Hey folks, I’m stuck trying to get the 16MP autofocus camera (IMX519) running on my Raspberry Pi. I followed the setup guide step by step but the kernel driver install just refuses to go through and I get an unsupported kernel version message. The camera never shows up at all. Anyone else hit this? Not sure if I’m doing something wrong during the install or if my OS is the problem.
Hey, happy to help narrow this down. That error usually means the driver package doesn’t line up with the kernel you’re currently booted into, rather than something you did wrong in the install steps. Can you post the full output of the install script, plus your board revision, kernel version, and which driver package you downloaded? Also, have you ever run rpi-update on this card? That detail matters a lot here.
Sure, here’s everything I’m seeing. I’m on a fresh-ish card but it’s been through a bunch of updates. Output from the driver install:
Hardware Revision: b03114
Kernel Version: 5.15.76-v7l+
Package: imx519_kernel_driver – bullseye-v5
You are using an unsupported kernel version, please install the official SD Card image(do not execute rpi-update):
I didn’t write any code for this, I’m just running the stock guide commands. And yes, I think I did run rpi-update at some point because I was chasing an unrelated issue — could that be it?
That’s exactly it, thanks for confirming. Here’s what’s going on:
- Your board is a 64-bit capable Pi (rev b03114) and you’re on a 64-bit OS, which the 16MP camera driver does support.
- The problem is purely the kernel number. The imx519 driver supports 5.15.74-v8+ and below. Your kernel is 5.15.76-v7l+, i.e. higher than the maximum supported version.
- rpi-update pulls the bleeding-edge kernel from the firmware repo, which bumped you past what the driver was built against. That’s why the installer throws the unsupported kernel version warning and stops.
So the driver/kernel mismatch is confirmed — nothing wrong with your hardware or the camera.
Ah, that explains it. I definitely ran rpi-update, I remember the warning text now. So what’s the fix — do I have to downgrade the kernel manually, or is there a newer driver I can use instead? I’d rather not break the other stuff I set up on this card if there’s a way around it.
The cleanest path is to re-burn the card with a supported OS image from the official Raspberry Pi images page (Raspberry Pi OS downloads – Raspberry Pi), then install the driver on top of that. As long as you don’t run rpi-update, the kernel stays at a version the driver supports.
You can check which kernel you’re on any time with name -a — run that before and after and you should see 5.15.74-v8+ or lower.
Small thing — I think you mean uname -a, not name -a? Tried name -a and it just says command not found. uname -a works and shows my kernel string fine.
Yeah, that’s a typo on my end — uname -a is the correct one, my bad. name -a won’t exist on the Pi.
So to wrap up the current state of this: your IMX519 install failure is a kernel compatibility issue, not a hardware fault. The 16MP (imx519) driver is limited to kernel 5.15.74-v8+ and below, and running rpi-update pushed you to 5.15.76-v7l+, which produces the “unsupported kernel version” message.
Workaround/conclusion:
- Re-burn the Pi with a supported official OS image.
- Do NOT run rpi-update afterwards.
- Verify the kernel with
uname -aand confirm it’s 5.15.74-v8+ or lower before installing the imx519 driver.
If the install still complains after a clean burn at the supported version, post the fresh output here and we’ll dig further.