Intel Posts Final Batch Of Graphics Driver Feature Changes Ahead Of Linux 4.21

With the time for new Direct Rendering Manager (DRM) driver feature material to enter DRM-Next for the Linux 4.21 kernel cycle quickly coming to a close, the Intel Open-Source Technology Center crew has sent in a final feature pull of material for this next kernel development cycle.

As the DRM-Next feature cutoff happens a few weeks prior to the end of the current kernel cycle, in the days ahead will mark that point for Linux 4.21 with 4.20 marching along for debut around Christmas. The open-source Intel developers have already sent in a few feature updates in the past few weeks to DRM-Next while today was their final expected batch for 4.21.

The earlier pull requests had continued work on Intel Icelake "Gen 11" graphics, prepping for DisplayPort Forward Error Correction (DP FEC) that is important for Display Stream Compression in beginning to look past 5K displays, Panel Self Refresh (PSR) fixes, DisplayPort Multi-Stream Transport (DP MST) improvements, HDCP 2.2 content protection prepping, and other low-level changes to this "i915" DRM kernel module.

With today's final 4.21 feature pull, added on top is enabling Icelake DSI video mode enabling, Embedded DisplayPort (eDP) fixes, more Panel Self Refresh work, enabling of the DisplayPort Forward Error Correction code, watermark handling improvements for Skylake and newer, GT/engine workaround improvements, and other changes.

The Linux 4.21 kernel cycle will kick off once Linux 4.20 debuts by month's end while that official 4.21.0 kernel should be out around early to mid March.