Firmware Assisted Shadowing Code Posted For AMD RDNA3 - Needed For SR-IOV

A new patch series posted today is of interest and is for firmware-assisted shadowing for AMD RDNA3 (GFX11) graphics processors as it's necessary for proper SR-IOV support.

This firmware assisted shadowing support is for supported GFX11/RDNA3 platforms and where the command processor firmware is recent. This functionality is necessary for mid-command buffer preemption and proper SR-IOV support.

Of course, many Phoronix readers have been clamoring to see SR-IOV support on a consumer Radeon GPU... But unfortunately this doesn't necessarily mean the case with today's patches, though we would be delighted if the Radeon RX 7900 series ends up supporting SR-IOV. Presumably this is for an unannounced/upcoming RDNA3-based workstation card with SR-IOV (MxGPU) support while we'll see in time what platforms ends up supporting. In any event, these patches point to something new that's coming based on RDNA3/GFX11 with SR-IOV functionality.

The mid command buffer preemption support is also interesting and helpful for GPU virtualization and is supported by RadeonSI and RADV drivers.

"This patch set allows for FW assisted shadowing on supported platforms. A new enough CP FW is required. This feature is required for mid command buffer preemption and proper SR-IOV support. This also simplifies the UMDs by allowing persistent hardware state when the command submission executes. UMDs that use this will have their state retained across command submissions."

More details within this patch series.