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authorAdrian Betschart <adrian.betschart@cinemaone.ch>2026-09-11 17:13:14 +0200
committerAlex Deucher <alexander.deucher@amd.com>2026-10-01 17:18:05 -0400
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tree5d40eef2428fb1a4791ab46a4b19091a5910eac2 /Documentation/admin-guide/hw_random.rst
downloadlinux-stable-106b4a2a78b2a2f14885604891957b84bba502db.tar.gz
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drm/amd/display: Try RGB before YCbCr 4:4:4 in stream validationgrafted
amdgpu_dm_create_validate_stream_for_sink() walks encoding_order[] and uses the first encoding that validates. YCbCr 4:4:4 is listed before RGB, so an HDMI sink that advertises 4:4:4 gets YCbCr 4:4:4 whenever the "color format" property is left at AUTO, even though RGB fits the same link. That contradicts the documented AUTO behaviour for HDMI in enum drm_connector_color_format (RGB, falling back to YCbCr 4:2:0 only when the bandwidth is not available or the mode is 4:2:0-only), which the amdgpu implementation of the property also describes. It also leaves the "Broadcast RGB" property without effect on such sinks, since the quantization range it selects only applies to RGB output. Try RGB first. The mask still holds every encoding the sink supports, so a mode that cannot carry RGB falls back exactly as before. For reference, v7.2 picked RGB here unless YCbCr 4:4:4 was forced through debugfs, while earlier kernels picked YCbCr 4:4:4 for any HDMI sink that advertised it. Fixes: 0b0ff65d3ca1 ("drm/amd/display: Refactor stream validation") Suggested-by: Adolfo Rodrigues <adolfotregosa@gmail.com> Assisted-by: Claude Code:claude-fable-5-1 Signed-off-by: Adrian Betschart <adrian.betschart@cinemaone.ch> Reviewed-by: Fangzhi Zuo <jerry.zuo@amd.com> Tested-by: Adolfo Rodrigues <adolfotregosa@gmail.com> Tested-by: Daniel Wheeler <daniel.wheeler@amd.com> Signed-off-by: Alex Deucher <alexander.deucher@amd.com> (cherry picked from commit 7de432bc753133764dc40d37f9388da56de251e7)
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+=================================
+Hardware random number generators
+=================================
+
+Introduction
+============
+
+The hw_random framework is software that makes use of a
+special hardware feature on your CPU or motherboard,
+a Random Number Generator (RNG). The software has two parts:
+a core providing the /dev/hwrng character device and its
+sysfs support, plus a hardware-specific driver that plugs
+into that core.
+
+To make the most effective use of these mechanisms, you
+should download the support software as well. Download the
+latest version of the "rng-tools" package from:
+
+ https://github.com/nhorman/rng-tools
+
+Those tools use /dev/hwrng to fill the kernel entropy pool,
+which is used internally and exported by the /dev/urandom and
+/dev/random special files.
+
+Theory of operation
+===================
+
+CHARACTER DEVICE. Using the standard open()
+and read() system calls, you can read random data from
+the hardware RNG device. This data is NOT CHECKED by any
+fitness tests, and could potentially be bogus (if the
+hardware is faulty or has been tampered with). Data is only
+output if the hardware "has-data" flag is set, but nevertheless
+a security-conscious person would run fitness tests on the
+data before assuming it is truly random.
+
+The rng-tools package uses such tests in "rngd", and lets you
+run them by hand with a "rngtest" utility.
+
+/dev/hwrng is char device major 10, minor 183.
+
+CLASS DEVICE. There is a /sys/class/misc/hw_random node with
+two unique attributes, "rng_available" and "rng_current". The
+"rng_available" attribute lists the hardware-specific drivers
+available, while "rng_current" lists the one which is currently
+connected to /dev/hwrng. If your system has more than one
+RNG available, you may change the one used by writing a name from
+the list in "rng_available" into "rng_current".
+
+==========================================================================
+
+
+Hardware driver for Intel/AMD/VIA Random Number Generators (RNG)
+ - Copyright 2000,2001 Jeff Garzik <jgarzik@pobox.com>
+ - Copyright 2000,2001 Philipp Rumpf <prumpf@mandrakesoft.com>
+
+
+About the Intel RNG hardware, from the firmware hub datasheet
+=============================================================
+
+The Firmware Hub integrates a Random Number Generator (RNG)
+using thermal noise generated from inherently random quantum
+mechanical properties of silicon. When not generating new random
+bits the RNG circuitry will enter a low power state. Intel will
+provide a binary software driver to give third party software
+access to our RNG for use as a security feature. At this time,
+the RNG is only to be used with a system in an OS-present state.
+
+Intel RNG Driver notes
+======================
+
+FIXME: support poll(2)
+
+.. note::
+
+ request_mem_region was removed, for three reasons:
+
+ 1) Only one RNG is supported by this driver;
+ 2) The location used by the RNG is a fixed location in
+ MMIO-addressable memory;
+ 3) users with properly working BIOS e820 handling will always
+ have the region in which the RNG is located reserved, so
+ request_mem_region calls always fail for proper setups.
+ However, for people who use mem=XX, BIOS e820 information is
+ **not** in /proc/iomem, and request_mem_region(RNG_ADDR) can
+ succeed.
+
+Driver details
+==============
+
+Based on:
+ Intel 82802AB/82802AC Firmware Hub (FWH) Datasheet
+ May 1999 Order Number: 290658-002 R
+
+Intel 82802 Firmware Hub:
+ Random Number Generator
+ Programmer's Reference Manual
+ December 1999 Order Number: 298029-001 R
+
+Intel 82802 Firmware HUB Random Number Generator Driver
+ Copyright (c) 2000 Matt Sottek <msottek@quiknet.com>
+
+Special thanks to Matt Sottek. I did the "guts", he
+did the "brains" and all the testing.