Gentoo Linux To See Improved ARM64 Support Thanks To An Ampere Altra Max Server

Gentoo Linux will be working on better support for ARM64/AArch64 and 32-bit ARM now that they have received an Ampere Altra Max server to help expedite their ARM build times for binary packages and installation stage builds.

Arm Ltd via their "Works on Arm" team provided the Gentoo Linux project with a 96-core Ampere Altra Max server. This 96-core ARM server shipped with 256GB of RAM and 4TB of NVMe solid state storage. This is a big improvement for the Gentoo Linux ARM infrastructure and will allow for quicker turnaround times on new Gentoo ARM/ARM64 builds as well as facilitating more ARM testing on Gentoo Linux.

The Gentoo Linux project this morning announced the Ampere Altra Max server donation to the project thanks to Arm. This follows other upstream ARM improvements thanks to the availability and robustness of Ampere Altra like Ampere Computing having provided Linus Torvalds with an Ampere Altra Max server to facilitate more ARM64 Linux kernel testing and in turn more ARM64 Linux kernel improvements.

Succeeding Ampere Altra is now AmpereOne with more and newer cores, DDR5 memory, PCIe 5.0 connectivity, and more, but so far AmpereOne processors and servers remain in tight supply as well as focusing more on the higher core counts for cloud-focused environments. We haven't seen any enthusiast/workstation-type AmpereOne server/motherboard offerings yet and no AmpereOne SKUs around 64 cores or lower to cater more towards the developer/workstation/build-box scenarios. Regardless, for those wanting to build an on-premise ARM workstation/server, Ampere Computing remains the only prominent choice.