Open-Source PowerVR Driver Being Extended For The Imagination BXS-4-64 MC1 GPU

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Open-Source PowerVR Driver Being Extended For The Imagination BXS-4-64 MC1 GPU

Upstreamed at the start of the year was the Imagination PowerVR open-source DRM kernel driver for newer Imagination Rogue GPUs. That upstream kernel driver is now being extended to cover the Imagination BXS-4-64 MC1 GPU...

https://www.phoronix.com/news/PVR-Imagination-BXS-4-64-MC1

[LockedPotato]

I don't mind Imagination becoming more open source friendly because they're making a major play to become the defacto iGPU vendor for RISC-V SoCs.... But dayum... They really need a new naming scheme.

[ayumu]

Nice but BXE-4-32 is the one we're waiting for, since VisionFive 2 released two years ago.

[ayumu]

Interestingly, it has an internal RISC-V CPU.

https://lore.kernel.org/dri-devel/[email protected]/

[Quackdoc]

I don't mind Imagination becoming more open source friendly because they're making a major play to become the defacto iGPU vendor for RISC-V SoCs.... But dayum... They really need a new naming scheme.

their naming scheme is the best, name one product that has a better naming scheme Generation - Fillrate - perf in flops. Literally nothing comes remotely close. The name tells you all you need to know about performance.

Nice but BXE-4-32 is the one we're waiting for, since VisionFive 2 released two years ago.

personally I am waiting for the chips that are in the new devices

[okias]

Nice but BXE-4-32 is the one we're waiting for, since VisionFive 2 released two years ago.

not likely going to happen. I'm optimistic it'll happen for upcoming GPUs, not for the older one. Also VisionFive V2 doesn't even support RVA22 (and ofc not 23), so this lovely board will be soon forgotten.

Only chance is someone RE and rewrite firmware for this one from scratch and then extend the driver, but the HW currently doesn't have RVA22, so unlikely someone will bother.

[ayumu]

this lovely board will be soon forgotten.

VisionFive 2 was the first mass-produced RISC-V SBC, a major milestone.

No matter how many decades pass, it will never be forgotten.

[bernstein]

not likely going to happen. I'm optimistic it'll happen for upcoming GPUs, not for the older one. Also VisionFive V2 doesn't even support RVA22 (and ofc not 23), so this lovely board will be soon forgotten.

Only chance is someone RE and rewrite firmware for this one from scratch and then extend the driver, but the HW currently doesn't have RVA22, so unlikely someone will bother.

Now that support for BXE-4-64 is here, i think it's very likely to happen.
The JH7110 with BX-4-32 is one of the very few RISC-V SoCs with a GPU being mass produced. there is only the SpacemIT K1 using the same BXE-4-32, the TH1520 using the BXM-4-64 & the EIC7700X which uses an even older Imagination A-Series GPU.

So it's likely the TH1520 will be the first supported, because it's essentially the same GPU just in another SoC. Next probably the K1 because it has RVA22, but from there it's a stone's throw to the JH7110 because they use the same GPU. Doubtful though, if Imagination will bother with the AXM in the EIC7700X...

I doubt we'll see any RISC-V SoCs with a newer GPU released without RVA23, which will take a while. Also there really Isn't much newer GPU IP for RISC-V available, other than C-Series (CXT). So it will be at least late 2025 until the GPU's in these SoC's are obsolete...

Edit: Forgot the HPM6800 which uses a Vivante GPU. Essentially the only other GPU-IP on the Market for RISC-V SoC's.
Edit: The sad part is, that it took 4 years from announcement to software enablement. I wonder how people would react if it took Intel, AMD & Nvidia this long for software to work on their GPUs... :-P