Linux 6.6 Perf Events Prepare For Intel's Crestmont In Grand Ridge & Sierra Forest

The perf event changes were submitted this week for the ongoing Linux 6.6 kernel merge window with changes this cycle for Intel, AMD, and Arm.

Intel's Crestmont PMU support is now in place with the perf changes for Linux 6.6. Crestmont is the Intel E-core design to be used in upcoming Grand Ridge and Sierra Forest processors. Crestmont ends up being quite similar to Meteor Lake's E core but with the LBR event logging feature added. The perf changes prepare for this Crestmont E-core-only design.

For a while now Intel Linux engineers have been upstreaming the various bits around Sierra Forest and Grand Ridge (along with the beefier Granite Rapids) and much of that enablement appears to be in place while some features such as the Crestmont PMU support are still being upstreamed. In any event prior to seeing these processors next year the mainline Linux kernel support should be in good shape.

On the AMD side there are updates around the IBS event handling and other changes to the perf handling for Zen 4 processors. Zen 4 IBS is the Instruction Based Sampling with earlier kernel versions having already provided the initial support.

Meanwhile on the Arm side there is perf work and Arm PMU driver changes for better handling Arm big.LITTLE events.

More details on the perf event changes for Linux 6.6 via this pull.