[unix_distributions][fedora] Enterprise Linux hardware enablement

[LukeShortCloud]

Enterprise Linux does not provide official hardware enablement like Ubuntu does. However, the ELRepo repository provides a newer Linux kernel and Linux firmware packages.

Announcing the release of an updated linux-firmware package set into
the elrepo-extras repository. This package set contains firmware files
for use with RHEL7 systems. It provides updated versions of packages
that are present in the base EL7 distribution.

The sources are from
git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/firmware/linux-firmware.git
as of March 1st, 2022.

The following files are currently synchronising to our mirror sites:

noarch
iwl1000-firmware-39.31.5.1-80.2.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
iwl100-firmware-39.31.5.1-80.2.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
iwl105-firmware-18.168.6.1-80.2.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
iwl135-firmware-18.168.6.1-80.2.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
iwl2000-firmware-18.168.6.1-80.2.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
iwl2030-firmware-18.168.6.1-80.2.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
iwl3160-firmware-25.30.13.0-80.2.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
iwl3945-firmware-15.32.2.9-80.2.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
iwl4965-firmware-228.61.2.24-80.2.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
iwl5000-firmware-8.83.5.1_1-80.2.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
iwl5150-firmware-8.24.2.2-80.2.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
iwl6000-firmware-9.221.4.1-80.2.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
iwl6000g2a-firmware-18.168.6.1-80.2.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
iwl6000g2b-firmware-18.168.6.1-80.2.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
iwl6050-firmware-41.28.5.1-80.2.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
iwl7260-firmware-25.30.13.0-80.2.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
libertas-sd8686-firmware-20220301-80.2.gitee0667aa.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
libertas-sd8787-firmware-20220301-80.2.gitee0667aa.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
libertas-usb8388-firmware-20220301-80.2.gitee0667aa.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
libertas-usb8388-olpc-firmware-20220301-80.2.gitee0667aa.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm
linux-firmware-20220301-80.2.gitee0667aa.el7_9.elrepo.noarch.rpm

src
linux-firmware-20220301-80.2.gitee0667aa.el7_9.elrepo.src.rpm

Thank you,

The ELRepo Team.

https://lists.elrepo.org/pipermail/elrepo/2022-March/006035.html

Related: https://github.com/LukeShortCloud/rootpages/issues/1053

[LukeShortCloud]

On a somewhat related note, the ELRepo kernels provide Btrfs support unlike the provided Enterprise Linux kernels. At least for ELRepo kernel-ml package (probably applies to the kernel-lts but that requires more investigation).

https://serverfault.com/questions/1078718/btrfs-on-rhel8-compiling-kernel-module-or-making-userspace-tools-work

[LukeShortCloud]

I have not found any repositories providing updated Mesa, Xorg, or Wayland drivers. One solution is to use Enterprise Linux with a newer Linux kernel and firmware to provide a stable baremetal experience. Then use distrobox to run the GUI with the latest Mesa and other packages via the use of a container (Fedora or any other newer Linux distribution).

[LukeShortCloud]

The CentOS Hyperscale SIG has a kernel-lt and btrfs-progs packages.

https://www.reddit.com/r/AlmaLinux/comments/151on30/almalinux_and_btrfs_support/