AMD Sends Out Initial Linux Graphics Driver Patches For "GFX 11.5"
GFX11 has been the graphics block for RDNA3 graphics processors while now the first signs of "GFX11.5" have appeared either for an RDNA3 refresh, next-gen APUs, or what could end up being RDNA4 -- RDNA and RDNA2 for example were both part of the GFX10 family. Meanwhile there's been rumors flying whether or not an RDNA3 "refresh" would be coming with some suggestions that it's not. This GFX11.5 support may be for the rumored Ryzen 8000 series Zen 4 APUs with the "Strix Halo" codename where some reports point to them having a "RDNA3.5" GPU. In fact, this GFX11.5 bring-up for Ryzen 8000 series APUs may be the most likely scenario especially with this initial patch series not being very invasive compared to the current GFX11 support.
Over the past month I've reported on AMD beginning to enable new GPU IP blocks for yet-to-be-released hardware. However, their modern block-by-block driver enablement strategy has made it more difficult to ascertain next-gen product specifics compared to the days of the large monolithic patch series marked by colorful fishy codenames. Over the past month there's been various new IP versions added while this is the first update we've seen to the GFX11 support.
Today's patches amount to 46.5k lines of new code but the vast majority of that is the auto-generated header files for the new revision. Only a few dozen lines of actual driver code changes are presented for the AMDGPU driver in comparison to the existing AMDGPU GFX11 code paths.
In any event it's nice to see AMD bringing out this open-source driver support early and as it stands now is probably early bring-up work for the Ryzen 8000 series APUs. Given the timing of these patches being published today and now past the 6.5-rc6 timeframe where its typically the cut-off for new feature code, these patches may miss out on landing for the upcoming v6.6 kernel cycle but then could be ready for merging later in the year with Linux v6.7 along with any other new enablement code.
Aside from the graphics driver work, AMD Linux engineers in recent weeks have also begun with other AMD Zen 5 / Family 1Ah preparations for the Linux kernel. Stay tuned to Phoronix to see what other new next-gen hardware support code may be posted soon.
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