Intel's Open-Source Contributions & Upstream Performance Optimizations Top 2023
Last year on Phoronix were 439+ original news articles around Intel in the software/hardware space as it pertains to my Linux focus. As usual, much of the news has been about Intel's upstreaming of new/future hardware support, making new performance optimizations, and their countless open-source projects spanning many different domains. The most popular Intel news during 2023 on Phoronix included:
Intel Publishes Blazing Fast AVX-512 Sorting Library, Numpy Switching To It For 10~17x Faster Sorts
Intel recently published an open-source C++ header file library for high performance SIMD-based sorting, which initially is focused on providing a lightning fast AVX-512 quicksort implementation. As of today that code has been merged to Numpy and is providing some 10~17x speed-ups.
Intel Thunder Bay Is Officially Canceled, Linux Driver Code To Be Removed
I hadn't heard any mentions of Intel's Thunder Bay in quite a while besides the occasional Linux kernel patch while now it has been officially confirmed as a cancelled Intel product and the Linux driver code being worked on the past 2+ years is on the chopping block.
Intel To Further Collaborate With Red Hat, Canonical & SUSE For Intel-Optimized Linux Distros
Intel announced this morning on the second day of their Innovation 2023 conference that they are collaborating with software vendors such as Red Hat, Canonical, and SUSE for providing Intel-optimized Linux distributions.
Intel Itanium IA-64 Support Removed With The Linux 6.7 Kernel
Overnight the mainline Linux kernel has retired support for Intel Itanium (IA-64) processors.
Intel i219-LM Had Only Been Running At ~60% Of Maximum Speed Due To Linux Driver Bug
If you rely on an Intel I219-LM Gigabit Ethernet adapter, you will want to look forward to upgrading your Linux kernel build soon... A fix was committed today after Intel engineers discovered this particular Ethernet chipset had only been running at around 60% of its maximum speed due to a regression introduced back in 2020.
Firefox 115 Now Available With Intel GPU Video Decoding On Linux
Mozilla Firefox 115.0 official builds are now available for this notable update to this open-source web browser while also marking the new Extended Support Release (ESR) series.
New Intel Linux Graphics Driver Patches Allow Tuning For Up To 10~15% Better Performance
After profiling and raising an issue by Google's Chrome OS engineers, there is a set of "request for comments" patches out today for the Intel Linux graphics driver that can provide 10~15% better performance when operating in the tuned mode.
Intel Issues New CPU Microcode Going Back To Gen8 For New, Undisclosed Security Updates
Well, this is a bit strange... Intel just published Friday afternoon CPU microcode updates for all supported processor families back to Coffee Lake "Gen 8" for undisclosed security updates.
Intel Continues With More Big-Time Optimizations To The Linux Kernel
I love Linux kernel patches that mention "massively", use exclamation points when talking about performance, and/or simply mention big speed-ups. Quite often such patches come out of Intel and last week they sent out another great performance optimization patch series to improve additional low-level bits of the kernel.
Intel Releases x86-simd-sort 2.0 With Faster AVX-512 Sorting, New Algorithms
Earlier this year Intel software engineers published a blazing fast AVX-512 sorting library that was initially picked up by Numpy where it netted them 10~17x faster sorts. Today marks the release of x86-simd-sort 2.0 with even more AVX-512 features in place and additional sorting algorithms added.
System76 Begins Publishing "Virgo" Laptop PCB Design Specs, Confirms Intel Raptor Lake
For months Linux hardware vendor System76 has been teasing their in-house designed and manufactured "Virgo" laptop to be built at their facility in Denver. They are hoping to develop the quietest yet most performant Linux laptop. Today they published the initial open-source design files for their custom motherboard PCB in this laptop.
Intel Publishes "X86-S" Specification For 64-bit Only Architecture
Intel quietly released a new whitepaper and specification for their proposal on "X86-S" as a 64-bit only x86 architecture. If their plans workout, in the years ahead we could see a revised 64-bit only x86 architecture.
Intel AVX10: Taking AVX-512 With More Features & Supporting It Across P/E Cores
Along with detailing Advanced Performance Extensions (APX), Intel as effectively a footnote to that also disclosed another exciting addition to find with future Intel CPUs: AVX10. Most notably for consumer use is that AVX10 will enable AVX-512 capabilities across both Performance and Efficient core designs with hybrid processors.
Intel Open-Sources Its OpenCL CPU-Based Runtime
As 718,996 lines of newly open-sourced code, Intel recently began opening up their previously proprietary CPU-based OpenCL run-time.
Trying Out Meteor Lake's Arc Graphics With The New Intel Xe Driver Was A Bust
With Linux 6.8 set to introduce the new Intel Xe experimental kernel graphics driver early next year, last week I ran some Xe vs. i915 driver benchmarks on various Intel Arc Graphics discrete GPUs. There's still room for bettering the performance but a nice initial entry into the kernel and easy to test out. For some Christmas weekend benchmarking I was curious to see how well the Xe kernel driver would work on the integrated graphics side with the new Meteor Lake processors.
OpenJDK Merges Intel's x86-simd-sort For Speeding Up Data Sorting 7~15x
Earlier this year Intel posted x86-simd-sort as a blazing fast sorting library that makes use of AVX-512. When the popular Numpy began using it they found up to 10~17x faster sorts for 16-bit to 64-bit data types. Today Intel software engineers released x86-simd-sort 3.0 and it also comes minutes after OpenJDK merged a modified version of this speeding sorting code into that reference JDK codebase.
Linux 6.3 Drops Support For The Intel ICC Compiler
On this last day of the Linux 6.3 kernel merge window, Linus Torvalds merged the patch dropping support for Intel (ICC) compiler support. Specifically this is Intel's long-standing ICC compiler now known as the "Intel C++ Compiler Classic" prior to its transition to being LLVM/Clang-based with the modern Intel DPC++ compiler.
Intel Arc Graphics A750/A770 Quick Linux Competition With The Radeon RX 7600
For those wondering how the performance of Intel Arc Graphics is relative to the newly-launched AMD Radeon RX 7600 and other recent graphics cards, here are a couple of benchmarks for the Arc Graphics using the new Linux 6.3 stable kernel paired with Mesa 23.2-dev for the latest open-source OpenGL and Vulkan drivers.
Raja Koduri Departing Intel To Start New Software Company
Prominent Intel leader Raja Koduri who currently serves as the company's Chief Architect is leaving to focus on a new software start-up.
System76's Coreboot Open Firmware Manages To Disable Intel ME For Raptor Lake
Linux laptop/desktop vendor System76 has made some improvements to their Coreboot open firmware offerings to benefit their latest Intel Core 13th Gen "Raptor Lake" wares as well as prior generation devices.
And the most popular Intel Linux hardware reviews / benchmark articles for 2023:
Intel Xeon Platinum 8490H "Sapphire Rapids" Performance Benchmarks
Now that the 4th Gen Xeon Scalable "Sapphire Rapids" and Xeon CPU Max Series overview is out of the way, you are probably very eager to see some independent performance benchmarks of the much anticipated Sapphire Rapids CPUs that are going up against AMD 4th Gen EPYC "Genoa" processors for 2023... For kicking off our Sapphire Rapids benchmarking, first up is a look at the Xeon Platinum 8490H performance under Linux as the flagship SKU.
Intel Core Ultra 7 155H Meteor Lake vs. AMD Ryzen 7 7840U On Linux In 300+ CPU Benchmarks
Last week Intel launched their Core Ultra "Meteor Lake" notebook processors. Genuinely very curious about the performance potential under Linux along with various features of these new mobile SoCs like the NPU and integrated Arc Graphics, I bought an Intel Core Ultra laptop on launch-day for carrying out Linux benchmarks. In this first review of Intel Meteor Lake on Linux is a look at how the Intel Core Ultra 7 155H performs against the common AMD Ryzen 7 7840U as the Zen 4 laptop competition.
Windows 11 vs. Ubuntu Linux Performance On The Intel Core Ultra 7 Meteor Lake
Following my Linux benchmarks of the Intel Core Ultra 7 155H processor performance where it ended up being rather disappointing but then with finding great success with the integrated Arc Graphics on Meteor Lake, like I you may be left wondering how much of a role Linux is playing with these results compared to Windows... Well, this article will shed some light on that aspect with looking at the Microsoft Windows 11 vs. Ubuntu Linux performance on the Acer Swift Go 14 Meteor Lake laptop.
AVX-512 Performance Comparison: AMD Genoa vs. Intel Sapphire Rapids & Ice Lake
With last week's launch of Intel's 4th Gen Xeon Scalable Sapphire Rapids server processors, Intel heavily talked up the shiny new accelerators and the big performance potential of AMX, but not really showcased and only heard through the grapevine was the improved AVX-512 implementation found with these new processors. With Sapphire Rapids there is reduced penalties from engaging AVX-512 -- and for some AVX-512 instructions, no longer any measurable impact -- compared to prior generation Xeon processors. In this article is a look at the performance for a wide variety of workloads with AVX-512 on/off not just for Sapphire Rapids but also for prior generation Ice Lake as well as AMD's new EPYC 4th Gen "Genoa" processors where they have introduced AVX-512 for the first time.
Initial Benchmarks Of The Intel Downfall Mitigation Performance Impact
With yesterday's disclosure of the Intel Downfall speculative execution vulnerability and the updated CPU microcode and Linux kernel patches I have been very busy testing the performance impact of this mitigation. Here are some initial numbers and workloads I have found to be impacted as a result of this security mitigation for Skylake to Icelake/Tigerlake client and server processors.
Intel Arc Graphics vs. AMD Radeon vs. NVIDIA GeForce For 1080p Linux Graphics In Late 2023
Following last month's launch of the Intel Arc Graphics A580 for a sub-$200 graphics card backed by an open-source Linux driver stack I ran some benchmarks looking at the Intel Arc Graphics compute performance against NVIDIA's proprietary driver stack. In today's article is a fresh look at the 1080p Linux gaming/graphics performance across Intel Arc Graphics, AMD Radeon, and NVIDIA GeForce GPUs while using the latest Linux drivers.
Intel Arc Graphics A770: Windows 11 vs. Linux Benchmarks
Following the year-end looks at Windows 11 vs. Linux graphics/gaming performance for AMD Radeon and NVIDIA GeForce graphics cards, today's article is my first look at the Windows 11 vs. Linux performance for Intel Arc Graphics with the flagship A770 graphics card.
LLVM Clang 16 vs. GCC 13 Compiler Performance On Intel Raptor Lake
For those wondering how the recent releases of the Clang 16 and GCC 13 are competing for the fastest generated binaries of these leading open-source compilers, here is a fresh round of benchmarks from an Intel Core i9 13900K "Raptor Lake" system looking at the performance for a variety of C/C++ workloads built under each of these compilers.
Intel's Open-Source Linux Compute Stack Maturing Very Well For Arc Graphics
From early December to late February there was an absence of new Compute-Runtime updates for that open-source stack for providing OpenCL and oneAPI Level Zero support for Intel graphics hardware on Linux. It was out of trend as they worked to move from a weekly~biweekly release rhythm to a monthly release cadence while taking extra time for making various other changes too. After that three month lull, they are back to pushing out new compute updates and damn it's looking nice. At least in my testing, the progress they've quietly made over the past few months has been very nice for the compute stack compatibility/support and performance.
Intel Arc Graphics A580 On Linux: Open-Source Graphics For Under $200
Last week Intel announced the Arc Graphics A580 as a new mid-range DG2/Alchemist graphics card option that comes in between the entry-level Arc Graphics A380 and the higher-end Arc Graphics A750/A770. With the Arc Graphics A580 coming in at under $200, it's quite an interesting graphics card for those after open-source Linux driver support and/or those wanting to experiment with Intel's growing oneAPI software ecosystem with excellent open-source GPU compute support.
Intel Meteor Lake Arc Graphics: A Fantastic Upgrade, Battles AMD RDNA3 Integrated Graphics
Yesterday I posted the first Intel Meteor Lake Linux benchmarks that were focused on the CPU capabilities with the Intel Core Ultra 7 155H on Ubuntu Linux compared to the existing AMD Ryzen 7 7840U. The strictly CPU core performance ended up being rather disappointing with the AMD Zen 4 laptop dominating in most cases at similar or better power efficiency. But where things become much more interesting -- and competitive -- with Meteor Lake is on the integrated graphics side now featuring Arc Graphics. The benchmarks today is our first look at the new Meteor Lake Arc Graphics with the Core 7 Ultra 155H while comparing it to the RDNA3 integrated graphics found with the AMD Ryzen 7 7840U as well as the prior generation Intel integrated graphics.
Intel Xeon Ice Lake vs. AMD EPYC Milan Server Performance, Efficiency & Value In 2023
While AMD 4th Gen EPYC "Genoa" and Intel 4th Gen Xeon Scalable "Sapphire Rapids" processors launched a few months ago, for those not yet able to obtain the new processors/platforms, prefer waiting for DDR5 memory prices to recede further, don't necessarily need the latest bells and whistles found with these new server processors, or just looking to maximize value, 3rd Gen AMD EPYC Milan and Intel Xeon Scalable Ice Lake processors are readily available and still seeing plenty of new deployments in data centers throughout the world. In this article is a fresh look at the AMD Milan vs. Intel Ice Lake server performance, power efficiency, and performance-per-dollar across a range of processors.
Intel Core i5 13400 Linux Performance - Raptor Lake 10 Cores / 16 Threads For $239
Earlier this month at CES, Intel announced the 35 and 65 Watt Raptor Lake processors alongside the 13th Gen Core Mobile CPUs. Those new Raptor Lake desktop CPUs are now available from multiple Internet retailers and the mid-range Core i5 13400 recently arrived at Phoronix to put it through its paces under Linux.
AMD Radeon vs. Intel Arc Graphics With Linux 6.2 + Mesa 23.0
Following the Windows vs. Linux benchmarks with Intel Arc Graphics from last week, in today's article is a look at how the Intel Arc Graphics A750 and A770 are competing to the AMD Radeon graphics when using the very latest Linux 6.2 kernel along with Mesa 23.0-devel for providing the very latest open-source graphics driver support from each vendor.
Linux 6.2 Performance Option Helps Extend The Longevity Of Intel Skylake Era PCs
One of the new features introduced with Linux 6.2 is Call Depth Tracking and it can help extend the useful service life of Intel Skylake through Coffeelake era processors in providing better performance than is otherwise found out-of-the-box on Linux.
Intel Advanced Matrix Extensions [AMX] Performance With Xeon Scalable Sapphire Rapids
One of the most exciting features of Intel's 4th Gen Xeon Scalable "Sapphire Rapids" processors is the introduction of Advanced Matrix Extensions (AMX). The Intel AMX ISA extensions are intended for speeding-up AI and machine learning related workloads. In this article is a look at the AMX performance on the Xeon Platinum 8490H processors on/off for machine learning performance.
Meteor Lake EPP Tuning For Greater Performance Or Power Efficiency With Intel Ultra Core 7
With all of my initial Intel Core Ultra 7 155H benchmarking since last week from the Windows 11 vs. Linux performance to the integrated Intel Arc Graphics performance it was at the Linux 6.7 kernel defaults / OS defaults. But for those wanting to push the Intel Core Ultra 7 155H further for better performance or conversely wanting to extend the battery life further for devices like the Acer Swift Go 14 laptop, the Intel P-State Energy Performance Preference (EPP) can be adjusted. Here's a look at the sometimes significant difference to power and performance when adjusting the Intel Meteor Lake CPU between the default balanced performance mode and the alternative power saver and performance modes.
From Whiskey Lake To Meteor Lake: The Intel CPU Linux Performance Evolution
Yesterday I ran through a number of benchmarks looking at how the Intel integrated graphics have evolved from the Gen9/Skylake era through the new Meteor Lake CPUs with integrated Arc Graphics. While carrying out those graphics tests with being infatuated by the performance and power efficiency of Meteor Lake integrated graphics, I also took the opportunity to run 100+ CPU benchmarks on each of these laptop CPUs / Intel mobile processor generations being tested. Here's that look at the Intel CPU performance and power efficiency comparison from Whiskey Lake to Meteor Lake.
Intel Core i5 14600K & Intel Core i9 14900K Linux Benchmarks
Earlier this month Intel introduced the 14th Gen Core "Raptor Lake Refresh" processors led by the flagship Core i9 14900K. Unfortunately my review samples had arrived late but in any event today are the first Linux benchmarks of the new Core i5 14600K and Core i9 14900K processors compared to prior 13th Gen Core processors as well as the AMD Ryzen 7000 series competition. All of these Intel and AMD processors were freshly re-tested on the newly-launched Ubuntu 23.10 with the Linux 6.5 kernel.
The Current Intel Arc Graphics Linux Gaming Performance On Linux 6.2 + Mesa 23.1-dev
Last week I shared my findings over the great state of Intel's open-source compute stack for Arc Graphics now that the DG2/Alchemist support was promoted to stable in Linux 6.2 and the Compute-Runtime user-space stack for OpenCL and Level Zero is back to seeing regular updates with that code having matured particularly well. Here is a brief look at the current state of the Linux gaming performance for Arc Graphics on Linux 6.2 and making use of the latest Mesa 23.1-devel OpenGL and Vulkan drivers.
Cheers to their 2023 accomplishments and here's to hopefully more exciting Intel open-source contributions, punctual new hardware support, and more enticing performance optimizations in 2024!
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