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Linux 4.4 Kernel To Bring Raspberry Pi Graphics Driver, Open-Channel SSD Support (phoronix.com)

Posted by timothy on from the is-it-big-and-fancy-yet? dept.

An anonymous reader writes: Linux 4.4-rc1 has been released. New features of Linux 4.4 include a Raspberry Pi kernel mode-setting driver, support for 3D acceleration by QEMU guest virtual machines, AMD Stoney APU support, Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 support, expanded eBPF virtual machine programs, new hardware peripheral support, file-system fixes, faster SHA crypto support on Intel hardware, and LightNVM / Open-Channel SSD support.

5 of 67 comments (clear)

  1. Qemu 3D Acceleration by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This is actually kind of cool, especially if the performance isn't terrible.

    1. Re:Qemu 3D Acceleration by geantvert · · Score: 2

      Where did you get that strange idea Linux 3D performance is terrible? I won't deny that OpenSource drivers can be less efficient that close source driver especially on devices that are not properly documented and must be reversed engineered. However, if you only consider the drivers provided by the vendors, the performances are usually similar to the Windows driver.

      Of course, Windows is usually a higher priority for the vendors so there is often a small delay before a good driver becomes available on Linux for new hardware.

    2. Re:Qemu 3D Acceleration by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      Considering Linux host 3D performance is terrible, I wouldn't hold my breath that QEMU guests will have reasonable performance.

      Uh, no it's not. The difference is in the noise with Nvidia drivers on Windows and Linux. I assume you're talking about that recent shit-fling from Ars Technica which also shows floating point performance drastically harmed on Linux, like an OS can even effect floating point performance (hint: they must have used different compilers). I'm sure there's software like the software Ars tested that is shit on Linux for whatever reasons, but my own benchmarks have never shown large performance differences between the Nvidia OpenGL implementations on Linux and Windows.

      I'm kind of excited about QEMU 3D acceleration, because it gives me an opportunity to add GL support to my hobby OS.

  2. Re:2015 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    no, new drivers get included with kernel updates. What do you think this is, Microsoft Windows?

  3. Re:Yeah, so? by Kidbro · · Score: 3, Informative

    Meanwhile, every single major revision of the kernel has been announced on Slashdot for at least as far back as I can remember (2.2 something).
    So how you can't "expect" it to happen is a mystery indeed.

    --
    May we live long and die out