Download Linux Kernel 2.6.39

Version 2.6.39 of the Linux Kernel has been released. The kernel is the heart of the operating system and, simply put, it sits as a layer between the hardware and the applications. The changelog for version 2.6.39 is not yet updatedbut from a article at Heise Media, we can tell that several graphics card improvements have been made for AMD, Nvidia and Intel.

Linux 2.6.39

The Radeon driver of kernel version 2.6.39 will support the Cayman family of graphics chips that AMD is using, models such as the current Radeon HD 6790 to 6970 cards (see 1, 2). However, these cards’ 2D and 3D acceleration features are unavailable because there is no DRM support; future kernel versions will fix this problem.

The Nouveau driver for NVIDIA GPUs now supports Z compression. The developers have also fixed a performance issue that reportedly reduced performance by 10 to 30 per cent.

The developers of the graphics drivers for Intel chips have made numerous minor changes; some of them reduce the power consumption of recent graphics cores (see 1, 2, 3) or improve performance in certain situations. The developers have added a rudimentary graphics driver for the GMA500, a graphics device that was previously considered a big problem under Linux. It is included in Intel’s US15W (“Poulsbo”) chipset, which was originally designed for the embedded market but is used in netbooks by some manufacturers.