Apart from getting performance improvements after transitioning to the AMDGPU driver, the AMD GCN GPUs will also get some more optimizations.
Linux Graphics Developers Submit Patches to Mitigate VM Fault Spam on AMD GCN GPUs
With the Linux Kernel 6.19 release date approaching, we are not just going to see improved gaming performance on decade-old AMD GCN GPUs, but there have been attempts to fix more bugs that have been affecting the cards for a long time. Previously, we saw how transitioning from the Radeon driver to the AMDGPU driver helped the GCN GPUs deliver a nearly 30% performance improvement, but Linux developers aren't done yet.
The Valve's Linux graphics team member, Timur Kristóf, has recently submitted a set of new patches that will mitigate the VM faults for the GCN GPUs, including both GFX6 (GCN 1.0) and GFX7 (GCN 1.1). So GPUs such as those in the HD 7000 and R9 290 series will soon get rid of the VM fault spam, which introduced instability. On these GPUs, Vulkan workloads used to trigger the GPU virtual memory faults on Linux. In simple words, this happened whenever the GPU tried to read from or write to invalid memory regions, which were treated as high-priority faults by the driver stack. This sometimes happened thousands of times per second.
Now that the patches are submitted, these non-critical faults will be filtered, preventing the Linux kernel from flooding logs during normal Vulkan operation. So, what essentially will happen now is that this VM fault spam can run quietly in the background. This doesn't improve the performance, but brings better stability and usability to the GPUs.
So, apart from getting a big change by shifting to the AMDGPU driver, the GCN GPUs will also receive more optimizations in this quarter.
News Sources: Freedesktop, Phoronix
About the author: Sarfraz Khan is a hardware reporter with a focus on PC components and the builder community. With years of experience writing about PC hardware and laptops, his work has been featured on several reputable technology publications. Sarfraz's hands-on experience is demonstrated through his first-person accounts of using and comparing different hardware configurations, providing practical and relatable insights for everyday users. His technical analysis is respected by peers in the enthusiast community and has been cited by specialized hardware sites such as Germany's Igor's Lab.
Follow Wccftech on Google to get more of our news coverage in your feeds.
