, the AU is
+                                 drained through poll_chunk and sealed as a STREAMED wire frame
+                                 (VIDEO_CAP_STREAMED_AU), then byte-verified by the loopback
     -h, --help                   this help
 
 NOTES:

crates/punktfunk-host/src/native.rs

@@ -1148,7 +1148,12 @@ async fn serve_session(
     // path verdict (WARN + learned clamp for the next session on a constrained path; clears
     // a stale clamp on a healthy one) — and, with the driver above, heal or grow THIS
     // session mid-stream. Bounded ~10 s task unless a jumbo grow leaves it as revert guard.
-    wire_mtu::spawn_watch(conn.clone(), welcome.shard_payload as usize, shard_reneg);
+    wire_mtu::spawn_watch(
+        conn.clone(),
+        welcome.shard_payload as usize,
+        hello.max_shard_payload,
+        shard_reneg,
+    );
     // Negotiated cursor forwarding: the HOST_CAP_CURSOR bit the Welcome advertised, read back
     // rather than recomputed (`handshake::cursor_forward` computed it once, with the encoder
     // blend-capability gate — re-running it here could drift, and would re-probe).

crates/punktfunk-host/src/native/handshake.rs

@@ -148,7 +148,6 @@ pub(super) async fn negotiate(
     Option<crate::vdisplay::GamescopeRoute>,
     Option<super::stream::PrepHandle>,
 )> {
-    let peer = conn.remote_address();
     let mut hello = Hello::decode(first).map_err(|e| anyhow!("Hello decode: {e:?}"))?;
     if hello.abi_version != punktfunk_core::WIRE_VERSION {
         close_rejected(
@@ -497,6 +496,11 @@ pub(super) async fn negotiate(
     let (data_sock, direct) = bind_data_socket(data_port)?;
     let udp_port = data_sock.local_addr()?.port();
 
+    // The session's video geometry (see the `shard_payload` field below). Resolved before the
+    // Welcome struct because a path a previous session proved jumbo is given a bounded moment
+    // to re-prove itself live on THIS connection — the awaited part of `negotiated_shard_payload`.
+    let shard_payload = wire_mtu::negotiated_shard_payload(conn, hello.max_shard_payload).await;
+
     let mut key = [0u8; 16];
     rand::thread_rng().fill_bytes(&mut key);
     // Fresh per-session salt alongside the fresh key. GCM nonce uniqueness only *requires* one
@@ -548,14 +552,15 @@ pub(super) async fn negotiate(
         // hardcoded 1452 overshot the v4 ceiling (its math forgot the header/crypto ride
         // inside the UDP payload) and silently IP-fragmented EVERY video datagram, doubling
         // per-datagram loss on Wi-Fi — the "100 Mbps badly fails on the phone" root cause.
-        // Negotiated, so the client follows. Jumbo (≈8900) is a future negotiated bump (needs
-        // MAX_DATAGRAM_BYTES raised + end-to-end 9000 MTU).
-        // Resolution order (wire_mtu.rs): `PUNKTFUNK_WIRE_MTU` operator override, then a path
-        // budget learned from a prior session whose QUIC MTU discovery settled below the
-        // video-datagram ceiling (the "VPN on the host blackholes every video packet" field
-        // shape — small flows pass, the stream is an endless black screen), then this family
-        // default. Healthy paths take the default branch and are byte-identical to before.
-        shard_payload: wire_mtu::negotiated_shard_payload(peer.ip()) as u16,
+        // Negotiated, so the client follows.
+        // Resolution order (wire_mtu.rs): a JUMBO start (≈8900) on a path a previous session
+        // proved AND this connection has just re-proved live, then the `PUNKTFUNK_WIRE_MTU`
+        // operator override, then a path budget learned from a prior session whose QUIC MTU
+        // discovery settled below the video-datagram ceiling (the "VPN on the host blackholes
+        // every video packet" field shape — small flows pass, the stream is an endless black
+        // screen), then this family default. Healthy paths take the default branch and are
+        // byte-identical to before.
+        shard_payload: shard_payload as u16,
         encrypt: true,
         key,
         salt,

crates/punktfunk-host/src/native/wire_mtu.rs

@@ -24,6 +24,14 @@
 //! - **Heal** — the next handshake from that peer clamps `shard_payload` to the recorded
 //!   budget, so a reconnect fixes the stream. A later session that reaches the ceiling erases
 //!   the record (the learn/heal loop is self-correcting in both directions).
+//! - **Grow** (PW7a) — the mirror image, for the jumbo half: a connection whose discovery
+//!   settles at the sealed JUMBO size has proven the path carries ~8.9 KB video datagrams, and
+//!   the next session on that same path *starts* there instead of at the 1500-byte default.
+//!   PyroWave sessions cannot be re-keyed mid-stream (the client's parse window is the
+//!   `Welcome` value, read once over the C ABI), so the session-start value is the ONLY way
+//!   they ever reach jumbo — and it is exactly where ~6× fewer datagrams per frame is worth
+//!   the most. See [`jumbo_session_start`] for why a remembered verdict alone is never
+//!   allowed to seal one byte above the default.
 
 use std::collections::HashMap;
 use std::net::IpAddr;
@@ -63,10 +71,155 @@ fn learned() -> &'static Mutex<HashMap<IpAddr, u16>> {
     LEARNED.get_or_init(|| Mutex::new(HashMap::new()))
 }
 
-/// The shard payload for a new session to `peer`: `PUNKTFUNK_WIRE_MTU` override, else the
-/// peer's learned path budget, else the family default (today's exact behavior). Logs whenever
-/// the result differs from the default.
-pub(super) fn negotiated_shard_payload(peer: IpAddr) -> usize {
+/// Identity of a PATH, not of a peer — the key the jumbo verdict is filed under.
+///
+/// The clamp above is keyed by peer IP alone, and that is safe *because being wrong is benign*:
+/// a stale clamp only makes video datagrams smaller than they had to be. A stale GROW is the
+/// opposite — one oversized datagram on a 1500-byte path is silently dropped, which is the
+/// "connects fine, black screen forever" shape this whole module exists to kill. So the grow
+/// keys strictly: a verdict earned over the host's 10 GbE NIC does not apply to the same peer
+/// IP reached over the host's Wi-Fi or a VPN adapter, because those are different routes with
+/// different MTUs.
+///
+/// `local` is `Connection::local_ip()` (the address the connection was actually received on);
+/// `None` where the platform can't report it, which degrades this key to the clamp's — safely,
+/// because the live re-proof in [`jumbo_session_start`] is what actually protects the grow.
+#[derive(Clone, Copy, PartialEq, Eq, Hash, Debug)]
+struct PathKey {
+    local: Option<IpAddr>,
+    peer: IpAddr,
+}
+
+/// A path that a completed MTU-discovery search proved carries jumbo video datagrams.
+#[derive(Clone, Copy, Debug)]
+struct JumboVerdict {
+    /// The settled UDP-payload budget the proof measured.
+    udp_budget: u16,
+    /// The operator's jumbo target when the proof was taken. A changed `PUNKTFUNK_JUMBO` /
+    /// `PUNKTFUNK_WIRE_MTU` invalidates it rather than being silently reinterpreted.
+    target_wire_mtu: usize,
+    /// When it was taken ([`JUMBO_VERDICT_TTL`]).
+    at: std::time::Instant,
+}
+
+/// How long a jumbo verdict may be redeemed for. Contrary evidence erases it long before this
+/// (any settle below the sealed target, on any later session over the same path — the same
+/// self-correction the clamp has), so the TTL is not the safety mechanism; it is a bound on how
+/// stale an *unrefreshed* memory can get, for the case where the path changes while no session
+/// is running.
+const JUMBO_VERDICT_TTL: std::time::Duration = std::time::Duration::from_secs(6 * 3600);
+
+/// How long the `Welcome` may wait for THIS connection's MTU discovery to re-prove a jumbo
+/// path.
+///
+/// The wait is structural, not laziness: every connection restarts discovery from ~1200 bytes,
+/// so the live proof the grow requires does not exist yet when the `Welcome` is built — and the
+/// binary search up to sealed-jumbo needs an ACKED probe per step, each of which a peer may sit
+/// on for its ack delay. Without a wait the gate would never pass and the feature would be dead.
+///
+/// It is honestly on the bring-up critical path (`handshake.rs` sends the `Welcome` and only
+/// THEN kicks the display prep), so it is bounded, returns the instant the proof lands, and is
+/// entered ONLY for a path a previous session already proved jumbo — i.e. an opted-in operator
+/// on a jumbo LAN, never anyone else. The worst case (the full wait, no proof) is the moved
+/// laptop, and it is self-limiting: that session's watcher erases the verdict, so the next
+/// connect doesn't wait at all.
+const JUMBO_PROOF_WAIT: std::time::Duration = std::time::Duration::from_millis(300);
+const JUMBO_PROOF_POLL: std::time::Duration = std::time::Duration::from_millis(10);
+
+/// Proven-jumbo paths. Same lifetime rules as [`learned`] — in-memory, re-earned in one session
+/// after a host restart.
+fn jumbo_verdicts() -> &'static Mutex<HashMap<PathKey, JumboVerdict>> {
+    static JUMBO: OnceLock<Mutex<HashMap<PathKey, JumboVerdict>>> = OnceLock::new();
+    JUMBO.get_or_init(|| Mutex::new(HashMap::new()))
+}
+
+fn path_key(conn: &quinn::Connection) -> PathKey {
+    PathKey {
+        local: conn.local_ip(),
+        peer: conn.remote_address().ip(),
+    }
+}
+
+/// Everything the session-start jumbo decision reads. Every field but `proven_udp_budget` is
+/// observed on THIS connection during THIS handshake — which is the point (see
+/// [`jumbo_session_start`]).
+#[derive(Clone, Copy, Debug)]
+struct JumboStart {
+    /// The host operator's opt-in ([`jumbo_wire_mtu`]) — `None` = no jumbo, ever.
+    target_wire_mtu: Option<usize>,
+    /// `Hello::max_shard_payload`: the client's own receive ceiling (0 = legacy client, which
+    /// never gets a geometry it didn't ask for).
+    client_ceiling: u16,
+    /// `conn.stats().path.current_mtu` right now: the largest UDP payload quinn has had ACKED
+    /// on this connection.
+    live_udp_mtu: u16,
+    /// What a previous session over this same [`PathKey`] settled at, if any.
+    proven_udp_budget: Option<u16>,
+    /// The constrained-path clamp [`learned`] for this peer, if any. Contradictory evidence
+    /// (this peer black-screened on a small MTU recently) vetoes the grow — the two memories
+    /// are keyed differently and the safe one wins.
+    clamped_udp_budget: Option<u16>,
+}
+
+/// The jumbo shard payload a session to `peer` could use, or `None` when there is nothing to
+/// gain (no opt-in, a legacy/low client ceiling, or a target that isn't bigger than the family
+/// default). Shared by the decision, the wait, and the watcher so all three agree on the number.
+fn jumbo_target(
+    target_wire_mtu: Option<usize>,
+    client_ceiling: u16,
+    peer: IpAddr,
+) -> Option<usize> {
+    let mtu = target_wire_mtu?;
+    let t = jumbo_shard_payload_for(mtu, peer).min(client_ceiling as usize);
+    let t = t - t % 2; // FEC requires even shards
+    (t > mtu1500_shard_payload_for(peer)).then_some(t)
+}
+
+/// The session-START jumbo decision: `Some(shard_payload)` only when every gate below holds.
+///
+/// **Why a remembered verdict is never enough.** A laptop that proved jumbo on the wired LAN
+/// and comes back on Wi-Fi, a switch that lost its jumbo config, a client IP recycled by DHCP —
+/// all of them present a path that cannot carry an 8.9 KB datagram, and a PyroWave session
+/// sealed at that size cannot be re-keyed mid-stream, so it would black-screen for its whole
+/// life. The memory therefore only decides whether it is worth WAITING for a proof; what
+/// actually authorises the grow is `live_udp_mtu` — a datagram of exactly that size, acked by
+/// this client, on this connection, seconds ago. That is why this is as safe as the clamp
+/// despite the failure modes being opposite: a wrong memory cannot produce a jumbo `Welcome`,
+/// only a live measurement can.
+///
+/// The gates, in order: the host operator opted in; the client advertised enough receive
+/// headroom; the target beats the family default (nothing to gain otherwise); no constrained-path
+/// clamp contradicts it; a prior session over this exact path settled at or above the sealed
+/// target; and this connection has re-proven it live.
+fn jumbo_session_start(i: JumboStart, peer: IpAddr) -> Option<usize> {
+    let target = jumbo_target(i.target_wire_mtu, i.client_ceiling, peer)?;
+    let sealed = sealed_datagram_bytes(target);
+    if let Some(clamp) = i.clamped_udp_budget {
+        if (clamp as usize) < sealed {
+            return None;
+        }
+    }
+    if (i.proven_udp_budget? as usize) < sealed {
+        return None;
+    }
+    if (i.live_udp_mtu as usize) < sealed {
+        return None;
+    }
+    Some(target)
+}
+
+/// The shard payload for a new session on `conn`: a proven-jumbo grow, else the
+/// `PUNKTFUNK_WIRE_MTU` override, else the peer's learned path budget, else the family default
+/// (today's exact behavior). Logs whenever the result differs from the default.
+///
+/// `client_ceiling` is the client's `Hello::max_shard_payload`. Async only for the bounded
+/// [`JUMBO_PROOF_WAIT`], which is entered *only* on a path a previous session already proved
+/// jumbo — every other session resolves without awaiting anything.
+pub(super) async fn negotiated_shard_payload(
+    conn: &quinn::Connection,
+    client_ceiling: u16,
+) -> usize {
+    let peer = conn.remote_address().ip();
     let env = match std::env::var("PUNKTFUNK_WIRE_MTU") {
         Ok(v) => match v.trim().parse::<usize>() {
             Ok(mtu) => Some(mtu),
@@ -78,13 +231,80 @@ pub(super) fn negotiated_shard_payload(peer: IpAddr) -> usize {
         Err(_) => None,
     };
     let learned_budget = learned().lock().unwrap().get(&peer).copied();
-    resolve(env, learned_budget, peer)
+    let target_wire_mtu = jumbo_wire_mtu();
+    let proven_udp_budget = fresh_verdict(path_key(conn), target_wire_mtu);
+    let mut jumbo = JumboStart {
+        target_wire_mtu,
+        client_ceiling,
+        live_udp_mtu: conn.stats().path.current_mtu,
+        proven_udp_budget,
+        clamped_udp_budget: learned_budget,
+    };
+    // A proven path is worth waiting a moment for: MTU discovery starts when the handshake
+    // completes and needs an acked probe per binary-search step, so at `Welcome` time it may
+    // simply not have got there yet. Bounded, and only on paths that already proved it once.
+    let awaited_proof = proven_udp_budget
+        .and_then(|_| jumbo_target(target_wire_mtu, client_ceiling, peer))
+        .map(|t| sealed_datagram_bytes(t) as u16);
+    if let Some(sealed) = awaited_proof {
+        if jumbo.live_udp_mtu < sealed {
+            let t0 = std::time::Instant::now();
+            while t0.elapsed() < JUMBO_PROOF_WAIT {
+                tokio::time::sleep(JUMBO_PROOF_POLL).await;
+                jumbo.live_udp_mtu = conn.stats().path.current_mtu;
+                if jumbo.live_udp_mtu >= sealed {
+                    break;
+                }
+            }
+            tracing::debug!(
+                peer = %peer,
+                waited_ms = t0.elapsed().as_millis() as u64,
+                live_udp_mtu = jumbo.live_udp_mtu,
+                needed = sealed,
+                "wire MTU: waited for this connection to re-prove its jumbo path"
+            );
+        }
+    }
+    resolve(env, learned_budget, jumbo, peer)
 }
 
-/// Pure resolution (env override > learned budget > family default) — the tested core of
-/// [`negotiated_shard_payload`].
-fn resolve(env_wire_mtu: Option<usize>, learned_udp_budget: Option<u16>, peer: IpAddr) -> usize {
+/// The peer's jumbo verdict if it is still redeemable: same operator target, inside the TTL.
+/// A verdict that fails either test is dropped on the spot rather than left to rot.
+fn fresh_verdict(key: PathKey, target_wire_mtu: Option<usize>) -> Option<u16> {
+    let target = target_wire_mtu?;
+    let mut map = jumbo_verdicts().lock().unwrap();
+    let v = *map.get(&key)?;
+    if v.target_wire_mtu != target || v.at.elapsed() > JUMBO_VERDICT_TTL {
+        map.remove(&key);
+        return None;
+    }
+    Some(v.udp_budget)
+}
+
+/// Pure resolution (proven jumbo > env override > learned budget > family default) — the tested
+/// core of [`negotiated_shard_payload`].
+fn resolve(
+    env_wire_mtu: Option<usize>,
+    learned_udp_budget: Option<u16>,
+    jumbo: JumboStart,
+    peer: IpAddr,
+) -> usize {
     let default = mtu1500_shard_payload_for(peer);
+    // First, because the two are mutually exclusive by construction: `jumbo_wire_mtu()` only
+    // fires above 1500, and the env branch below CLAMPS to the family default, so a
+    // `PUNKTFUNK_WIRE_MTU=9000` operator would otherwise get 1408 and never a jumbo start.
+    if let Some(p) = jumbo_session_start(jumbo, peer) {
+        tracing::info!(
+            peer = %peer,
+            shard_payload = p,
+            default,
+            live_udp_mtu = jumbo.live_udp_mtu,
+            proven_udp_budget = jumbo.proven_udp_budget,
+            "wire MTU: session starts at the JUMBO shard — this path proved it in a previous \
+             session AND re-proved it live on this connection (~6× fewer datagrams per frame)"
+        );
+        return p;
+    }
     if let Some(mtu) = env_wire_mtu {
         let p = shard_payload_for_wire_mtu(mtu, peer);
         if p != default {
@@ -119,34 +339,73 @@ fn resolve(env_wire_mtu: Option<usize>, learned_udp_budget: Option<u16>, peer: I
 /// into a verdict — and, with a [`ShardReneg`] driver, act on it MID-SESSION
 /// (design/shard-payload-reneg.md Phase 2): a below-ceiling verdict shrinks the live wire at
 /// the ~3–10 s mark (session 1 heals instead of staying black), and a settled-at-jumbo
-/// verdict grows it, ack-gated, when the operator opted in. Spawned once per negotiated
-/// session; without a grow the task ends after the final sample (bounded ~10 s lifetime,
-/// holding only a cheap `Connection` handle) — after a grow it stays as the revert guard
-/// until the connection closes.
+/// verdict grows it, ack-gated, when the operator opted in. The same settled-at-jumbo reading
+/// also writes this path's next-session verdict (PW7a) — `client_ceiling` is the client's
+/// `Hello::max_shard_payload`, which decides what "jumbo" is worth proving for this peer.
+/// Spawned once per negotiated session; without a grow the task ends after the final sample
+/// (bounded ~10 s lifetime, holding only a cheap `Connection` handle) — after a grow, or on a
+/// session that STARTED jumbo, it stays as the revert guard until the connection closes.
 pub(super) fn spawn_watch(
     conn: quinn::Connection,
     session_shard_payload: usize,
+    client_ceiling: u16,
     reneg: Option<ShardReneg>,
 ) {
     tokio::spawn(async move {
         let peer = conn.remote_address().ip();
         let ceiling = video_datagram_udp_ceiling() as u16;
+        // The sealed size a JUMBO proof has to reach on this path (PW7a) — `None` unless the
+        // operator opted in AND this client advertised the headroom. Read once: the verdict
+        // records the target it was proven under, and the two must be the same number.
+        let target_wire_mtu = jumbo_wire_mtu();
+        let jumbo_proof =
+            jumbo_target(target_wire_mtu, client_ceiling, peer).map(sealed_datagram_bytes);
         // Discovery finishes in a handful of RTTs on a LAN (well under the first sample) but
         // needs a loss timeout per failed probe on a constrained path — the second sample
         // covers that with margin. Max, because discovery only ever raises `current_mtu`
         // (the post-grow revert guard below re-reads it live, where blackhole detection CAN
-        // lower it again).
+        // lower it again). Stop early only once nothing more is expected: with a jumbo opt-in
+        // the search keeps climbing past the 1500-byte ceiling, and stopping there would throw
+        // away the very measurement the proof needs.
+        let goal = jumbo_proof
+            .unwrap_or(ceiling as usize)
+            .max(ceiling as usize) as u16;
         let mut settled = 0u16;
         for wait_s in [3u64, 7] {
             tokio::time::sleep(std::time::Duration::from_secs(wait_s)).await;
             settled = settled.max(conn.stats().path.current_mtu);
-            if settled >= ceiling {
+            if settled >= goal {
                 break;
             }
         }
         // The wire this session is CURRENTLY sealed at — moves on a mid-session shrink/grow.
         let mut current = session_shard_payload;
         let mut reneg = reneg;
+        // PW7a bookkeeping, before anything else can return: this is where a jumbo path earns
+        // its next-session verdict — and, far more importantly, where it LOSES it. Recording
+        // needs a live connection that reached the sealed target; anything else (a lower
+        // settle, a connection that died before the window closed, i.e. exactly what a client
+        // staring at a black screen does) erases, so the next session falls back to the
+        // 1500-byte default and has to prove itself again from scratch.
+        if let Some(need) = jumbo_proof {
+            let key = path_key(&conn);
+            if settled as usize >= need && conn.close_reason().is_none() {
+                jumbo_verdicts().lock().unwrap().insert(
+                    key,
+                    JumboVerdict {
+                        udp_budget: settled,
+                        target_wire_mtu: target_wire_mtu.unwrap_or_default(),
+                        at: std::time::Instant::now(),
+                    },
+                );
+                tracing::info!(peer = %peer, discovered_udp_mtu = settled, needed = need,
+                    "wire MTU: this path carries JUMBO video datagrams — the next session over \
+                     it starts at the big shard (it still has to re-prove the path live)");
+            } else if jumbo_verdicts().lock().unwrap().remove(&key).is_some() {
+                tracing::info!(peer = %peer, discovered_udp_mtu = settled, needed = need,
+                    "wire MTU: jumbo verdict cleared — this path no longer proves it");
+            }
+        }
         if settled >= ceiling {
             // The path carries full-size video datagrams — erase any stale learned clamp so
             // the next session returns to the default wire.
@@ -154,6 +413,34 @@ pub(super) fn spawn_watch(
                 tracing::info!(peer = %peer,
                     "wire MTU: path re-measured at full size — learned clamp cleared");
             }
+            // …but "full size" is the 1500-byte ceiling, and this session may have STARTED
+            // above it (a PW7a jumbo start whose path changed since the proof, or a client
+            // that roamed onto a 1500-MTU link). Then every video datagram is dying right now.
+            // The verdict is already erased above; heal the live wire if this session can be
+            // re-keyed at all — a PyroWave client cannot (its parse window is the `Welcome`
+            // value), so for those the WARN plus a corrected next session is all there is.
+            if sealed_datagram_bytes(current) > settled as usize {
+                tracing::warn!(
+                    peer = %peer,
+                    discovered_udp_mtu = settled,
+                    shard_payload = current,
+                    "wire MTU: this session started at a JUMBO shard but the path does not \
+                     carry it — video datagrams are oversized for a hop, which streams as a \
+                     black screen with zero reported loss. The jumbo verdict for this path is \
+                     cleared: the next connect starts at the standard 1500-byte wire."
+                );
+                if let Some(r) = reneg.as_ref() {
+                    let back = shard_payload_for_udp_budget(settled as usize, peer);
+                    if back < current
+                        && r.change_tx.send(back as u16).is_ok()
+                        && r.apply_tx.send(back).is_ok()
+                    {
+                        tracing::info!(peer = %peer, shard_payload = back, was = current,
+                            "wire MTU: video re-keyed mid-session back to the standard wire");
+                        current = back;
+                    }
+                }
+            }
         } else {
             // A closed connection stops discovering, so a session that ended before the final
             // sample proves nothing (a healthy high-RTT path could still be mid-search): learn
@@ -203,12 +490,41 @@ pub(super) fn spawn_watch(
                 }
             }
         }
+        // PW7a revert guard for a session that STARTED jumbo and has no re-key channel (the
+        // PyroWave case, and the only reason the session-start grow exists). Nothing can save
+        // this session if the path stops fitting mid-stream — but the NEXT one must not repeat
+        // it, so keep sampling and drop the verdict the moment quinn's blackhole detection or
+        // a re-search says the path shrank. Cheap: one `Connection` handle, one sample per 5 s.
+        // Only for a session that is currently FITTING — one that already failed the check
+        // above has been warned about and had its verdict erased there.
+        if current > mtu1500_shard_payload_for(peer)
+            && reneg.is_none()
+            && sealed_datagram_bytes(current) <= settled as usize
+        {
+            loop {
+                tokio::time::sleep(std::time::Duration::from_secs(5)).await;
+                if conn.close_reason().is_some() {
+                    return;
+                }
+                let mtu_now = conn.stats().path.current_mtu;
+                if (mtu_now as usize) < sealed_datagram_bytes(current) {
+                    jumbo_verdicts().lock().unwrap().remove(&path_key(&conn));
+                    tracing::warn!(peer = %peer, discovered_udp_mtu = mtu_now,
+                        shard_payload = current,
+                        "wire MTU: the jumbo path this session started on stopped fitting — this \
+                         session cannot be re-keyed (chunk-aligned client parse window), so it \
+                         will not recover, but the verdict is cleared and the next connect \
+                         starts at the standard wire");
+                    return;
+                }
+            }
+        }
         // Phase 2 up-leg: jumbo grow — operator opt-in (PUNKTFUNK_JUMBO / PUNKTFUNK_WIRE_MTU
         // > 1500, which also raised the endpoint's probe ceiling so `settled` can even reach
         // here), client-advertised headroom, and a settled-at-jumbo proof. The grow is
         // ACK-GATED: not one sealed datagram above the old size leaves before the client's
         // ack, even though its buffers are statically sized — the rule must not erode.
-        let (Some(mtu), Some(r)) = (jumbo_wire_mtu(), reneg.as_mut()) else {
+        let (Some(mtu), Some(r)) = (target_wire_mtu, reneg.as_mut()) else {
             return;
         };
         let target = jumbo_shard_payload_for(mtu, peer).min(r.client_ceiling as usize);
@@ -275,34 +591,196 @@ mod tests {
 
     const V4: IpAddr = IpAddr::V4(Ipv4Addr::new(192, 168, 1, 2));
     const V6: IpAddr = IpAddr::V6(Ipv6Addr::new(0x2001, 0xdb8, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1));
+    /// No jumbo anywhere — what every session that isn't on an opted-in jumbo LAN passes.
+    const NO_JUMBO: JumboStart = JumboStart {
+        target_wire_mtu: None,
+        client_ceiling: 0,
+        live_udp_mtu: 0,
+        proven_udp_budget: None,
+        clamped_udp_budget: None,
+    };
+    /// A 9000-MTU LAN, a modern client, a path proven last session and re-proven live now.
+    fn proven_jumbo() -> JumboStart {
+        JumboStart {
+            target_wire_mtu: Some(9000),
+            client_ceiling: punktfunk_core::config::max_shard_payload() as u16,
+            live_udp_mtu: 8972,
+            proven_udp_budget: Some(8972),
+            clamped_udp_budget: None,
+        }
+    }
 
     #[test]
     fn default_when_nothing_known() {
-        assert_eq!(resolve(None, None, V4), mtu1500_shard_payload_for(V4));
-        assert_eq!(resolve(None, None, V6), mtu1500_shard_payload_for(V6));
+        assert_eq!(
+            resolve(None, None, NO_JUMBO, V4),
+            mtu1500_shard_payload_for(V4)
+        );
+        assert_eq!(
+            resolve(None, None, NO_JUMBO, V6),
+            mtu1500_shard_payload_for(V6)
+        );
     }
 
     #[test]
     fn env_override_beats_learned() {
         // 1280 wire − 28 IP/UDP − 64 header/crypto = 1188.
-        assert_eq!(resolve(Some(1280), Some(1472), V4), 1188);
+        assert_eq!(resolve(Some(1280), Some(1472), NO_JUMBO, V4), 1188);
     }
 
     #[test]
     fn learned_budget_clamps() {
         // A WARP-shaped path: 1280-byte UDP budget → 1280 − 64 = 1216.
-        assert_eq!(resolve(None, Some(1280), V4), 1216);
+        assert_eq!(resolve(None, Some(1280), NO_JUMBO, V4), 1216);
     }
 
     #[test]
     fn learned_at_or_above_ceiling_is_the_default_wire() {
-        assert_eq!(resolve(None, Some(1472), V4), mtu1500_shard_payload_for(V4));
-        assert_eq!(resolve(None, Some(2000), V4), mtu1500_shard_payload_for(V4));
+        assert_eq!(
+            resolve(None, Some(1472), NO_JUMBO, V4),
+            mtu1500_shard_payload_for(V4)
+        );
+        assert_eq!(
+            resolve(None, Some(2000), NO_JUMBO, V4),
+            mtu1500_shard_payload_for(V4)
+        );
     }
 
     #[test]
     fn env_full_mtu_is_the_default_wire_both_families() {
-        assert_eq!(resolve(Some(1500), None, V4), mtu1500_shard_payload_for(V4));
-        assert_eq!(resolve(Some(1500), None, V6), mtu1500_shard_payload_for(V6));
+        assert_eq!(
+            resolve(Some(1500), None, NO_JUMBO, V4),
+            mtu1500_shard_payload_for(V4)
+        );
+        assert_eq!(
+            resolve(Some(1500), None, NO_JUMBO, V6),
+            mtu1500_shard_payload_for(V6)
+        );
+    }
+
+    /// The happy path, both families: 9000 − 28 (IPv4) − 64 = 8908, and 9000 − 48 − 64 = 8888.
+    #[test]
+    fn proven_and_reproven_path_starts_jumbo() {
+        assert_eq!(jumbo_session_start(proven_jumbo(), V4), Some(8908));
+        let mut v6 = proven_jumbo();
+        v6.live_udp_mtu = 8952;
+        v6.proven_udp_budget = Some(8952);
+        assert_eq!(jumbo_session_start(v6, V6), Some(8888));
+        // …and it is what `resolve` returns, ahead of the env branch that would clamp a
+        // >1500 `PUNKTFUNK_WIRE_MTU` back down to the family default.
+        assert_eq!(resolve(Some(9000), None, proven_jumbo(), V4), 8908);
+    }
+
+    /// THE guard: the laptop that proved jumbo on the wired LAN and came back on a 1500-MTU
+    /// link. The memory still says jumbo; the live connection says otherwise; the live one
+    /// wins, every time. This is what makes the grow as safe as the clamp.
+    #[test]
+    fn a_remembered_verdict_never_grows_without_a_live_reproof() {
+        let mut moved = proven_jumbo();
+        moved.live_udp_mtu = 1472; // a clean 1500-MTU path, freshly measured
+        assert_eq!(jumbo_session_start(moved, V4), None);
+        assert_eq!(
+            resolve(None, None, moved, V4),
+            mtu1500_shard_payload_for(V4)
+        );
+        // Not even one byte of headroom short of the sealed target is enough.
+        let mut nearly = proven_jumbo();
+        nearly.live_udp_mtu = 8971;
+        assert_eq!(jumbo_session_start(nearly, V4), None);
+    }
+
+    /// …and the mirror: a live-proven path with no prior verdict still starts at the default.
+    /// Both halves are required, so a single fluke on either side cannot seal a jumbo wire.
+    #[test]
+    fn a_live_proof_alone_does_not_grow() {
+        let mut first_ever = proven_jumbo();
+        first_ever.proven_udp_budget = None;
+        assert_eq!(jumbo_session_start(first_ever, V4), None);
+        let mut weak_memory = proven_jumbo();
+        weak_memory.proven_udp_budget = Some(1472);
+        assert_eq!(jumbo_session_start(weak_memory, V4), None);
+    }
+
+    /// The two memories are keyed differently (clamp: peer; verdict: route), so they can
+    /// disagree. When they do, the one that keeps datagrams small wins.
+    #[test]
+    fn a_constrained_path_clamp_vetoes_the_grow() {
+        let mut contradicted = proven_jumbo();
+        contradicted.clamped_udp_budget = Some(1280);
+        assert_eq!(jumbo_session_start(contradicted, V4), None);
+        // A clamp that is itself at or above the sealed target isn't contrary evidence.
+        let mut roomy = proven_jumbo();
+        roomy.clamped_udp_budget = Some(8972);
+        assert_eq!(jumbo_session_start(roomy, V4), Some(8908));
+    }
+
+    #[test]
+    fn without_the_operator_opt_in_nothing_grows() {
+        let mut no_optin = proven_jumbo();
+        no_optin.target_wire_mtu = None;
+        assert_eq!(jumbo_session_start(no_optin, V4), None);
+    }
+
+    /// A legacy client (no `Hello::max_shard_payload`) is never handed a geometry it did not
+    /// advertise, and a client whose ceiling lands under the family default is left alone
+    /// rather than being "grown" to something smaller.
+    #[test]
+    fn the_client_ceiling_is_binding() {
+        let mut legacy = proven_jumbo();
+        legacy.client_ceiling = 0;
+        assert_eq!(jumbo_session_start(legacy, V4), None);
+        let mut small = proven_jumbo();
+        small.client_ceiling = 1408;
+        assert_eq!(jumbo_session_start(small, V4), None);
+        // A ceiling between the default and the path target caps the grow — and the proof
+        // then only has to cover the SMALLER sealed size.
+        let mut capped = proven_jumbo();
+        capped.client_ceiling = 4000;
+        assert_eq!(jumbo_session_start(capped, V4), Some(4000));
+    }
+
+    /// Every shard payload the grow can produce is even (Leopard FEC splits shards in halves)
+    /// and fits the receive ceiling every client sizes its buffers from.
+    #[test]
+    fn grown_shards_stay_even_and_inside_the_receive_ceiling() {
+        for mtu in [2000usize, 4000, 4001, 9000, 9216, 64000] {
+            for peer in [V4, V6] {
+                let Some(t) = jumbo_target(Some(mtu), u16::MAX, peer) else {
+                    continue;
+                };
+                assert_eq!(t % 2, 0, "odd shard for mtu {mtu}");
+                assert!(t <= punktfunk_core::config::max_shard_payload());
+                assert!(t > mtu1500_shard_payload_for(peer));
+                assert!(
+                    sealed_datagram_bytes(t) <= punktfunk_core::packet::MAX_DATAGRAM_BYTES,
+                    "sealed datagram overflows the receive ceiling at mtu {mtu}"
+                );
+            }
+        }
+        // Below the family default there is nothing to grow to.
+        assert_eq!(jumbo_target(Some(1500), u16::MAX, V4), None);
+        assert_eq!(jumbo_target(None, u16::MAX, V4), None);
+    }
+
+    /// A path is a (local interface, peer) pair, not a peer: the same client reached over the
+    /// host's other NIC is a different route with a different MTU.
+    #[test]
+    fn the_verdict_key_separates_routes_to_the_same_peer() {
+        let over_10g = PathKey {
+            local: Some(IpAddr::V4(Ipv4Addr::new(10, 0, 0, 1))),
+            peer: V4,
+        };
+        let over_wifi = PathKey {
+            local: Some(IpAddr::V4(Ipv4Addr::new(192, 168, 1, 1))),
+            peer: V4,
+        };
+        assert_ne!(over_10g, over_wifi);
+        assert_ne!(
+            over_10g,
+            PathKey {
+                local: None,
+                peer: V4
+            }
+        );
     }
 }

crates/punktfunk-host/src/session_plan.rs

@@ -193,12 +193,29 @@ impl SessionPlan {
                 // Surface the trade loudly: this is the single biggest per-frame cost a 4:4:4
                 // session adds (full-res CPU readback + swscale RGB→YUV444P every frame), and
                 // it looks like an unexplained fps ceiling if you don't know it happened.
-                tracing::warn!(
-                    "4:4:4 session on the NVENC path without PUNKTFUNK_ZEROCOPY: zero-copy GPU \
-                     capture DISABLED — every frame is CPU RGB + swscale RGB→YUV444P; expect a \
-                     lower fps ceiling than 4:2:0 at this mode (set PUNKTFUNK_ZEROCOPY=1 for the \
-                     GPU 4:4:4 convert)"
-                );
+                //
+                // Name the SESSION's codec, not the backend the gate is named after. The gate
+                // keys on `linux_zero_copy_is_vaapi()`, which reads the host-global encoder pref
+                // — so a per-session PyroWave negotiation on an NVENC/auto host lands here and
+                // was told it was "on the NVENC path", which is false in every particular: the
+                // wavelet encoder never touches NVENC, never swscales to YUV444P, and what it
+                // actually loses is the raw-dmabuf passthrough its whole design assumes.
+                if self.codec == crate::encode::Codec::PyroWave {
+                    tracing::warn!(
+                        "4:4:4 PyroWave session with PUNKTFUNK_ZEROCOPY off: zero-copy GPU \
+                         capture DISABLED — the wavelet encoder loses its raw-dmabuf passthrough \
+                         and every frame becomes a full-resolution CPU readback plus an upload \
+                         into its own Vulkan device; expect a materially lower fps ceiling (set \
+                         PUNKTFUNK_ZEROCOPY=1 to restore the passthrough)"
+                    );
+                } else {
+                    tracing::warn!(
+                        "4:4:4 session on the NVENC path without PUNKTFUNK_ZEROCOPY: zero-copy \
+                         GPU capture DISABLED — every frame is CPU RGB + swscale RGB→YUV444P; \
+                         expect a lower fps ceiling than 4:2:0 at this mode (set \
+                         PUNKTFUNK_ZEROCOPY=1 for the GPU 4:4:4 convert)"
+                    );
+                }
             }
             gpu && !force_cpu_for_nvenc_444
         };

crates/punktfunk-host/src/spike.rs

@@ -48,6 +48,17 @@ pub struct Options {
     pub out: PathBuf,
     /// Also round-trip every AU through a `punktfunk_core` host→client loopback and verify.
     pub loopback: bool,
+    /// PyroWave datagram-aligned packetization at this shard payload
+    /// ([`Encoder::set_wire_chunking`], plan §4.4) — what a real session passes from its
+    /// negotiated `shard_payload`. `None` = the dense one-packet-per-AU shape.
+    ///
+    /// This is also the switch that makes the STREAMED-AU wire reachable from the spike: with
+    /// it set and `PUNKTFUNK_PYROWAVE_STREAMED_AU=1` armed, the encoder's `poll_chunk` hands the
+    /// AU out in window-aligned pieces and the loopback seals them through
+    /// `begin_streamed_frame_at`/`seal_streamed_chunk`/`seal_streamed_finish` — the same path a
+    /// `VIDEO_CAP_STREAMED_AU` client drives. Without it there is no way to exercise PW6 end to
+    /// end outside a real client session.
+    pub wire_chunk: Option<usize>,
 }
 
 pub fn run(opts: Options) -> Result<()> {
@@ -114,9 +125,21 @@ pub fn run(opts: Options) -> Result<()> {
                     refresh_hz: opts.fps,
                 })
                 .context("create virtual output")?;
+            // `resolve` is the shared GameStream/spike constructor and hard-codes `pyrowave: false`
+            // (GameStream never negotiates it). The spike DOES know its codec, and on Linux that
+            // flag is what puts the capture on the raw-dmabuf passthrough
+            // (`ZeroCopyPolicy::pyrowave_session`, set from the same comparison in
+            // `session_plan::output_format`). Left false, `--codec pyrowave` encoded PyroWave off a
+            // capture negotiated for somebody else, and the only way to exercise the real path was
+            // the host-global `PUNKTFUNK_ENCODER=pyrowave` lever — which ALSO flips
+            // `backend_is_vaapi`, so it cannot reproduce a per-session PyroWave negotiation on an
+            // auto/NVENC host at all. That is precisely the configuration PW2 exists for.
+            let mut want =
+                capture::OutputFormat::resolve(false, crate::encode::resolved_backend_is_gpu());
+            want.pyrowave = opts.codec == Codec::PyroWave;
             capture::capture_virtual_output(
                 vout,
-                capture::OutputFormat::resolve(false, crate::encode::resolved_backend_is_gpu()),
+                want,
                 crate::session_plan::CaptureBackend::resolve(),
                 compositor == crate::vdisplay::Compositor::Kwin,
             )
@@ -155,6 +178,18 @@ pub fn run(opts: Options) -> Result<()> {
     )
     .context("open encoder")?;
 
+    // Datagram-aligned packetization (§4.4) — and, with the PW6 knob armed, the gate that makes
+    // `supports_chunked_poll()` true so the drain below takes the streamed-AU path.
+    if let Some(c) = opts.wire_chunk {
+        encoder.set_wire_chunking(c);
+        tracing::info!(
+            shard_payload = c,
+            chunked_poll = encoder.supports_chunked_poll(),
+            "spike: wire chunking on (chunked_poll=false means PUNKTFUNK_PYROWAVE_STREAMED_AU \
+             is not armed — the AU still goes out whole)"
+        );
+    }
+
     let mut sink = BufWriter::new(
         File::create(&opts.out).with_context(|| format!("create {}", opts.out.display()))?,
     );
@@ -194,6 +229,12 @@ pub fn run(opts: Options) -> Result<()> {
         out = %opts.out.display(),
         elapsed_s = format!("{elapsed:.2}"),
         encode_fps = format!("{:.1}", stats.encoded as f64 / elapsed.max(1e-9)),
+        // 0 = the whole-AU drain; > encoded = the streamed drain actually cut AUs into pieces.
+        chunks = stats.chunks,
+        chunks_per_au = format!(
+            "{:.1}",
+            stats.chunks as f64 / (stats.encoded.max(1)) as f64
+        ),
         "spike capture→encode→file complete"
     );
 
@@ -217,6 +258,9 @@ struct Stats {
     encoded: u64,
     keyframes: u64,
     bytes_out: u64,
+    /// Streamed-AU drain only: total chunks polled across all AUs (1 per AU means the cut never
+    /// engaged — the knob is off or the AU fits one chunk).
+    chunks: u64,
 }
 
 fn drain_encoder(
@@ -225,6 +269,12 @@ fn drain_encoder(
     mut lb: Option<&mut Loopback>,
     stats: &mut Stats,
 ) -> Result<()> {
+    // Streamed-AU drain (PW6): the encoder hands the finished AU out in shard-aligned pieces and
+    // the loopback seals each piece as it arrives, exactly as the native host's send thread does.
+    // Re-queried per drain, never cached — the trait's contract.
+    if encoder.supports_chunked_poll() {
+        return drain_encoder_chunked(encoder, sink, lb, stats);
+    }
     while let Some(au) = encoder.poll().context("encoder poll")? {
         sink.write_all(&au.data).context("write AU to file")?;
         stats.encoded += 1;
@@ -239,6 +289,49 @@ fn drain_encoder(
     Ok(())
 }
 
+/// The streamed-AU drain. Each chunk is sealed into the open wire frame the moment it is polled;
+/// the concatenation is kept only so the completed AU can still be written to the file sink and
+/// byte-compared against what the client reassembled — which is the point of the leg: it proves
+/// the chunks the encoder cut, sealed through the sentinel-block wire, reassemble to EXACTLY the
+/// AU `poll()` would have produced.
+fn drain_encoder_chunked(
+    encoder: &mut dyn Encoder,
+    sink: &mut impl Write,
+    mut lb: Option<&mut Loopback>,
+    stats: &mut Stats,
+) -> Result<()> {
+    let mut whole: Vec<u8> = Vec::new();
+    let mut chunks = 0u32;
+    while let Some(c) = encoder.poll_chunk().context("encoder poll_chunk")? {
+        if c.first {
+            whole.clear();
+            chunks = 0;
+            if let Some(lb) = lb.as_deref_mut() {
+                lb.streamed_begin(c.pts_ns, c.keyframe)?;
+            }
+        }
+        whole.extend_from_slice(&c.data);
+        chunks += 1;
+        if let Some(lb) = lb.as_deref_mut() {
+            lb.streamed_chunk(&c.data)?;
+        }
+        if !c.last {
+            continue;
+        }
+        sink.write_all(&whole).context("write AU to file")?;
+        stats.encoded += 1;
+        stats.bytes_out += whole.len() as u64;
+        stats.chunks += chunks as u64;
+        if c.keyframe {
+            stats.keyframes += 1;
+        }
+        if let Some(lb) = lb.as_deref_mut() {
+            lb.streamed_finish(&whole)?;
+        }
+    }
+    Ok(())
+}
+
 /// A host↔client `punktfunk_core` pair over a lossless in-process loopback. Each encoded AU is
 /// FEC-protected, packetized, sent, then reassembled on the client and byte-compared to the
 /// original — exercising the core on real encoder output (the spike "feed into a Session" goal).
@@ -249,6 +342,14 @@ struct Loopback {
     recovered: u64,
     mismatches: u64,
     bytes: u64,
+    /// The streamed AU currently open (PW6). `Some` strictly between `streamed_begin` and
+    /// `streamed_finish`, mirroring the native send thread's `StreamedOpen`.
+    open: Option<punktfunk_core::packet::StreamedAu>,
+    /// Wire frame index for the streamed path. `submit_frame` uses the packetizer's internal
+    /// counter and `begin_streamed_frame_at` takes an explicit one; a session must use ONE
+    /// numbering style, and the spike never mixes them (`supports_chunked_poll()` is constant
+    /// for a PyroWave session, so every AU takes the same route).
+    next_index: u32,
 }
 
 impl Loopback {
@@ -265,9 +366,101 @@ impl Loopback {
             recovered: 0,
             mismatches: 0,
             bytes: 0,
+            open: None,
+            next_index: 0,
         })
     }
 
+    /// Open a streamed AU on the wire (PW6). The client side needs no opt-in: a streamed frame
+    /// completes exactly like a whole one and is handed up as a single `Frame` — which is the
+    /// finding this leg exists to demonstrate rather than assert.
+    fn streamed_begin(&mut self, pts_ns: u64, keyframe: bool) -> Result<()> {
+        if self.open.is_some() {
+            return Err(anyhow!(
+                "streamed AU still open at begin — a previous AU never sent its `last` chunk"
+            ));
+        }
+        let mut flags = FLAG_PIC as u32;
+        if keyframe {
+            flags |= FLAG_SOF as u32;
+        }
+        let idx = self.next_index;
+        self.next_index = self.next_index.wrapping_add(1);
+        self.open = Some(
+            self.host
+                .begin_streamed_frame_at(pts_ns, flags, idx)
+                .map_err(|e| anyhow!("begin_streamed_frame_at: {e:?}"))?,
+        );
+        Ok(())
+    }
+
+    /// Seal + send one encoder chunk. The returned batch is often EMPTY (the sealer buffers
+    /// until a whole FEC block accumulates) — that is the normal case, not an error.
+    fn streamed_chunk(&mut self, data: &[u8]) -> Result<()> {
+        let au = self
+            .open
+            .as_mut()
+            .ok_or_else(|| anyhow!("streamed chunk with no open AU"))?;
+        let wires = self
+            .host
+            .seal_streamed_chunk(au, data, false)
+            .map_err(|e| anyhow!("seal_streamed_chunk: {e:?}"))?;
+        self.send(wires)
+    }
+
+    /// Close the AU (final block carries the real totals) and verify what the client got.
+    fn streamed_finish(&mut self, expect: &[u8]) -> Result<()> {
+        let au = self
+            .open
+            .take()
+            .ok_or_else(|| anyhow!("streamed finish with no open AU"))?;
+        let wires = self
+            .host
+            .seal_streamed_finish(au)
+            .map_err(|e| anyhow!("seal_streamed_finish: {e:?}"))?;
+        self.send(wires)?;
+        self.submitted += 1;
+        self.bytes += expect.len() as u64;
+        self.verify(expect)
+    }
+
+    fn send(&mut self, wires: Vec<Vec<u8>>) -> Result<()> {
+        if wires.is_empty() {
+            return Ok(());
+        }
+        let refs: Vec<&[u8]> = wires.iter().map(|w| w.as_slice()).collect();
+        self.host
+            .send_sealed(&refs)
+            .map_err(|e| anyhow!("send_sealed: {e:?}"))?;
+        drop(refs);
+        self.host.reclaim_wires(wires);
+        Ok(())
+    }
+
+    /// Drain whatever the client can now reassemble and byte-compare it to `expect`.
+    fn verify(&mut self, expect: &[u8]) -> Result<()> {
+        loop {
+            match self.client.poll_frame() {
+                Ok(frame) => {
+                    self.recovered += 1;
+                    if frame.data != expect {
+                        self.mismatches += 1;
+                        tracing::warn!(
+                            recovered = self.recovered,
+                            got = frame.data.len(),
+                            expected = expect.len(),
+                            complete = frame.complete,
+                            "loopback AU mismatch"
+                        );
+                    }
+                }
+                Err(punktfunk_core::PunktfunkError::NoFrame) => break,
+                Err(e) => return Err(anyhow!("client poll_frame: {e:?}")),
+            }
+        }
+        Ok(())
+    }
+
     fn submit(&mut self, au: &EncodedFrame) -> Result<()> {
         let mut flags = FLAG_PIC as u32;
         if au.keyframe {

crates/pyrowave-sys/patches/0005-global-priority-queue.patch

@@ -17,7 +17,38 @@ VK_ERROR_NOT_PERMITTED_KHR so a refused class NEVER regresses the encoder. Gated
 NOTE: on an RTX 4090 / Windows / WDDM this did not reduce the spikes (the graphics-vs-compute
 preemption granularity is the wall) — kept because it is correct, harmless (graceful fallback), and
 may help other GPUs/drivers. Reduce the encode's GPU cost (4:2:0/8-bit) or use H.265 for a
-GPU-saturated game.
+GPU-saturated game. **That measurement is Windows/WDDM and does NOT transfer to Linux** — a
+different driver stack with a different preemption model.
+
+MEASURED ON LINUX/NVIDIA 2026-08-08, and it comes out the OTHER WAY: the elevated queue DOES cut
+the tail. RTX 5070 Ti (driver 610.57.04), GRID 2 benchmark loop saturating the GPU at 54-87 %,
+PyroWave 1080p, same binary in both arms (the only difference is CAP_SYS_NICE, i.e. whether the
+class is granted at all), steady-state windows of 30 frames:
+
+  arm                       p50        p99        worst frame
+  default priority (refused) ~2.6 ms   ~6.4 ms    9.5 ms
+  REALTIME granted           ~3.2 ms   ~4.4 ms    5.4 ms      (repeat: p50 ~3.35, p99 ~4.8)
+
+So on this stack the priority class buys a materially tighter TAIL — p99 down ~30 %, worst frame
+roughly halved — at the cost of ~0.6 ms on the median. For a streaming encoder that is the right
+side of the trade: the tail is what shows up as a visible hitch. Do NOT delete this patch on the
+strength of the RTX 4090/WDDM result above; the two stacks disagree.
+
+Caveats, so the number is not over-read: the arms were not interleaved and the background game
+load drifted between them, capture was frame-starved (~2.5 fps) so this measures encode latency
+under contention rather than a full-rate stream, and it is two granted runs against one refused
+run. The direction was consistent across all 25 measurement windows.
+
+NOTE 2 — WHERE THIS PATCH IS ACTUALLY LIVE. It is gated `if (!inherit_info)`, and only the WINDOWS
+path leaves `inherit_info` null: `crates/pf-encode/src/enc/windows/pyrowave.rs` calls
+`pyrowave_create_device_by_compat`, so Granite builds the device itself and this block runs.
+**On LINUX it has never done anything.** `crates/pf-encode/src/enc/linux/pyrowave.rs::open_inner`
+passes its own instance/device create-infos into `pyrowave_device_create_info`, Granite's
+`MyDeviceFactory::get_existing_create_info()` returns them, `create_device` takes the inherit
+branch, and the whole block above is skipped. The Linux request is therefore wired natively in
+**`crates/pf-encode/src/enc/linux/pyrowave.rs`** (search `queue_priority_candidates`), which
+implements the SAME env grammar and the SAME downgrade ladder so one knob means one thing on both
+platforms. If you change the grammar here, change it there in the same commit.
 
 diff --git a/crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/Granite/vulkan/context.cpp b/crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/Granite/vulkan/context.cpp
 index 5257fc33..479eeded 100644

crates/pyrowave-sys/patches/0007-encoder-sequence-override.patch

@@ -0,0 +1,123 @@
+Encoder wire-sequence override — PUNKTFUNK LOCAL PATCH.
+
+Not upstream. Exposes `Encoder::set_next_sequence(uint32_t)` (and a
+`pyrowave_encoder_set_next_sequence` C entry) so the caller can stamp the 3-bit wire sequence
+counter itself instead of relying on the encoder object's private one.
+
+WHY IT EXISTS. PyroWave's `Encoder` structurally cannot hold two frames in flight: `Encoder::Impl`
+owns ONE each of `wavelet_img_high_res`, `bucket_buffer`, `meta_buffer`, `block_stat_buffer`,
+`payload_data` and `quant_buffer`, and `Impl::encode` OPENS by discarding them — an image barrier
+with `VK_IMAGE_LAYOUT_UNDEFINED` as the old layout (a written promise nothing else is reading it)
+plus three `fill_buffer` clears. Two `encode()` calls recorded into two command buffers and
+submitted to the same queue have no execution dependency in Vulkan, so encode N+1's DWT would
+overwrite the bands and zero the RDO buckets while encode N's block packing still reads them.
+
+So overlapping frames means TWO encoder handles on one device, alternated — which is fine for
+every resource above, because each handle gets its own. It is NOT fine for `sequence_count`, which
+also lives on `Impl` and is stamped into every block header (pyrowave_encoder.cpp `packing_push`).
+Two alternating handles each count 1,2,3... independently, so the wire sees 1,1,2,2,3,3...
+
+That is silently fatal on the decode side. `pyrowave_decoder.cpp` computes
+`diff = (hdr.sequence - last_seq) & 0x7` and treats `restart = diff != 0`, so a REPEATED value
+reads as "more blocks of the same frame": `clear()` never runs, `decoded_frame_for_current_sequence`
+stays true, and every second frame is swallowed. The symptom is "it works, just at half rate, with
+occasional mixed-frame blocks" — the kind of failure that passes a smoke test. It would hit every
+client, since pf-client-core and the Apple Metal hand-port parse the same field.
+
+WHAT IT DOES. `set_next_sequence(seq)` stores `(seq - 1) & SequenceCountMask`, because
+`Impl::encode` pre-increments before stamping — the setter's contract is about the next ENCODE, not
+the next store. The Rust side keeps one monotonic counter across both handles and calls this before
+each encode, so the wire sequence increments by exactly 1 mod 8 regardless of which handle produced
+the frame.
+
+INERT WHEN UNUSED. Nothing calls it unless the caller does, so the single-handle paths — including
+the whole Windows backend — behave exactly as before. No `.def` change is needed: the C API is
+built as a static archive (crates/pyrowave-sys/CMakeLists.txt).
+
+Upstream status: not reported. It is a hook for a use case upstream explicitly designed against
+("For low-latency use cases, overlapping frames in encode is meaningless due to latency and the
+encoder is so fast anyway" — pyrowave.h). That reasoning holds at 1080p60 and stops holding at 4K
+or under a GPU-bound game, which is what PW5 measured.
+
+diff --git a/crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave.h b/crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave.h
+index fc0d5834..aeb22ffc 100644
+--- a/crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave.h
++++ b/crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave.h
+@@ -476,6 +476,19 @@ PYROWAVE_PUBLIC_API pyrowave_result
+ pyrowave_encoder_packetize(pyrowave_encoder encoder, pyrowave_packet *packets, size_t packet_boundary,
+                            size_t *out_packets, void *bitstream, size_t size);
+ 
++// PUNKTFUNK LOCAL EXTENSION (patches/0007-encoder-sequence-override.patch), not upstream.
++// The wire sequence counter is 3 bits (PyroWave::SequenceCountMask, pyrowave_common.hpp);
++// exported here so callers mask with the codec's own value instead of a copied literal.
++#define PYROWAVE_SEQUENCE_MASK 0x7u
++
++// Overrides the 3-bit wire sequence counter the NEXT encode will stamp into every block header.
++// The counter lives on the encoder object, so a caller that alternates TWO encoders to overlap
++// frames emits 1,1,2,2,3,3... and the decoder — which restarts a frame only when the value
++// CHANGES — reads the repeat as more blocks of the same frame and silently swallows every second
++// frame. Stamp a single monotonic counter across the handles with this. Value is masked to 3 bits.
++PYROWAVE_PUBLIC_API pyrowave_result
++pyrowave_encoder_set_next_sequence(pyrowave_encoder encoder, uint32_t sequence);
++
+ // Implementation ensures GPU is idle before destroying objects.
+ PYROWAVE_PUBLIC_API void
+ pyrowave_encoder_destroy(pyrowave_encoder encoder);
+diff --git a/crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave_c.cpp b/crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave_c.cpp
+index 985cd0a9..fcd7d6f8 100644
+--- a/crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave_c.cpp
++++ b/crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave_c.cpp
+@@ -1196,6 +1196,17 @@ pyrowave_encoder_packetize(pyrowave_encoder encoder, pyrowave_packet *packets, s
+ 	return PYROWAVE_SUCCESS;
+ }
+ 
++// PUNKTFUNK LOCAL EXTENSION (patches/0007-encoder-sequence-override.patch), not upstream.
++pyrowave_result
++pyrowave_encoder_set_next_sequence(pyrowave_encoder encoder, uint32_t sequence)
++{
++	Util::set_thread_logging_interface(&null_logger);
++	if (!encoder)
++		return PYROWAVE_ERROR_GENERIC;
++	encoder->encoder.set_next_sequence(sequence);
++	return PYROWAVE_SUCCESS;
++}
++
+ void pyrowave_encoder_destroy(pyrowave_encoder encoder)
+ {
+ 	auto *device = encoder->device;
+diff --git a/crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave_encoder.cpp b/crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave_encoder.cpp
+index ad4e9746..f23717f3 100644
+--- a/crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave_encoder.cpp
++++ b/crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave_encoder.cpp
+@@ -1230,6 +1230,14 @@ bool Encoder::encode(CommandBuffer &cmd, const ViewBuffers &views, const Bitstre
+ 	return impl->encode(cmd, views, buffers);
+ }
+ 
++// PUNKTFUNK: see the declaration in pyrowave_encoder.hpp. Impl::encode PRE-increments
++// (sequence_count = (sequence_count + 1) & mask before stamping), so store one less than the value
++// the caller wants stamped — the setter's contract is about the next ENCODE, not the next store.
++void Encoder::set_next_sequence(uint32_t sequence)
++{
++	impl->sequence_count = (sequence - 1) & SequenceCountMask;
++}
++
+ const Vulkan::ImageView &Encoder::get_wavelet_band(int component, int level)
+ {
+ 	return *impl->component_layer_views[component][level];
+diff --git a/crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave_encoder.hpp b/crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave_encoder.hpp
+index a65447d5..8c0ef0d0 100644
+--- a/crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave_encoder.hpp
++++ b/crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave_encoder.hpp
+@@ -37,6 +37,12 @@ public:
+ 	bool init(Vulkan::Device *device, int width, int height, ChromaSubsampling chroma);
+ 	bool encode(Vulkan::CommandBuffer &cmd, const ViewBuffers &views, const BitstreamBuffers &buffers);
+ 
++	// PUNKTFUNK: override the 3-bit wire sequence counter the NEXT encode will stamp.
++	// The counter is per-Encoder, so alternating two encoder objects to overlap frames emits
++	// 1,1,2,2,3,3... and the decoder reads a repeated value as "more blocks of the same frame".
++	// See crates/pyrowave-sys/patches/0007-encoder-sequence-override.patch.
++	void set_next_sequence(uint32_t sequence);
++
+ 	// Debug hackery
+ 	const Vulkan::ImageView &get_wavelet_band(int component, int level);
+ 	bool encode_pre_transformed(Vulkan::CommandBuffer &cmd, const BitstreamBuffers &buffers, float quant_scale);

crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/PUNKTFUNK-VENDOR.txt

@@ -46,4 +46,9 @@ upstream:
     realtime) so the wavelet encode can preempt a GPU-bound game on the shared shader cores. A
     create loop downgrades on NOT_PERMITTED so a refused class never regresses the encoder. Did
     not overcome the graphics-vs-compute preemption wall on an RTX 4090 (kept: correct + harmless,
-    may help other HW/drivers).
+    may help other HW/drivers) — that measurement is Windows/WDDM and does not transfer to Linux.
+    GATED ON !inherit_info, so it is LIVE ONLY ON THE WINDOWS PATH (pyrowave_create_device_by_compat,
+    where Granite builds its own device). Linux passes its own create-infos and takes the inherit
+    branch, so this patch is inert there; the Linux request lives natively in
+    crates/pf-encode/src/enc/linux/pyrowave.rs (queue_priority_candidates), with the same grammar
+    and the same downgrade ladder. Change one, change both.

crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave.h

@@ -476,6 +476,19 @@ PYROWAVE_PUBLIC_API pyrowave_result
 pyrowave_encoder_packetize(pyrowave_encoder encoder, pyrowave_packet *packets, size_t packet_boundary,
                            size_t *out_packets, void *bitstream, size_t size);
 
+// PUNKTFUNK LOCAL EXTENSION (patches/0007-encoder-sequence-override.patch), not upstream.
+// The wire sequence counter is 3 bits (PyroWave::SequenceCountMask, pyrowave_common.hpp);
+// exported here so callers mask with the codec's own value instead of a copied literal.
+#define PYROWAVE_SEQUENCE_MASK 0x7u
+
+// Overrides the 3-bit wire sequence counter the NEXT encode will stamp into every block header.
+// The counter lives on the encoder object, so a caller that alternates TWO encoders to overlap
+// frames emits 1,1,2,2,3,3... and the decoder — which restarts a frame only when the value
+// CHANGES — reads the repeat as more blocks of the same frame and silently swallows every second
+// frame. Stamp a single monotonic counter across the handles with this. Value is masked to 3 bits.
+PYROWAVE_PUBLIC_API pyrowave_result
+pyrowave_encoder_set_next_sequence(pyrowave_encoder encoder, uint32_t sequence);
+
 // Implementation ensures GPU is idle before destroying objects.
 PYROWAVE_PUBLIC_API void
 pyrowave_encoder_destroy(pyrowave_encoder encoder);

crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave_c.cpp

@@ -1196,6 +1196,17 @@ pyrowave_encoder_packetize(pyrowave_encoder encoder, pyrowave_packet *packets, s
 	return PYROWAVE_SUCCESS;
 }
 
+// PUNKTFUNK LOCAL EXTENSION (patches/0007-encoder-sequence-override.patch), not upstream.
+pyrowave_result
+pyrowave_encoder_set_next_sequence(pyrowave_encoder encoder, uint32_t sequence)
+{
+	Util::set_thread_logging_interface(&null_logger);
+	if (!encoder)
+		return PYROWAVE_ERROR_GENERIC;
+	encoder->encoder.set_next_sequence(sequence);
+	return PYROWAVE_SUCCESS;
+}
+
 void pyrowave_encoder_destroy(pyrowave_encoder encoder)
 {
 	auto *device = encoder->device;

crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave_encoder.cpp

@@ -1230,6 +1230,14 @@ bool Encoder::encode(CommandBuffer &cmd, const ViewBuffers &views, const Bitstre
 	return impl->encode(cmd, views, buffers);
 }
 
+// PUNKTFUNK: see the declaration in pyrowave_encoder.hpp. Impl::encode PRE-increments
+// (sequence_count = (sequence_count + 1) & mask before stamping), so store one less than the value
+// the caller wants stamped — the setter's contract is about the next ENCODE, not the next store.
+void Encoder::set_next_sequence(uint32_t sequence)
+{
+	impl->sequence_count = (sequence - 1) & SequenceCountMask;
+}
+
 const Vulkan::ImageView &Encoder::get_wavelet_band(int component, int level)
 {
 	return *impl->component_layer_views[component][level];

crates/pyrowave-sys/vendor/pyrowave/pyrowave_encoder.hpp

@@ -37,6 +37,12 @@ public:
 	bool init(Vulkan::Device *device, int width, int height, ChromaSubsampling chroma);
 	bool encode(Vulkan::CommandBuffer &cmd, const ViewBuffers &views, const BitstreamBuffers &buffers);
 
+	// PUNKTFUNK: override the 3-bit wire sequence counter the NEXT encode will stamp.
+	// The counter is per-Encoder, so alternating two encoder objects to overlap frames emits
+	// 1,1,2,2,3,3... and the decoder reads a repeated value as "more blocks of the same frame".
+	// See crates/pyrowave-sys/patches/0007-encoder-sequence-override.patch.
+	void set_next_sequence(uint32_t sequence);
+
 	// Debug hackery
 	const Vulkan::ImageView &get_wavelet_band(int component, int level);
 	bool encode_pre_transformed(Vulkan::CommandBuffer &cmd, const BitstreamBuffers &buffers, float quant_scale);

docs-site/content/docs/configuration.md

@@ -241,6 +241,7 @@ notes for context.
 | `PUNKTFUNK_NVENC_SPLIT_ARBITRATE` | `1` | Opt-in: let the host change its split-encode decision **live**, mid-session, as the pixel rate moves, instead of only choosing once at session start. Currently wired on the Linux direct-NVENC path. Only interesting alongside `PUNKTFUNK_SPLIT_ENCODE=auto` at very high pixel rates. |
 | `PUNKTFUNK_GPU_PRIORITY_CLASS` | `off` · `normal` · `high` · `realtime` · `auto` | **(Windows)** GPU scheduling priority for capture/encode under a GPU-saturating game. Default `auto` (starts `high`, upgrades to `realtime` when it's safe — e.g. HAGS off); `high` pins the static pre-gate behaviour; `realtime` is the strongest lever but can freeze NVENC on some setups. |
 | `PUNKTFUNK_IDD_DEPTH` | `N` (default `2`) | **(Windows)** IDD-push pipeline depth. `1` cuts latency once GPU priority is raised; higher smooths a contended GPU. |
+| `PYROWAVE_QUEUE_PRIORITY` | `realtime` *(default)* · `high` · `off` | [PyroWave](/docs/pyrowave) sessions only. PyroWave encodes on the same GPU shader cores a game uses, so a demanding game can starve it and the frame rate drops. This asks the driver to schedule the encode ahead of the game. `realtime` tries the strongest class and falls back to `high`; `high` asks only for the middle one; `off` disables the request. A driver that refuses simply encodes at normal priority — it can never stop a session starting. The packages grant the host the `CAP_SYS_NICE` capability this needs; on a host built or installed by hand it will be refused, and the host says so once at session start. Set `off` if you see the desktop stutter while streaming. |
 
 ## Diagnostics
 

docs-site/content/docs/pyrowave.mdx

@@ -101,6 +101,27 @@ dropped packets.
 
 The stats overlay shows `pyrowave` as the decode path when the mode is active.
 
+## Checking the host is really zero-copy
+
+On a Linux host the CPU fallback mentioned above is not an error — the session still streams, it
+just pays a full-resolution copy of every frame, which shows up as a lower frame-rate ceiling and
+higher CPU use rather than as anything obviously broken. The host log states which path a session
+took, once, when the capture starts:
+
+```
+capture pipeline resolved: dmabuf-passthrough → pyrowave
+```
+
+`dmabuf-passthrough` is the good one: the compositor's buffer goes straight into the wavelet
+encoder. `cpu` means the copy is happening, and a second line says why — a compositor that would
+not allocate a dmabuf, `PUNKTFUNK_ZEROCOPY` set to `0`, or a per-frame fall-through such as the
+compositor serving shared memory after agreeing to dmabufs. Each distinct reason is logged once per
+session with a running count, so a persistent downgrade is easy to tell from a hiccup while the
+display mode settles.
+
+If you see `cpu` and did not ask for it, check that `PUNKTFUNK_ZEROCOPY` is unset (it defaults to
+on) and read the accompanying line — it names the cause and the fix.
+
 ## Current limits
 
 - Linux and Windows hosts; Linux clients (the GTK desktop app and the session client, including

docs-site/content/docs/running-as-a-service.md

@@ -205,6 +205,36 @@ the host.
 If the host answers, it's up. If not, check `journalctl --user -u punktfunk-host` on the host — on
 a Windows host, run `punktfunk-host service status` from an elevated prompt on the machine itself.
 
+## GPU scheduling priority
+
+The Linux packages give the host binary one Linux capability, `CAP_SYS_NICE`, and it is worth
+knowing why it is there and how to take it away.
+
+The [PyroWave](/docs/pyrowave) codec encodes on the same GPU shader cores your game is using, so a
+demanding game can crowd it out and the stream's frame rate drops with it. The fix is to ask the
+driver to schedule the encode ahead of the game, and every driver we tested gates that request on
+this capability: without it the request is simply refused and nothing changes. The other codecs use
+a separate video engine on the GPU and are unaffected either way.
+
+`CAP_SYS_NICE` lets a process raise its own scheduling priority. It grants no access to files,
+the network or other users' processes, and it is **not** the same as running as root — the host
+still runs as you, under your user session.
+
+To check, or to take it away:
+
+```sh
+getcap /usr/bin/punktfunk-host          # shows cap_sys_nice=ep when granted
+sudo setcap -r /usr/bin/punktfunk-host  # remove it; streaming still works
+```
+
+Removing it costs you nothing unless you stream PyroWave, and you can also just set
+`PYROWAVE_QUEUE_PRIORITY=off` to stop the host asking. Note that a package update replaces the
+binary and re-applies the capability.
+
+Two side effects, if you are debugging the host: a binary carrying a capability is treated as
+security-sensitive by the dynamic loader, so `LD_LIBRARY_PATH` and `LD_PRELOAD` are ignored for it,
+and it does not write core dumps by default.
+
 ## Stopping and removing
 
 After a Linux package update the user service keeps running the old binary until it's restarted, and

docs/releases/v0.26.0.md

@@ -0,0 +1,66 @@
+Wire-compatible with 0.25.x — everything you have already paired keeps working, and you can update one side at a time. Nothing here changes how a host and a client agree on what to send each other, so an old client on a new host, or the other way round, streams exactly as it does today.
+
+Most of this release came from people reporting what 0.25.0 did on their own machines. Bluetooth headphones get their sound back on iPhone and iPad, a Steam Deck stops losing HEVC halfway through the week and stops moving the game behind the Steam menu, games running inside a gamescope session are finally told the refresh rate they are actually being given, and a Windows host recovers its display after the machine sleeps. Linux hosts also get a substantial round of streaming performance work.
+
+## TL;DR
+
+- **Bluetooth headphones had no game audio on iPhone and iPad.** On the default settings the phone played through its own speaker instead of your headset. Update the client.
+- **On a Steam Deck, opening the Steam menu also moved the game.** The same controller drove both, so browsing the menu was steering whatever was running on the host behind it — an invisible second player. Update the client.
+- **A Steam Deck could lose HEVC and drop to H.264.** The "Full chroma" switch was promising something no Deck can decode, and the cost was the entire codec rather than a little crispness. It looked random because it is a per-profile setting. Update the client.
+- **Games in a gamescope session were told their display was 60 Hz.** A game capped itself to 60 while your stream ran at 120, and the in-session display settings offered nothing else. Update the host.
+- **One capture hiccup could slow a Linux host down until you restarted it.** A single timeout switched that host to the slow capture path for every session afterwards — including sessions with an entirely different desktop, which had never failed at anything — and said nothing.
+- **Windows hosts stopped recovering after sleep**, and **"Native resolution" streamed a smaller, blurry picture** on desktops that scale fractionally. Both fixed; update the host and the client respectively.
+
+## Before you update
+
+Most people need to do nothing. Check this list if any of it applies to you.
+
+- **Linux, if the virtual Steam Deck controller never attached on 0.25.0:** this is why. 0.25.0 moved that permission onto a new `punktfunk` group, but four of the six ways of installing never created the group — so the permission step failed quietly, and `sudo usermod -aG punktfunk "$USER"` answered "group does not exist". Arch upgrades, Nix, the Bazzite system extension and the Steam Deck script are all fixed. After updating, run `sudo usermod -aG punktfunk "$USER"` and log back in. Ordinary virtual gamepads were never affected.
+- **Steam Deck, if `update.sh --pull` was aborting:** it no longer does, and it clears the mess it made. The updater had been rewriting one of its own tracked files on every run, so the next update refused to start and deleting that file by hand was the only way through. Nothing needs deleting now.
+- **If you turned "Full chroma" on and HEVC came and went:** leave the setting wherever you like. It no longer costs you the codec, and on hardware that cannot decode it the option simply stops being offered.
+- **Steam Deck, if you have been told the client was up to date:** it may not have been. The plugin's client update check had never once succeeded since 0.24 and reported "up to date" whenever it failed. Update the plugin, then check again.
+
+## New
+
+- **The statistics overlay is reachable on an Apple TV.** There had been no way to it from inside a stream at all — every other client cycles it with a key combination or a three-finger tap, and a TV has neither. Press **Select + X** on a controller, or **hold Play/Pause** on the Siri Remote. A tap on Play/Pause still right-clicks as before.
+- **An OLED palette.** A thirteenth colour scheme for the controller interface whose dark half is genuinely black — pixels switched off rather than very dark grey — with a faint indigo ember in one corner so the background still goes somewhere. On the Steam Deck, TV and handheld interfaces.
+- **Choose when the controller interface appears.** The switch that turns it on had also been deciding that it shows up only while a controller is plugged in. Those are now separate: keep the old behaviour, or have it always on. On every settings surface.
+- **Hide a single game.** Visibility used to be all-or-nothing per source — a Proton tool the filter missed, a demo, or something you would rather not have on the TV meant hiding its whole launcher. Individual titles can now be hidden, and the choice survives a re-scan.
+- **A gamescope session can offer more refresh rates** in Steam's in-session display settings, and the Deck's own performance overlay can be composited into what you stream instead of staying on the local screen. Both are off unless you ask for them.
+- **The patched gamescope is installable on Fedora and on Debian and Ubuntu**, not only Arch — so a virtual display in game mode no longer depends on which distribution you picked.
+- **Add-ons can publish games the host has no way to name.** A library add-on can now list a title whose launch is entirely its own business — an emulator with the core and flags you configured, say — and the host asks the add-on what to run at the moment you press play. Nothing runnable is stored or sent to a client, and an emulator that has moved is picked up on the next launch instead of leaving a dead tile behind.
+
+## Improved
+
+- **Audio catches jitter before you can hear it.** The rule that decides how much sound to keep buffered only ever learned from failures you could already hear: it waited for three audible dropouts before deepening the buffer, and it re-tested a shallower one every few quiet seconds, paying for a wrong guess with a click, forever. It now reads the near-misses nobody hears, backs off after a probe that fails, and refills in one go rather than limping. Simulating ten minutes of a Wi-Fi power-saving pattern went from roughly two thousand audible events to nine. Update the client.
+- **A gamescope session says so when its refresh rate has been lost.** If something in the session's own configuration drops the setting that carries it, the stream still runs and still looks right while the game underneath is capped to 60 — which is exactly the kind of fault that costs a week to find. It is now one line in the log.
+- **The low-latency wavelet codec got a serious round of work on Linux hosts.** It encodes on the same graphics cores your game is using, so under heavy load it was being crowded out — the encode step measured around 2 ms idle and 15–18 ms at 95% game load, with the stream's frame rate collapsing along with it. The switch that asks the graphics driver for priority had never actually been applied on Linux; it is now, and the package grants the host the permission that switch needs. Alongside it, the encoder can now work on two frames at once and the capture path asks your desktop for enough buffers to keep up, where before it took whatever it was given and never even expressed a preference.
+- **Jumbo frames can now be proven rather than hoped for.** The whole path was dead code: the discovery that was supposed to find a larger packet size could never settle above the ordinary limit, so the setting that grows mid-stream was unreachable on every path that has ever existed. A network that genuinely carries big packets is now detected, and a wavelet session starts at the large size instead of never getting there — around six times fewer packets per frame. Still opt-in, on both ends.
+- **The configuration documentation caught up with 0.25**, including the jumbo-frame option and several other settings that had shipped with nothing written about them.
+
+## Fixed
+
+- **Bluetooth headphones got no game audio on iPhone and iPad.** With the microphone on — which is the default — the app was forcing output to the phone's own speaker, and that override outranks a Bluetooth headset. Wired headphones beat it, which is why plugging in a cable made it look correct. Turning the microphone off was the accidental workaround people found. Audio now goes to whatever you have connected, and dropping a headset mid-stream no longer lands on the earpiece. Update the client.
+- **On a Steam Deck, the Steam menu and the Quick Access Menu also moved the game.** Both are driven by the same physical controller the client is forwarding, so opening either one played the game behind it at the same time — a second, invisible player picking things up and walking into walls while you browsed. Steam masks a normal game here and cannot mask this one, because the client deliberately forwards your real controller rather than Steam's stand-in, which has no gyro, trackpads or paddles. The stream now stops forwarding while an overlay has the controller, and hands it back without the button that dismissed the menu firing in the game. Update the client.
+- **One capture timeout could slow a Linux host down for good.** Two very different problems shared a single switch: a graphics driver that genuinely cannot handle what your desktop produces, and a desktop that simply happened to be restarting. The second was being treated as permanently as the first, so a single moment of bad timing put that host on the slow capture path for every session until the process was restarted — including sessions against a completely different desktop that had never failed at anything, and with nothing at all in the log. The two now have the lifetimes they should, and a capture that works credits the budget back.
+- **A wavelet-codec session could quietly fall back to slow capture and log nothing whatsoever.** The warning was asking a host-wide question about a per-session decision, so a degraded host and a healthy one produced identical logs while one of them touched every pixel on the processor.
+- **"Full chroma" could cost a Steam Deck its codec.** The client advertised the feature on the strength of the setting alone, with nothing checking whether the device could decode it — and no AMD hardware can. The host grants it on HEVC only, so a Deck with the switch on lost HEVC entirely and reconnected on H.264. It looked intermittent because it is a per-profile setting: a "Work" profile lost HEVC where "Game" kept it, on the same machine and the same host. The client now asks the graphics driver the same question the decoder will, so the advertisement and what actually works cannot disagree.
+- **The decoder triage tool reported the opposite of the truth on a Steam Deck.** `--probe-decode` ran before the Deck's own video-decode option was applied, so it said no hardware decoding was available on a machine that had been decoding on it all along — and anyone triaging a Deck with it was led away from the answer.
+- **Every gamescope session ended in a crash.** The graphics device was being torn down after the driver behind it had already been unloaded, so the process fell over on the way out — after the compositor had finished, which is why the stream looked perfectly fine and this surfaced only as crash reports piling up. Five in one ordinary ten-minute session.
+- **A Windows host no longer refuses its own recovery after sleep.** When a machine woke with its virtual display detached, every repair attempt came back refused — because the host was still holding the device open, and that is precisely what blocks the reset the repair depends on. Stopping the whole service by hand was the only thing that worked. The host now lets go before it asks.
+- **"Native resolution" streamed the wrong resolution on fractional scaling.** A 2560×1600 laptop panel at 150% negotiated 1706×1066 and streamed a visibly soft picture: the desktop reports its size in scaled units, and that was being read as pixels. The window itself was not high-density either, so even a correct stream was shrunk and then stretched back. Both are fixed, and "Match window" was quietly losing the same detail. Wayland desktops that scale fractionally — KDE among them.
+- **Pinning a compositor silently cancelled dedicated game sessions.** A host set to launch games into their own session went on saying it did while every launch landed on the desktop instead, with nothing in the log either way — on the machine that surfaced this, for thirty days. The pin still wins, but it now says so and names itself. The same pin also made a configured session-recovery command unreachable, and a mid-startup mode change could take the whole GNOME desktop down with it, killing the game it had just launched.
+- **The Steam Deck plugin's "update the client" had never once detected an update.** It asked about the app without saying which release channel, the answer was refused as ambiguous, and a failed check was displayed as "up to date" — so it went a week unnoticed while offering to update only itself. A check that cannot run now says so.
+- **The Steam Deck updater kept sabotaging its own next update.** It rewrote a tracked generated file on every run, so the following update refused to start and hand-deleting that file was the only way past it. It no longer creates the mess, and it clears the one already there.
+- **Add-on scanners appeared in the console sidebar they had opted out of**, their settings could not be reached from the Library screen, and syncing artwork from a local folder failed — one disagreement about how a folder path is written, and a change that had never been published. Library source settings also stopped opening at all after add-ons moved to their own address.
+- **A fix to the add-on toolkit could never reach an add-on already installed**, because the copy each one runs was pinned at install time and nothing updated it.
+- **A routine system update can no longer leave an Arch or CachyOS host unable to start**, and the rebuild that ships the corrected package no longer fails on a step that cannot exist during a rebuild. This is the same fault 0.25.0-2 was published for; it is now fixed in the pipeline rather than by hand.
+- **A stale virtual monitor left behind by a crash is cleaned up properly**, and when the cleanup is refused it says why instead of failing silently or aiming at a device that is no longer there.
+
+## For developers
+
+Protocol, ABI, driver and add-on detail — the version table, the new environment variables and what did *not* move — is in [CHANGELOG.md](https://git.unom.io/unom/punktfunk/src/tag/v0.26.0/CHANGELOG.md).
+
+The short version: **nothing breaks.** The wire protocol stays at 2 and the C ABI stays at 17, so this release adds no new call, no new message and no new capability bit.
+
+If you write a library add-on, there is one addition worth reading about: the new launch kind that lets you publish a title the host cannot name, and the add-on toolkit release that carries it.

docs/releases/whatsnew/v0.26.0.txt

@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+• New: an OLED colour scheme whose dark half is truly black, not dark grey.
+• The controller interface can now stay on screen when no controller is attached, instead of only appearing while one is plugged in.
+• Sound catches jitter before you can hear it. The buffer learns from the near-misses nobody notices rather than waiting for three audible dropouts, so a busy Wi-Fi network clicks far less.

packaging/arch/punktfunk-host.install

@@ -12,9 +12,33 @@ _ensure_punktfunk_group() {
   getent group punktfunk >/dev/null 2>&1 || groupadd --system punktfunk 2>/dev/null || true
 }
 
+# CAP_SYS_NICE on the host binary — the GPU-scheduling grant.
+#
+# WHY: PyroWave encodes on the GPU's shader cores, so a GPU-bound game starves it (measured: the
+# encode dispatch goes from ~2 ms to 15-18 ms at 95 % game load). The fix is an elevated
+# global-priority Vulkan queue, which the driver gates on CAP_SYS_NICE — measured 2026-08-08 on an
+# RTX 5070 Ti: WITHOUT the capability every priority class is refused, WITH it the encoder is
+# granted REALTIME on the first attempt. RADV is the same. Without this line the knob exists and
+# does nothing. Same capability, same mechanism, as our gamescope package sets on its own binary.
+#
+# NARROW: CAP_SYS_NICE only permits raising scheduling priority (nice/ioprio/affinity/RT class). It
+# grants no filesystem, network or user-switching privilege, and it is NOT setuid.
+#
+# TWO CONSEQUENCES worth knowing before you debug something odd on this host:
+#  * a file capability makes the process AT_SECURE, so the dynamic loader IGNORES LD_LIBRARY_PATH
+#    and LD_PRELOAD for it. A library-path shim that used to work will silently stop.
+#  * core dumps are suppressed for capability-carrying binaries by default (fs.suid_dumpable).
+#
+# Never fails the install: a box without libcap, or a filesystem that cannot store capabilities
+# (some overlay/NFS setups), just runs at default priority exactly as before.
+_grant_sched_capability() {
+  setcap 'cap_sys_nice=ep' usr/bin/punktfunk-host 2>/dev/null || true
+}
+
 post_install() {
   _ensure_update_group
   _ensure_punktfunk_group
+  _grant_sched_capability
   udevadm control --reload-rules 2>/dev/null || true
   udevadm trigger --subsystem-match=misc 2>/dev/null || true
   # Apply the UDP socket-buffer tuning now (also auto-applied at boot by systemd-sysctl).
@@ -73,6 +97,8 @@ post_upgrade() {
   # root-only, and the virtual Steam Deck pad silently unable to attach. groupadd is idempotent, so
   # this is a no-op on boxes that installed fresh.
   _ensure_punktfunk_group
+  # A replaced binary is a NEW inode — file capabilities do not survive the upgrade, so re-grant.
+  _grant_sched_capability
   udevadm control --reload-rules 2>/dev/null || true
   sysctl -p /usr/lib/sysctl.d/99-punktfunk-net.conf >/dev/null 2>&1 || true
   _warn_stale_firewall_ports

packaging/bazzite/build-sysext.sh

@@ -130,6 +130,31 @@ SYSEXT_VERSION_ID=$PF_VR
 EXTENSION_RELOAD_MANAGER=1
 EOF
 
+# CAP_SYS_NICE on the host binary — the GPU-scheduling grant. PyroWave encodes on the GPU shader
+# cores a game saturates, and the driver gates the elevated global-priority Vulkan queue that fixes
+# it on this capability (measured 2026-08-08 on an RTX 5070 Ti: refused without it, granted REALTIME
+# with it; RADV the same). Narrow — scheduling priority only, no filesystem/network privilege, not
+# setuid.
+#
+# It has to be applied HERE, not in the merge hook: a merged sysext's /usr is a read-only squashfs,
+# so nothing can setcap it afterwards. And it cannot ride in from the RPM either — the spec declares
+# it with %caps, but rpm stores capabilities in its own header and `rpm2cpio | cpio` carries only
+# the payload, so the staged file arrives with no capability at all. mksquashfs DOES record
+# security.capability (only security.selinux is excluded below), so a setcap on the staging tree is
+# what ends up in the image.
+#
+# Needs CAP_SETFCAP, i.e. root (or fakeroot) — a plain-user CI build cannot do it. That is not fatal:
+# the image just ships as it does today and the encode runs at default GPU priority, so warn and
+# carry on rather than fail a release build over a performance lever.
+if [ -f "$STAGE/usr/bin/punktfunk-host" ]; then
+  if setcap 'cap_sys_nice=ep' "$STAGE/usr/bin/punktfunk-host" 2>/dev/null; then
+    echo "granted CAP_SYS_NICE to usr/bin/punktfunk-host (GPU-priority lever active)"
+  else
+    echo "WARNING: could not setcap CAP_SYS_NICE (need root/CAP_SETFCAP) — the image will ship" >&2
+    echo "         without it and PyroWave will encode at default GPU priority." >&2
+  fi
+fi
+
 # SELinux labels as pseudo-xattrs (see header). matchpathcon resolves each target path against
 # the targeted policy's file_contexts; <<none>> means "no specific entry" — skip those (the
 # handful of matches all resolve to real contexts for our payload).

packaging/debian/build-deb.sh

@@ -294,6 +294,16 @@ if [ "$1" = "configure" ]; then
     # primitive that must not ride on the group users are told to join for gamepads
     # (security-review 2026-08-05 M-4).
     getent group punktfunk >/dev/null 2>&1 || addgroup --system punktfunk 2>/dev/null || true
+    # CAP_SYS_NICE — the GPU-scheduling grant. PyroWave encodes on the shader cores a game
+    # saturates, and the driver gates the elevated global-priority Vulkan queue that fixes it on
+    # this capability: measured 2026-08-08 on an RTX 5070 Ti, WITHOUT it every priority class is
+    # refused and WITH it the encoder is granted REALTIME first try (RADV behaves the same).
+    # Without this line the knob exists and does nothing. Narrow: it permits raising scheduling
+    # priority only — no filesystem, network or user-switching privilege, and no setuid. Note a
+    # capability-carrying binary is AT_SECURE, so the loader ignores LD_LIBRARY_PATH/LD_PRELOAD for
+    # it and core dumps are suppressed by default. Best-effort: a box without libcap, or a
+    # filesystem that cannot store capabilities, just runs at default priority as before.
+    setcap 'cap_sys_nice=ep' /usr/bin/punktfunk-host 2>/dev/null || true
     # Pick up the /dev/uinput rule without a reboot (best-effort, no-op in containers).
     udevadm control --reload-rules 2>/dev/null || true
     udevadm trigger --subsystem-match=misc 2>/dev/null || true

packaging/flatpak/io.unom.Punktfunk.yml

@@ -65,6 +65,14 @@ finish-args:
   - --socket=wayland                 # GTK4 native Wayland window (the client is Wayland-first)
   - --socket=fallback-x11            # Xwayland fallback when no Wayland socket is exposed
   - --share=ipc                      # required alongside X11 for shared-memory surfaces
+  # Gaming Mode's overlay signal lives on a DIFFERENT X server than ours. gamescope runs
+  # `--xwayland-count 2`: Steam and the GAMESCOPE_FOCUSED_APP/_GFX atoms are on the first,
+  # the app is handed the second, so `$DISPLAY` alone can never see them — and --socket=x11
+  # would not help, since flatpak binds only the ONE socket named by DISPLAY. Read-only
+  # access to the socket directory is what lets `overlay_focus` reach the root ctx and stop
+  # forwarding the pad while the Steam menu / QAM is up. gamescope's Xwayland takes
+  # unauthenticated local connections, so no cookie has to cross with it.
+  - --filesystem=/tmp/.X11-unix:ro
   # --- GPU + all input devices ---
   # --device=all (not just --device=dri): covers the GPU render node (VAAPI HEVC decode + GL),
   # evdev joysticks, AND the hidraw CHAR devices SDL3's HIDAPI needs for DualSense touchpad/

packaging/nix/nixos-module.nix

@@ -356,6 +356,26 @@ in
         allowedUDPPorts = nativeUDP ++ optionals cfg.host.gamestream gamestreamUDP;
       };
 
+      # CAP_SYS_NICE — the GPU-scheduling grant. PyroWave encodes on the GPU shader cores a game
+      # saturates; the elevated global-priority Vulkan queue that fixes it is gated on this
+      # capability (measured 2026-08-08, RTX 5070 Ti: without it EVERY priority class is refused,
+      # with it the encoder gets REALTIME on the first attempt; RADV behaves the same).
+      #
+      # NixOS cannot `setcap` a store path — it is read-only and shared — so this goes through
+      # `security.wrappers`, which builds a small setcap'd wrapper in /run/wrappers/bin. The unit's
+      # ExecStart points at the wrapper below; everything else about the host is unchanged.
+      #
+      # Narrow: CAP_SYS_NICE permits raising scheduling priority only — no filesystem, network or
+      # user-switching privilege, and the wrapper is capability-based, NOT setuid. Two side effects
+      # to know: the wrapped binary is AT_SECURE (the loader ignores LD_LIBRARY_PATH/LD_PRELOAD for
+      # it) and core dumps are suppressed by default.
+      security.wrappers.punktfunk-host = {
+        source = "${cfg.host.package}/bin/punktfunk-host";
+        capabilities = "cap_sys_nice=ep";
+        owner = "root";
+        group = "root";
+      };
+
       systemd.user.services.punktfunk-host = {
         description = "punktfunk GameStream + punktfunk/1 streaming host";
         documentation = [ "https://git.unom.io/unom/punktfunk" ];
@@ -374,8 +394,12 @@ in
         # PUNKTFUNK_GAMESCOPE_BIN so an operator's own override of that env still wins.
         ++ optional cfg.host.gamescopeHdr cfg.host.gamescopePackage;
         serviceConfig = {
+          # Through the wrapper (see `security.wrappers.punktfunk-host` above), NOT the store path
+          # directly — the store path carries no capability and the GPU-priority lever would be
+          # inert. `config.security.wrapperDir` rather than a hard-coded /run/wrappers/bin so an
+          # operator who has moved it is still correct.
           ExecStart =
-            "${cfg.host.package}/bin/punktfunk-host serve" + optionalString cfg.host.gamestream " --gamestream";
+            "${config.security.wrapperDir}/punktfunk-host serve" + optionalString cfg.host.gamestream " --gamestream";
           Restart = "on-failure";
           RestartSec = 2;
           EnvironmentFile =

packaging/rpm/punktfunk.spec

@@ -477,7 +477,15 @@ install -Dm0644 scripts/punktfunk-scripting.service %{buildroot}%{_userunitdir}/
 %files
 %license LICENSE-MIT LICENSE-APACHE THIRD-PARTY-NOTICES.txt
 %doc README.md packaging/README.md
-%{_bindir}/punktfunk-host
+# CAP_SYS_NICE — the GPU-scheduling grant, declared the RPM-native way so rpm applies it at
+# install, restores it on upgrade, and VERIFIES it (a plain %post setcap does none of those).
+# PyroWave encodes on the shader cores a game saturates; the elevated global-priority Vulkan queue
+# that fixes it is gated on this capability. Measured 2026-08-08 on an RTX 5070 Ti: without it
+# every priority class is refused, with it the encoder gets REALTIME first try (RADV the same).
+# Narrow — scheduling priority only, no filesystem/network/user-switching privilege, not setuid.
+# Consequences: the binary becomes AT_SECURE, so the loader ignores LD_LIBRARY_PATH/LD_PRELOAD for
+# it, and core dumps are suppressed by default.
+%caps(cap_sys_nice=ep) %{_bindir}/punktfunk-host
 %{_bindir}/punktfunk-tray
 %{_udevrulesdir}/60-punktfunk.rules
 %dir %{_libexecdir}/punktfunk

scripts/steamdeck/install.sh

@@ -344,6 +344,25 @@ if [ "$SUDO_OK" = 1 ]; then
         warn "(everything else works; the pad arrives as a generic Xbox 360 controller). By hand:"
         warn "  sudo groupadd --system punktfunk; sudo usermod -aG punktfunk $USER"
     fi
+    # CAP_SYS_NICE on the host binary — the GPU-scheduling grant, and the Deck is the box that
+    # needs it most: a Van Gogh APU shares one small GPU between the game and PyroWave's encode
+    # dispatch. The driver gates the elevated global-priority Vulkan queue on this capability
+    # (measured 2026-08-08 on an RTX 5070 Ti: refused without it, granted REALTIME with it; RADV
+    # behaves the same), so without this the knob exists and does nothing.
+    #
+    # The binary lives under $HOME, not /usr — so unlike the /etc drop-ins above this survives a
+    # SteamOS A/B update on its own and needs no atomic-keep entry. It DOES need re-applying after
+    # every rebuild, because a fresh binary is a new inode; re-running this installer does that.
+    #
+    # Narrow (scheduling priority only, no filesystem/network privilege, not setuid) and
+    # best-effort — a failure just means the encode runs at default priority as it does today.
+    if [ -x "$BIN" ]; then
+        if sudo setcap 'cap_sys_nice=ep' "$BIN" 2>/dev/null; then
+            ok "granted CAP_SYS_NICE (PyroWave encode can outrank a GPU-bound game)"
+        else
+            warn "could not grant CAP_SYS_NICE to $BIN — PyroWave encode stays at default GPU priority"
+        fi
+    fi
     # SteamOS A/B updates rebuild /etc and DROP everything not on Valve's keep list — verified
     # live: an OS update stripped the udev rule + vhci autoload + UDP sysctl (gamepads silently
     # degrade to Xbox 360, buffers back to 208 KB). The sanctioned fix is a preserve drop-in in

tools/loss-harness/src/main.rs

@@ -9,6 +9,7 @@
 use punktfunk_core::config::{Config, FecConfig, FecScheme, ProtocolPhase, Role};
 use punktfunk_core::crypto::SessionKey;
 use punktfunk_core::error::PunktfunkError;
+use punktfunk_core::packet::{FLAG_PIC, FLAG_SOF, USER_FLAG_CHUNK_ALIGNED};
 use punktfunk_core::session::Session;
 use punktfunk_core::transport::loopback_pair;
 
@@ -83,6 +84,281 @@ fn run(
     (completed, frames)
 }
 
+// ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
+// PW6: partial delivery under loss — streamed AU vs whole AU
+// ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
+//
+// The question this answers (wave-2 plan PW6, security-review finding 10): a PyroWave client
+// enables `set_deliver_partial_frames` unconditionally, so a chunk-aligned AU that loses shards
+// is still handed up as blocks-with-holes — one frame of localized blur instead of a freeze. But
+// a STREAMED frame is excluded from that when it is UNPINNED: its size lives only on the FINAL
+// block's headers (`frame_bytes` is the 0 sentinel until then), and `advance_window` refuses to
+// deliver a partial it cannot truncate. So where the whole-AU path delivers blur, a streamed
+// frame whose final block is entirely lost delivers NOTHING.
+//
+// Three legs, because a bare 2 % sweep cannot see the effect (see `partial_sweep`'s note):
+//  1. `final_block_probe`  — DETERMINISTIC: drop exactly the frame's last block in both shapes.
+//                            Proves the mechanism exists (or does not) without any statistics.
+//  2. `partial_sweep`      — RANDOM Bernoulli loss, both shapes, same seed: the delivery rates.
+//  3. the stress rows      — the same sweep at higher loss, where the gap becomes measurable.
+
+/// The realistic PyroWave wire geometry: 1500-MTU IPv4 shards, 200 data shards per FEC block,
+/// and **FEC pinned OFF** (the Phase-4 recipe — parity would mask exactly the loss under study).
+fn partial_config(role: Role) -> Config {
+    Config {
+        role,
+        phase: ProtocolPhase::P2Punktfunk,
+        fec: FecConfig {
+            scheme: FecScheme::Gf16,
+            fec_percent: 0,
+            max_data_per_block: 200,
+        },
+        shard_payload: 1408,
+        max_frame_bytes: 8 * 1024 * 1024,
+        encrypt: false,
+        key: SessionKey::Aes128Gcm([0u8; 16]),
+        salt: [0u8; 4],
+        loopback_drop_period: 0, // loss is injected here, per packet, so it can be random
+    }
+}
+
+/// Reproducible xorshift64* — the harness must be re-runnable to the same numbers, and
+/// `loopback_drop_period`'s deterministic 1-in-N cannot model independent per-packet loss
+/// (it would systematically hit or miss the final block, which is the whole question).
+struct Rng(u64);
+impl Rng {
+    fn new(seed: u64) -> Rng {
+        Rng(seed | 1)
+    }
+    fn next_u64(&mut self) -> u64 {
+        let mut x = self.0;
+        x ^= x >> 12;
+        x ^= x << 25;
+        x ^= x >> 27;
+        self.0 = x;
+        x.wrapping_mul(0x2545_F491_4F6C_DD1D)
+    }
+    /// True with probability `pct`/10000 (basis points, so 2 % = 200).
+    fn hits(&mut self, bp: u32) -> bool {
+        (self.next_u64() % 10_000) < bp as u64
+    }
+    fn range(&mut self, lo: usize, hi: usize) -> usize {
+        lo + (self.next_u64() as usize) % (hi - lo).max(1)
+    }
+}
+
+/// How each source frame ended up at the client.
+#[derive(Default, Clone, Copy)]
+struct Outcome {
+    complete: usize,
+    partial: usize,
+    nothing: usize,
+}
+
+impl Outcome {
+    fn total(&self) -> usize {
+        self.complete + self.partial + self.nothing
+    }
+    /// Partial deliveries as a percentage of frames that did NOT arrive complete — "when the
+    /// frame was damaged, how often did the user still get a picture?". That ratio, not the raw
+    /// count, is what the two wire shapes must be compared on: they damage different numbers of
+    /// frames at the same packet-loss rate (streamed adds no parity but does add a final block
+    /// whose loss is fatal, and the shapes' block splits differ slightly).
+    fn rescue_pct(&self) -> f64 {
+        let damaged = self.partial + self.nothing;
+        if damaged == 0 {
+            return 100.0;
+        }
+        100.0 * self.partial as f64 / damaged as f64
+    }
+}
+
+/// How many packets the frame's LAST FEC block occupies, and how many packets the whole AU
+/// should seal into. With FEC pinned off there is no parity, so `packetize_each` emits exactly
+/// one packet per data shard in block order — the final block is therefore the last `final_k`
+/// packets of the batch. Returned together so the caller can ASSERT the packet count and fail
+/// loudly if that emission shape ever changes, rather than silently probing the wrong packets.
+fn final_block_span(len: usize, shard: usize, per_block: usize) -> (usize, usize) {
+    let shards = len.div_ceil(shard);
+    let blocks = shards.div_ceil(per_block);
+    let final_k = shards - (blocks - 1) * per_block;
+    (shards, final_k)
+}
+
+/// Drive `frames` AUs through a host→client pair and classify each one. `loss_bp` is the
+/// per-packet loss probability in basis points; `final_only` instead forces the frame's LAST
+/// block to be dropped wholesale, and nothing else (the deterministic mechanism probe).
+///
+/// `sizes` gives each frame's AU length. Real PyroWave AUs vary frame to frame under rate
+/// control, and the FINAL block's size is what bounds this trap's exposure, so the sweep varies
+/// the length across the whole 1..=200-shard range of final-block sizes rather than pinning one.
+fn run_partial(
+    streamed: bool,
+    sizes: &[usize],
+    loss_bp: u32,
+    final_only: bool,
+    seed: u64,
+) -> Outcome {
+    // Flush frames: `advance_window` only ages a frame out once something NEWER exists and the
+    // capture-time fuse has passed (PARTIAL_WINDOW_NS = 30 ms vs a 16.67 ms frame period), so
+    // the tail of the run needs successors before its verdicts land.
+    const FLUSH: usize = 8;
+    const FRAME_NS: u64 = 16_666_667;
+
+    let (h, c) = loopback_pair(0, 0);
+    let mut host = Session::new(partial_config(Role::Host), Box::new(h)).unwrap();
+    let mut client = Session::new(partial_config(Role::Client), Box::new(c)).unwrap();
+    // The PyroWave client's real setting (`client/pump/handshake.rs` turns this on for every
+    // CODEC_PYROWAVE session).
+    client.set_deliver_partial_frames(true);
+
+    let mut rng = Rng::new(seed);
+    // frame_index -> saw a complete delivery
+    let mut delivered: std::collections::HashMap<u32, bool> = std::collections::HashMap::new();
+    let flags = FLAG_PIC as u32 | FLAG_SOF as u32 | USER_FLAG_CHUNK_ALIGNED;
+
+    let n = sizes.len();
+    for f in 0..(n + FLUSH) {
+        let len = sizes[f.min(n - 1)];
+        // Busy, frame-varying content — never a flat fill (a constant buffer would still
+        // reassemble byte-identically, but it makes every debug dump look alike).
+        let data: Vec<u8> = (0..len).map(|b| (b.wrapping_mul(31) ^ f) as u8).collect();
+        let pts = f as u64 * FRAME_NS;
+        let fi = f as u32;
+
+        // Send one sealed batch. `kill_from` is the index at/after which every packet is dropped
+        // outright (the deterministic final-block probe); otherwise each packet is lost
+        // independently at `loss_bp`.
+        let mut send = |host: &mut Session, wires: Vec<Vec<u8>>, kill_from: usize| {
+            let refs: Vec<&[u8]> = wires
+                .iter()
+                .enumerate()
+                .filter(|(i, _)| *i < kill_from && !(loss_bp > 0 && rng.hits(loss_bp)))
+                .map(|(_, w)| w.as_slice())
+                .collect();
+            if !refs.is_empty() {
+                host.send_sealed(&refs).unwrap();
+            }
+            drop(refs);
+            host.reclaim_wires(wires);
+        };
+
+        if streamed {
+            let mut au = host.begin_streamed_frame_at(pts, flags, fi).unwrap();
+            // Cut at the encoder's chunk granularity (the PW6 `AuChunker` default: 256 KiB
+            // rounded down to whole 1408-byte windows = 186 windows).
+            for chunk in data.chunks(186 * 1408) {
+                let wires = host.seal_streamed_chunk(&mut au, chunk, false).unwrap();
+                send(&mut host, wires, usize::MAX);
+            }
+            let wires = host.seal_streamed_finish(au).unwrap();
+            // The finish batch IS the final block — the only one carrying the real totals.
+            send(&mut host, wires, if final_only { 0 } else { usize::MAX });
+        } else {
+            let wires = host.seal_frame_at(&data, pts, flags, fi).unwrap();
+            let (shards, final_k) = final_block_span(len, 1408, 200);
+            assert_eq!(
+                wires.len(),
+                shards,
+                "FEC is off, so the whole-AU batch must be exactly one packet per data shard — \
+                 the final-block probe's index rule depends on it"
+            );
+            let kill_from = if final_only {
+                wires.len() - final_k
+            } else {
+                usize::MAX
+            };
+            send(&mut host, wires, kill_from);
+        }
+
+        loop {
+            match client.poll_frame() {
+                Ok(got) => {
+                    let e = delivered.entry(got.frame_index).or_insert(false);
+                    *e |= got.complete;
+                }
+                Err(PunktfunkError::NoFrame) => break,
+                Err(e) => panic!("unexpected error: {e}"),
+            }
+        }
+    }
+
+    let mut out = Outcome::default();
+    for f in 0..n {
+        match delivered.get(&(f as u32)) {
+            Some(true) => out.complete += 1,
+            Some(false) => out.partial += 1,
+            None => out.nothing += 1,
+        }
+    }
+    out
+}
+
+/// AU lengths spanning the full range of FINAL-block sizes (1..=200 shards on top of two full
+/// 200-shard blocks) — 564 KB…845 KB, i.e. the 400 Mb/s-at-60fps operating point.
+fn varied_sizes(count: usize, seed: u64) -> Vec<usize> {
+    let mut rng = Rng::new(seed);
+    (0..count)
+        .map(|_| rng.range(401 * 1408, 600 * 1408 + 1))
+        .collect()
+}
+
+fn partial_section() {
+    let frames: usize = std::env::var("PW6_FRAMES")
+        .ok()
+        .and_then(|v| v.parse().ok())
+        .unwrap_or(2000);
+
+    println!("\n\npunktfunk PW6 — partial delivery under loss: STREAMED vs WHOLE AU");
+    println!("(chunk-aligned AUs, deliver_partial ON, FEC pinned OFF, shard 1408, 200/block)\n");
+
+    // ---- Leg 1: the mechanism, deterministically -------------------------------------------
+    println!("Leg 1 — DETERMINISTIC probe: the frame's LAST block is lost, nothing else.");
+    let sizes = varied_sizes(200, 0xC0FFEE);
+    for (label, streamed) in [("whole-AU", false), ("streamed", true)] {
+        let o = run_partial(streamed, &sizes, 0, true, 1);
+        println!(
+            "  {label:>8}: complete {:>4}  partial {:>4}  NOTHING {:>4}   (of {})",
+            o.complete,
+            o.partial,
+            o.nothing,
+            o.total()
+        );
+    }
+    println!(
+        "  → if the streamed row shows NOTHING where whole-AU shows partial, the trap is real."
+    );
+
+    // ---- Leg 2 + 3: rates under random loss -------------------------------------------------
+    println!("\nLeg 2/3 — RANDOM per-packet loss, same seed and same AU sizes for both shapes.");
+    println!("  'rescue' = partials / (partials + nothing): of the frames that arrived DAMAGED,");
+    println!("  how many still reached the decoder as blur instead of vanishing.\n");
+    println!(
+        "{:>7}  {:>9}  {:>26}  {:>26}",
+        "loss", "shape", "complete / partial / none", "rescue of damaged"
+    );
+    println!("{}", "-".repeat(78));
+    let sizes = varied_sizes(frames, 0xBEEF);
+    for &bp in &[200u32, 1000, 3000, 5000] {
+        for (label, streamed) in [("whole-AU", false), ("streamed", true)] {
+            let o = run_partial(streamed, &sizes, bp, false, 0x5EED);
+            println!(
+                "{:>6.1}%  {label:>9}  {:>8} / {:>7} / {:>5}  {:>24.2}%",
+                bp as f64 / 100.0,
+                o.complete,
+                o.partial,
+                o.nothing,
+                o.rescue_pct()
+            );
+        }
+    }
+    println!(
+        "\nNote: at 2 % the streamed penalty is bounded by P(final block fully lost) =\n\
+         E[0.02^k] over final-block sizes k — ~1e-4 — so the 2 % row is EXPECTED to tie.\n\
+         The higher-loss rows are what make the gap (if any) visible; Leg 1 proves the mechanism."
+    );
+}
+
 fn main() {
     let frames = 50;
     let frame_len = 100_000; // ~98 shards across 2 FEC blocks
@@ -111,4 +387,6 @@ fn main() {
         );
     }
     println!("\nNote: recovery drops off once per-block loss exceeds the 25% recovery budget.");
+
+    partial_section();
 }