Intel Mesa Driver Code Working To Split Off Old Broadwell "Gen8" Graphics Code

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Intel Mesa Driver Code Working To Split Off Old Broadwell "Gen8" Graphics Code

Intel's Iris Gallium3D driver for modern OpenGL support works on hardware going back to old Broadwell processors with "Gen8" integrated graphics as does the HasVK Vulkan driver for Haswell/Broadwell. But in allowing to focus on the common Skylake "Gen9" graphics and newer/future Intel graphics architectures, pending Mesa code is working to split-off that old Broadwell/Gen8 code. The Gen8 support will continue to be in-tree but separated from the rest of the compiler code so that the code can continue to be improved for newer Intel hardware without risking regressions/breaking those still on Broadwell era processors...

https://www.phoronix.com/news/Intel-Mesa-Splitting-Gen8

[varikonniemi]

amazing how a less than 2 year old processor can be delegated to "legacy" support

[ezst036]

amazing how a less than 2 year old processor can be delegated to "legacy" support

What are you talking about? That's ancient.

Anyways,

Anybody know if the driver still called "i915"?

[gulafaran2]

amazing how a less than 2 year old processor can be delegated to "legacy" support

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...ing_units#Gen8 uhm 2015/2016 depending if they count Gen8LP

[pWe00Iri3e7Z9lHOX2Qx]

amazing how a less than 2 year old processor can be delegated to "legacy" support

What? Isn't the newest Gen 8 iGPU part in Atoms / Celerons / Pentiums from 2016?

[AlDunsmuir]

The date of last commercial sale is far more relevant than when the component was first sold.

[pWe00Iri3e7Z9lHOX2Qx]

The date of last commercial sale is far more relevant than when the component was first sold.

In this case, who cares? I could see the backlash if they were dropping the driver completely. They are just splitting it out into its own driver. Broadwell desktop parts haven't been sold new in ages. That leaves the Atom / Celeron / Pentiums. What kind of important fixes or optimizations have those gotten in the past 3 years? Those parts are fast enough to render a desktop and decode whatever video formats their media engine supports, and that's it. It's not like release day game optimizations matter here.

[Quackdoc]

amazing how a less than 2 year old processor can be delegated to "legacy" support

amd says hello lmao, they are selling new products on legacy support LOL

[varikonniemi]

What? Isn't the newest Gen 8 iGPU part in Atoms / Celerons / Pentiums from 2016?

At least one Haswell-based processor was still being sold in 2022 — the Pentium G3420.

[pWe00Iri3e7Z9lHOX2Qx]

At least one Haswell-based processor was still being sold in 2022 — the Pentium G3420.

Calling that a "less than 2 year old processor" is pretty disingenuous. It was released in Q3 of 2013, is discontinued, and is more than 2 years past its end of servicing date. I can find some random recent Android device in retail channels with an ancient POS SOC in it. That doesn't make the SOC current.

And again, what is the actual impact? The barely usable iGPU in this 2013 CPU that doesn't even support AES instructions will get its own driver that performs exactly like it performs today.