Marek Olšák At Valve Lands RADV Code That Can "Double Performance" With Some VRS Cases

([Radeon] 6 July 02:56 PM EDT Variable Rate Shading)

Longtime AMD Linux graphics driver expert Marek Olšák, who joined Valve earlier this year and now focusing more on RADV rather than the RadeonSI Gallium3D driver, has seen some of his latest work now merged for Mesa 26.2. Marek landed a big overhaul to the variable rate shading (VRS) code that in some cases can double the performance.

AMD Ryzen AI Halo Is An Excellent & Powerful Mini PC With Fully Open-Source Software

([Computers] 6 July 11:00 AM EDT 22 Comments)

Earlier this year AMD announced the Ryzen AI Halo as their in-house mini PC offering built around their leading Ryzen AI Max+ "Strix Halo" platform. After pre-orders began last month, the Ryzen AI Halo is officially beginning to ship this week and over the past few weeks we have been testing it out at Phoronix.

Ryzen AI Developer Platform: AMD's Own Linux Distribution Built Atop Debian

([Operating Systems] 6 July 11:00 AM EDT 5 Comments)

With the AMD Ryzen AI Halo developer platform there is the option of ordering this Ryzen AI Max+ mini PC with either Microsoft Windows 11 or "Linux OS". When receiving a AMD Ryzen AI Halo review sample last month, I fully expected it to just be an Ubuntu LTS install with ROCm preloaded. I was quite surprised when powering it up to find that it's an OS called the AMD Ryzen AI Developer Platform 1 "Rex" and is based on Debian Linux.

Linux 7.3 Expected To "Flatten The Pick" For Better Scheduling While Gaming & More

([Linux Kernel] 6 July 09:22 AM EDT "Flatten The Pick" Patches Queued)

Going back to early May there were patches for improving the Linux scheduler to help with gaming performance on old "potato" hardware by providing better cgroup scheduling. Those patches, referred to as the "flatten the pick" patch series, are now slated for introduction in the Linux 7.3 kernel.

Intel i915 Driver Nearly Ready To "Work Well" With RT Linux Kernel Sans Display Support

([Intel] 6 July 08:29 AM EDT Intel i915 + Real-Time)

When it comes to the real-time "RT" patches carried outside of the Linux kernel, a number of them pertain to adjustments around the Intel i915 kernel DRM graphics driver. The mainline Linux kernel and its RT support depend upon not building "PREEMPT_RT" for the i915 driver support while patches have been worked on recently for making this Intel kernel graphics driver code play nicely with real-time Linux.

Canonical On Making Ubuntu For ARM64 "Truly A First-Class Architecture"

([Ubuntu] 6 July 06:20 AM EDT Ubuntu ARM64)

The Ubuntu Foundations Engineering Manager, Ravi Kant Sharma, with Canonical has provided an update regarding the current ARM64 state on Ubuntu Linux.

Pioneer DJM-S11 Professional DJ Mixer To Be Supported By Linux 7.3

([Hardware] 6 July 05:57 AM EDT Pioneer DJ DJM-S11)

The Pioneer DJM-S11 is a professional scratch style 2-channel DJ mixer that retails for $2,269 USD. But if currently connecting this expensive piece of kit to Linux, it does nothing and is unusable. With 87 new lines of code, it will begin to work with the Linux 7.3 kernel later this year.

Uniwill Laptop Driver Preparing A Number Of Features For Linux 7.3

([Hardware] 6 July 05:49 AM EDT Unwill Laptop Driver)

The Unwill laptop driver on Linux for supporting various device-specific features by that major OEM/ODM will be seeing several new features with the Linux 7.3 cycle later this year. One of the most notable users of the Unwill driver is Bavarian Linux PC vendor TUXEDO Computers.

D7VK's Performance Gains Since Its Inception For Older Direct3D Versions On Linux

([Linux Gaming] 6 July 12:00 AM EDT Better Performance)

In addition to Sunday's release of DXVK 3.0.1, D7VK 1.12 was separately released as the latest version of this implementation for Direct3D 7 and older atop the Vulkan API.

Linux 7.2-rc2 Released: "Things Look Very Normal"

([Linux Kernel] 5 July 09:08 PM EDT Linux 7.2)

Linux 7.2-rc2 is now available for testing in working toward the stable Linux 7.2 release in August.

DXVK 3.0.1 Released With More Game Fixes, Other Improvements

([Linux Gaming] 5 July 07:08 PM EDT DXVK 3.0.1)

Following the release of DXVK 3.0 from late June that brought several big changes, DXVK 3.0.1 is out today with shipping various game fixes and other improvements to this important piece of Valve's Steam Play (Proton) for Direct3D Windows games on Linux.

ReactOS "Open-Source Windows" Project Now Capable Of Running Half-Life 2

([Operating Systems] 5 July 06:42 AM EDT Half-Life 2 + ReactOS)

One month ago it was exciting to see the open-source ReactOS operating system running Valve's Half-Life game. Little to realize less than 30 days later it would also be running Half-Life 2.

AMD Begins Staging Graphics Driver Changes For Linux 7.3

([AMD] 5 July 06:32 AM EDT Linux 7.3 AMDGPU + AMDKFD)

In addition to Intel beginning to volley graphics driver patches for Linux 7.3, this week AMD also began sending out their pull requests of "new stuff" to DRM-Next for the Linux 7.3 kernel cycle.

Intel Preparing Linux For IPU8 Web Camera Support With Nova Lake Laptops

([Intel] 5 July 06:14 AM EDT Intel IPU8 With Nova Lake)

More Linux kernel patches have been surfacing that confirm next-gen, high-end Nova Lake laptops will feature IPU8 image processing capabilities.

OpenRazer 3.12.4 Fixes Compatibility With Linux 7.2

([Hardware] 4 July 08:33 PM EDT OpenRazer 3.12.4)

OpenRazer 3.12.4 is now available as the newest update to these out-of-tree, unofficial Linux drivers for Razer devices. OpenRazer when paired with the likes of Polychromatic or other GUI options is what makes for a nice experience running Razer gaming peripherals under Linux.

FEX 2607 Optimizing For Yet-To-Be-Released ARM 256-bit SVE2 Hardware

([Free Software] 4 July 03:40 PM EDT FEX 2607 Emulator)

The FEX Emulator that allows running Linux x86/x86_64 software on ARM64 (AArch64) systems, including the likes of Wine / Valve's Steam Play (Proton) for Windows gaming on ARM, is out with its newest monthly feature release. The Valve-backed project for running x86_64 games and other software on ARM for the upcoming Steam Frame and other more typical ARM Linux systems has been baking more optimizations and improvements.

Linux DRM Scheduler Patches Yield Massive Improvement For Job Submission Latency

([Linux Kernel] 4 July 12:21 PM EDT Lower Latency)

A set of patches to the Linux kernel's Direct Rendering Manager (DRM) scheduler that is shared among different kernel graphics drivers is showing the potential of delivering much lower job submission latency when the system is loaded with many runnable CPU processes.

4K @ 60 FPS USB Video Capture Finally Becomes Less Problematic On Linux

([Hardware] 4 July 09:39 AM EDT Quirks)

One area of Linux hardware testing I haven't explored much in many years has been modern USB video capture for the lack of said hardware. The last time I did much video capturing on Linux was during the Hauppauge PCI card days. It turns out though that USB video capture of 4K 60 FPS content has been a pain point under Linux but is finally smoothing out with newer versions of the Linux kernel.

Phoronix Premium Summer Sale To Help Support Linux Hardware Testing

([Phoronix] 4 July 09:26 AM EDT 2026 Summer Sale)

For those that missed Phoronix turning 22 years old last month when running a special to help support the site, a few readers mentioned recently they missed out on seeing the deal in time. Paired with the US Independence Day holiday and summer sales elsewhere, now through 10 July is a Phoronix Premium summer sale if wishing to view the site ad-free while supporting the daily open-source/Linux news coverage and relentless Linux hardware testing.

GNOME Lands ext-background-effect-v1 Support For Background Blur Effect

([GNOME] 4 July 08:14 AM EDT Mutter + ext-background-effect-v1)

Added to the Wayland Protocols repository back in May of 2025 was the ext-background-effect-v1 protocol for background blur that had been under discussion since early 2024. The initial focus is on being able to apply a blur effect on a window's background or otherwise a specified screen region. GNOME 51 has now merged support for ext-background-effect-v1 with the latest Mutter code.