Having the libraries installed does impact daily performance—no background processes, no CPU usage, no memory consumption. The DLLs remain on disk until an application loads them.
You might notice that version numbers for drivers and APIs change frequently. The version is relatively old in the timeline of Vulkan, which tells us a lot about how it likely ended up on your computer.
Corrupted installer, permissions issue, or conflicting antivirus. Fix: vulkan run time libraries 1.0.39.1
When you run a Vulkan game, the performance benefit comes from the API itself, not from the runtime version. However, using a (like 1.0.39.1) with a modern game or a new GPU driver might cause:
Vulkan was designed from the ground up to solve this by: The version is relatively old in the timeline
Always keep your GPU drivers up to date. Modern drivers install the latest Vulkan runtime. Once a new runtime is installed, you can safely remove older versions like 1.0.39.1.
| Issue | Likely Cause | Solution | |-------|--------------|----------| | Game crashes on launch using Vulkan | Old validation layer bug | Update GPU drivers (which install a newer Vulkan RT) | | “Vulkan-1.dll not found” | Missing or corrupted runtime | Reinstall GPU driver or manually install latest Vulkan RT | | Multiple entries in Programs list | Several versions installed side-by-side | Safe to keep; uninstall only if you confirm no legacy app needs them | However, using a (like 1
By distributing tasks more efficiently across multiple CPU cores.