AMD Overhauls Open-Source Linux Driver

An anonymous reader writes "AMD's open-source developer has posted an incredible set of 165 patches against the Linux kernel that provide support for a few major features to their Linux graphics driver. Namely, the open-source Radeon Linux driver now supports dynamic power management on hardware going back to the Radeon HD 2000 (R600) generation. The inability to re-clock the GPU frequencies and voltages dynamically based upon load has been a major limiting factor for open-source AMD users where laptops have been warm and there is diminished battery power. The patches also provide basic support for the AMD Radeon HD 8000 'Sea Islands' graphics processors on their open-source Linux driver."

Comments

Yay AMD

[Noishe]

This is a great step in the right direction. Hopefully it's not the last step.

Good guys AMD

[Reliable Windmill]

I'm excited about getting the upcoming Kaveri. APUs are the way to go unless you have needs that call for huge CPU or GPU power, and I think AMD is definitely leading the innovation here. It's a nice bonus if I will be able to run Linux with good graphics acceleration as well.

Re:Still not Stallman-approved.

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Blobs are definitely not ideal; but I've never really understood the distinction between people who put them in ROM and people who require them to be loaded at initialization time(as long as they aren't assholes about redistribution: if Distro X is legally unable to distribute firmware.bin and I have to go to your site, download the Windows driver, and then chop it open to get firmware.bin, just to get an unaltered copy of your firmware to run with your device, I'm going to be pissed).

Both approaches involve exactly the same binary firmware blob, one just stores it on comparatively expensive, board-space-consuming, flash ROM and one stores it on system mass storage.

Firmware that is open is better than either; but closed firmware that is handled behind the curtain on the card seems no better than closed firmware that is supplied to the card during startup(again, assuming proper redistribution terms and proper driver support for that aspect of initializing the device).

Re:Still not Stallman-approved.

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

I don't understand why simply putting the closed source firmware on the card suddenly makes it ok for free software. Same code, just different home.