MSM DRM Driver Adds Support For Newer Qualcomm Platforms With Linux 6.3

The MSM Direct Rendering Manager (DRM) driver that was started originally as part of the Freedreno effort for open-source, reverse-engineered graphics driver support for Qualcomm Adreno graphics continues flourishing. A number of MSM driver additions -- including new Qualcomm platform support -- is ready to go with the upcoming Linux 6.3 kernel.

The MSM DRM-Next changes were submitted by Freedreno founder Rob Clark on Monday ahead of the cut-off for new material aiming to get into Linux 6.3. When it comes to the new Qualcomm platform support there is enabling around the SM8350, SM8450, SM8550, and SC8280XP platforms. The SM8350 is the Snapdragon 888, SM8450 is the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, SM8550 is the Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, and the SC8280XP is the Snapdragon 8cx Gen 3.

Lenovo ThinkPad X13s

Particularly with the SC8280XP / Snapdragon 8cx Gen 3 powering the likes of the Lenovo ThinkPad X13s laptop, it's great to see the MSM DRM driver activity happening there for enabling open-source graphics support to go along with the Freedreno OpenGL efforts in user-space as well as the Turnip Vulkan driver in Mesa. In addition to the graphics, there has been other recent upstream work around the 8cx Gen 3 and ThinkPad X13s support.

The MSM DRM updates for Linux 6.3 also include adding MSM_SUBMIT_BO_NO_IMPLICIT to allow user-space to opt-out of implicit syncs on a per buffer object basis, support for loading legacy firmware for the Adreno 200 series, GPU devfreq tuning and fixes, support for DisplayPort on the SDM845 and SC8280XP platforms, support for DP HBR3 rates, and various other changes and fixes throughout.

The full list of MSM kernel driver changes for Linux 6.3 can be found via this pull request.