When SiFive introduced its HiFive Unmatchd RISC-V desktop motherboard for developers last year, it was clear from the start that sooner or later an enthusiast would attempt to try using its U7 SoC for something it is not meant for: general PC usage with high-performance graphics and video decoding. That time has come as an enthusiast has managed to make AMD’s Radeon RX 6700 XT work with a RISC-V SoC under Linux.
Computer scientist René Rebe decided to prove that the SiFive HiFive Unmatched not only can run Linux, but can also use a high-performance graphics processor, reports Hackster.io. To do so, he spent 10 hours patching the Linux kernel to add support for AMD’s Radeon RX 6700 XT graphics card as well as the Mesa Gallium 21.1.5 driver.