Linux 2.6.20-rc6 Kernel Performance

Michael writes "The Linux 2.6.20 kernel will feature KVM support, Playstation 3 support, and a variety of other improvements. With the Linux 2.6.20-rc6 kernel out the door, Phoronix has written a performance comparison of the Linux 2.6.20-rc6 kernel against the 2.6.19 and 2.6.19.2 kernels in a variety of benchmarks."

Bottom Line

[shirizaki]

With the Linux 2.6.19 kernel coming out last November and only two additional releases in the 2.6.19 branch, the Linux 2.6.20 kernel is certainly coming quickly. Linus Torvalds had mentioned in the 2.6.20-rc6 release announcement that this is likely the last release candidate. However, even with this quick kernel release coming the features are definitively impressive. Sony Playstation 3 support and Kernel-based Virtual Machine support are among the exciting features in this release. From today's testing in our environment used and set of benchmarks, there were no definitive performance gains or losses seen throughout the set of tests.

It's nice to get features without sacrificing performance. The added PS3 support would nab those ubuntu people to put it on PS3. Not only that, but yellow dog might get some competition if some peoepl decide to make their own PS3-based distro with all kinds of extras.

Re:PS-3

[Bluesman]

I bought a PS-3 for the sole reason that I want to run Linux on it to use as a cheap, quiet server, and play with the Cell processor, which I think should be pretty fast for DSP and software radio applications.

I'm pretty excited about the Cell, and the Playstation is an incredible value for a small form-factor computer that you can put next to your TV without having fan noise be a bother.

Why not support it in the Linux kernel?

Why not?

[brunes69]

It's support for the cell, and some PS3 hardware.

Why would it not be included? If the kernel is still shipping support for 15 year old legacy ISA hardware (yes it is) and Cyrix X86 optimization s(yes it is), it can include support for the PS3, which is likely more in use than either of the above.

There is support for hardware in the kernel that is so obscure that there are probably less than 100 people in the world still using it. There's nothing wrong with this - this is why Open Source beats closed source for overall hardware support - as long as someone is around using it, and someone else maintaining it, there is no reason to remove support for it.

Regarding Playstation Support

[Kadin2048]

Does anyone know how much of the PS3's hardware is actually supported? When you run Linux on Cell, is it actually using all of the Cell cores, or is it just using the main (PPC-like) one?

It seems like Cell is probably going to be a lackluster performer, if only the single main processor is used; at that point it's just like using a 3 or 4 year old PowerPC system. But if Linux can support its additional hardware and coprocessors, it seems like you could do some neat stuff with it; I'd think that you could make a nice media-PC frontend on it, for pushing HD video around.

Seems like getting software to take advantage of it, would require changes both to the kernel, and also to GCC, in order to produce optimized binaries for it, not to mention various pieces of software themselves (rewriting for greater parallelizability).

Still, it's a neat hardware platform (that's about all I have nice to say about it, actually), and it's a good bet that at some time in the future, they'll be available inexpensively on the used market. Anything that starts the process of getting better support now, seems like a good thing to me.

A 2% improvement is HUGE

[amorsen]

Kernel developers regularly hunt elusive speed boosts which can only be detected by specialized benchmark. 2% on something as generic as kernel compilation is fantastic.

Of course the tests probably weren't conducted in a sufficiently scientific way, so the measurement error probably swamps the 2% improvement. If it can be independently repeated, congratulations are definitely in order!

Re:PS-3

[Bluesman]

1) A file/subversion server for my home network.
2) It's not, yet. It's arriving today via UPS.

And the main reason I bought it was not as a server, although that's certainly a benefit. I'm more interested in development on the Cell.

Where does the hypervisor live?

[Kadin2048]

I've played with PS3 linux. I can tell you, the hypervisor is just that. It virtualizes the PS3 hardware. ...

I don't know about anybody else, but I find this just conceptually fascinating. Where does the hypervisor run from, anyway? Is it in the machine's ROM, so that there's no way to prevent it from booting? (Without irreversible hardware modifications.)

I was just wondering whether it's possible to get rid of it, and boot Linux on the bare metal, or whether the hypervisor is tied into the hardware so tightly, it's impossible to remove and install a new Domain 0 operating system.

Getting Linux to run on the bare metal, 'below' the hypervisor, will be an interesting exercise in what I suspect may be a large part of the future of "unauthorized" computing. I don't think it'll be long before most consumer systems have something like that in place, so it'll be a good intellectual challenge, if nothing else, to see if it can be gotten around.

Re:PS-3

[Anonymous Coward]

Except, it was Sony that wrote the code to allow Linux to run on the PS3. And it only runs on their hypervisor - we don't have direct access to the hardware (you won't see Compiz running on the PS3 - it's only usable for plotting ICBM courses and other scientific tasks - ask Persia), and we won't until the PS3 is cracked.

Same here

[this great guy]

I also bought a PS3 two weeks ago primarily to develop on the Cell processor. So far, I have written a prototype application that runs 5x faster on the PS3's Cell than on the highest end Woodcrest Xeon at 3.0 GHz. When I am not coding on it, I am also using it as a Blu-ray player. Given all this, plus the fact that the PS3 is a next-gen console (though I don't plan to buy any game), I am probably one of the few to recognize that $500 is dirty cheap for such a polyvant device !

It's about like a G5

[reaktor]

The Processor is about equivalent to a mid-to-late Pentium III.

No, it's actually about the same as a Powermac G5 at the moment. Read more here [geekpatrol.ca].

"Results
Overall Score
PlayStation 3
105.2
Power Mac G5
106.9"