Linux 6.3 Supports The Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 & Other New High-End Arm SoCs

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Linux 6.3 Supports The Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 & Other New High-End Arm SoCs

Ahead of the Linux 6.3 merge window officially opening up following the Linux 6.2 stable release tomorrow, Arnd Bergmann has already mailed in his pull requests of the Arm SoC and defconfig updates for this next kernel version. Most notable is having mainline support for the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 as well as some other new, high-end embedded SoCs...

https://www.phoronix.com/news/Linux-6.3-Arm-SoC-Updates

[dreamcat4]

ah ok so i take to read this mostly as cpu support (rather than actual whole soc support of everything on the soc).... the big thing is normally lacking is gpu drivers for linux right? because without that there is no gpu acceleration.

this is why i am looking for new samsung exynos soc, this was supposed to include amd mobile ip gpu block. because an amd based graphics hardware mobile architecture should be sharing driver codebase / common features with their desktop gpus. that would be most welcome.

but if any of these other modern affordable gpu smartphone socs also includes a good quality of gpu support for linux (or chromebook) then please let me know. (by that i mean other than nvidia developer platforms which are simply way too expensive than these other typical arm socs).

so how about qualcomm maybes? how are those for linux gpu accelerated drivers and encode / decode blocks? it would be nice to hear about

[coder]

so how about qualcomm maybes? how are those for linux gpu accelerated drivers and encode / decode blocks? it would be nice to hear about

The usual go-to is https://mesamatrix.net/

Noteworthy points, regarding Qualcomm:

• "tu" Vulkan driver reports 100% conformance with Vulkan 1.3 w/ 133 extensions (68.6%) + 50.4% of non-versioned extensions.
• "freedreno" OpenGL driver reports 100% conformance with OpenGL 4.5 w/ 156 extensions (97.5%) + 27 (49.1%) of non-versioned extensions.
• "freedreno" OpenGL driver reports 100% conformance with OpenGL ES 3.2 w/ 41 extensions (100%)
• No opensource OpenCL driver, but I think it should work with Rusticle? Qualcomm has a proprietary OpenCL driver, which you can consult to see which version a given hardware generation is capable of supporting.
• To see native hardware capabilities, refer to: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adreno

Noteworthy points, regarding ARM's Mali:

• "panvk" Vulkan driver reports full conformance with no Vulkan version, but supports 12 v1.3 extensions (6.2%) + 4.9% of non-versioned extensions.
• "parfrost" OpenGL driver reports 100% conformance with OpenGL 3.1 w/ 109 extensions (68.1%) + 17 (30.9%) of non-versioned extensions.
• "panfrost" OpenGL driver reports 100% conformance with OpenGL ES 3.1 w/ 34 extensions (82.9%)
• No opensource OpenCL driver, but I think it should work with Rusticle? I think ARM has a proprietary OpenCL driver, which you could consult to see which version a given hardware generation is capable of supporting.
• To see native hardware capabilities, refer to: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mali_(processor)#Variants

Final thoughts:

• Qualcomm support is a lot better than I expected. Based on that data, I'd say it looks ready for prime time.
• Now, I'm very curious to see how Freedreno's performance compares. Microsoft released a desktop mini-PC with the Snapdragon 8cx Gen 3 for $600 that seems compelling if it could easily boot a mainstream distro: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/arm/dev-kit/ Considering it includes 32 GB of LPDDR4x and 512 GB NVMe storage, that seems like quite a deal!
• I'm pretty surprised at how poor support is for ARM's Mali. I'd have expected that to be better supported than Qualcomm's Adreno, since ARM's IP is used in a lot more SoCs.
• Imagination/PowerVR is almost nowhere to be seen.

Of course, another option is probably to use the proprietary drivers. I expect that would be a necessity to get decent 3D support on ARM's Mali GPUs.

[dreamcat4]

thank you so much for replying me here with this detailed assessment. i found it to be quite valuable, very helpful actually

[*]I'm pretty surprised at how poor support is for ARM's Mali. I'd have expected that to be better supported than Qualcomm's Adreno, since ARM's IP is used in a lot more SoCs.[*]Imagination/PowerVR is almost nowhere to be seen.[/LIST]
Of course, another option is probably to use the proprietary drivers. I expect that would be a necessity to get decent 3D support on ARM's Mali GPUs.

haha well yes, this explains a lot my own poor luck finding chinese sbcs with a good graphics support, since (just as you say) that arm socs with mali gpu is so many. for example 2 of the most popular chinese soc (at least for cheap sbcs) are stuff like amlogic s905 (or similar)... and certain mediatek socs. both of which usually have the arm mali gpu.

i suspect this maybe is lower design cost, that arm provides a default graphics that is cheaper. and while it may work for android it does not on linux.

so then... imagination powervr. i see listings on wikipedia (for mediatek) that the used to use that a long time ago. but at some point they ditched it and changed instead for arm mali in newer socs. perhaps (again) the reason might have been around licensing fees, or legal battles with apple. who knows - i forget now what actually happened. so nevermind.

quallcomm - these socs we do not find them in low end sbcs, which is perhaps due to higher cost vs the other cheapest chinese soc manufacturers. however perhaps china also has some policies regarding importing and using components from other countries. for example if qualcomm is usa based, then the chinese prc governement wants to instead promote sourcing of chinese made parts instead (when available). or other such nonsense. and you know... the whole chinese branch of arm fiasco whereby the ceo of arm china company broke away from internation arm, but also took with themselves arm intellectual property and designs. there is some whole rogue subsidiary disputes for going on around that.

anyhow back to quallcomm... we dont find in cheap sbcs. but we do see mid range quallcomm chips in cheap chinese smartphones (like poco brand, redmi etc). so that is very interesting cheap hardware platform. with some potential but only if (like you say) that the uboot or whatever bootloader can boot linux kernel instead of android. and that all of the connected chinese hardware around the soc can too be supported properly in linux well enough. for example power management and sensors, touch. all of those necessary peripherals for a decent working phone platform (or tablet platform). so that is less likely to be well supported on linux, (rather than android). but at least maybe the gpu can work if nothing else.

and also (perhaps more useful) we see quallcomm chips appear in some chromebooks now too. so that is a great candidate platform for native linux, especially in particular to give a very long batterly life. and a low price point. however it does have to compete quite fiercely with x86 chromebooks, which they are... dirt cheap. and we always get better or best possible support for x86 on linux. which perhaps somewhat de-values in that space the quallcomm option. except for the longer battery life / lower power usage.

so a mixture of feelings about this levels of gpu support. my thinking is however that perhaps the most desirable for quallcomm soc is either an sbc form factor similar to the rpi compute module 4 (cm4). to be able to use with a touchscreen and gpios in many custom projects.

or

an android tablet with snapdragon soc, that has become old, or broken. or that the android version is no longer anymore supported. then it would be a great platform to install linux onto it. for a linux mobile platform and interface. something a bit like the other linux mobile phone, or when we can install a very effecient touch based ui onto the touch screen. that could be used for mobile display or whatever tablet-like use case. (not to replace an ipad in terms of apps, just to have a mobile touch screen, for a dedicated purpose, such as in car ice head unit, things like that).

so maybe it is worth to look for such hardware device(s) now with quallcomm. at least, it cannot be any worse than all of those mali

[dreamcat4]

i suppose maybe one day if they improve kernel support for arm mali later down the line. then that would also be most welcome too... its just has not been yet to my knowledge (i think i gave up looking for such long time, perhaps since years ago now).

so until then, happy to explore these other alternatives

[coder]

haha well yes, this explains a lot my own poor luck finding chinese sbcs with a good graphics support, since (just as you say) that arm socs with mali gpu is so many. for example 2 of the most popular chinese soc (at least for cheap sbcs) are stuff like amlogic s905 (or similar)... and certain mediatek socs. both of which usually have the arm mali gpu.

Rockchip also uses Mali, from what I've seen.

I have an Odroid N2 with the Amlogic S905. People seem to have gotten it running with the proprietary GPU drivers without much trouble, though I think it requires custom kernel build (if using Ubuntu). If the Armbian spin for that board supports its GPU out-of-the-box, then I may switch. Other than that, my experience running Ubuntu on it has been pretty good.

i suspect this maybe is lower design cost, that arm provides a default graphics that is cheaper. and while it may work for android it does not on linux.

I'll bet all the Android devices using it are also using ARM's proprietary driver.

quallcomm - these socs we do not find them in low end sbcs, which is perhaps due to higher cost

Yeah, probably due to cost. There are some chromeboks with their 7c, so I wonder if that could be an alternative to the RK3588 on some higher-end SBCs. I wish Qualcomm would contend more for the embedded market. I think they're going after robotics, so that might portend good things for the SBC community.

and also (perhaps more useful) we see quallcomm chips appear in some chromebooks now too. so that is a great candidate platform for native linux, especially in particular to give a very long batterly life. and a low price point. however it does have to compete quite fiercely with x86 chromebooks, which they are... dirt cheap.

If you don't mind 4 GB, you can get used Snapdragon 7c chromebooks quite cheap:

https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fro...&LH_Complete=1

The 8 GB versions sell for a lot more.

we always get better or best possible support for x86 on linux. which perhaps somewhat de-values in that space the quallcomm option. except for the longer battery life / lower power usage.

I think the main potential benefits of Linux/ARM laptops are actually:

• Low-cost (I said potential benefits!), due to smaller core & die size.
• Smaller & lighter-weight (lower power -> cheaper, thinner, lighter cooling solution and smaller batteries)

I'm not convinced battery life will be that much longer, because the temptation is too great for them to simply use smaller batteries to save on cost/weight/bulk.

so maybe it is worth to look for such hardware device(s) now with quallcomm. at least, it cannot be any worse than all of those mali

We still need good Mali support. Qualcomm will never be in the cheapest SBCs. MediaTek is a big player in Chromebooks, and they look set to either stay with Mali or maybe Nvidia.

[dreamcat4]

thanks so much for these responses, it has informed and improved my knowledge around this topic

There are some chromeboks with their 7c, so I wonder if that could be an alternative to the RK3588 on some higher-end SBCs. I wish Qualcomm would contend more for the embedded market. I think they're going after robotics, so that might portend good things for the SBC community.

If you don't mind 4 GB, you can get used Snapdragon 7c chromebooks quite cheap:

https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fro...&LH_Complete=1

The 8 GB versions sell for a lot more.

a quick search (in my country, over on ebay uk) turned up this one:

Samsung Galaxy Book Go 14" Snapdragon 7c 2nd Gen 8GB RAM, 128GB SSD, Win 11
Opens in a new window or tab
Pre-owned
£129.99

so i am just left wondering now if the display is good. since it is samsung brand, and so on. maybe there are reviews for it. then it is also a matter to check for linux support of pheripherals (touch pad, power management), and so on. which may be specific to the device

and the batter size, if others have already made guides for installing linux onto the specific device. thanks again for pointing it out here, to find those models

[schmidtbag]

[*]Qualcomm support is a lot better than I expected. Based on that data, I'd say it looks ready for prime time.[*]Now, I'm very curious to see how Freedreno's performance compares. Microsoft released a desktop mini-PC with the Snapdragon 8cx Gen 3 for

As someone who has installed Linux on a WoS laptop, I'm not so confident it's a good idea to get any ARM-based device that shipped with Windows 10+, not until there's a strong community behind it. The aarch64-laptops community is quite insufficient, and Linaro seemed to abandon the project once they got a working proof of concept. It's a major PITA to install Linux on these devices, it takes very little effort to break it, and it's hard to get everything to work properly.

[rbanffy]

A writeup on the development kits available for these SoCs would be awesome. If there are affordable ones, then even more amazing.

[bemerk]

Upstream Support of SoC Arm Chips and components is always good to see. The real enablement would be the job of the oems though and require firmware licenses and drivers for other components like gyro, modem, display , charger and more as well as a proper devicetree.
I don't see these coming anytime soon.