What's new in Linux Kernel 5.9?

Announced in the LKML, the Linux Kernel 5.9 was immediately available for download from major Kernel builds.

The latest Linux Kernel 5.9 will be available on mainstream Linux distributions in early 2021. This year, most distributions will have Linux Kernel 5.8, like Ubuntu 20.10 Groovy Gorilla and Fedora 33.

Let's see what's new in Linux Kernel 5.9!

New Features of Linux Kernel 5.9

- FSGSBASE support is complete with this kernel version. That means you'll get more performance out of AMD and Intel systems, as this support helps in switching context in the operating system when working hard without any kernel interaction.

- Added support for Toshiba USB 3.0 adapter and MCT USB 3.0 adapter.

A variety of performance improvements for IBM's Thinkpad line.

- Supports Radeon RX 6000 'RDNA' graphics card and Intel Rocket Lake graphics card.

- The upcoming USB 4 specifications are being supported more, eventually towards full support in future kernel versions.

- More support for storage space and file system. Btrfs, F2FS seem to improve performance. Added NVMe 2.0 spec support for SSDs.

- Support for IBM POWER10 is started.

- Increased performance for ARM / ARM64 devices with optimized usage of scheduler usage information added.

- Fixed race conditions errors (multiple threads access and want to change data at the same time), memory leak on modules.

What's new in Linux Kernel 5.9? Picture 1

Download Linux Kernel 5.9

You can install official kernel packages from below link right now in latest Ubuntu or Ubuntu based versions. But you shouldn't install it now as it can break your current Ubuntu Linux system, no matter what system you're running - Ubuntu 20.04 LTS or Ubuntu 18.04 LTS.

For the average user, unless you want to experiment with the latest hardware with support added in this release, you should not update at this time.

If you still want to install the latest Linux Kernel 5.9, follow the instructions below to install in an Ubuntu based system.

- Access the official kernel page.

There are two types of builds available - generic and lowlatency. For popular systems, you can download generic builds, which works in almost any case. For audio recordings and other settings that require low latency, download the lowlatency.

- Download the 3 packages below for generics via Terminal and install.

cd /tmp

wget -c https://kernel.ubuntu.com/~kernel-ppa/mainline/v5.9/amd64/linux-headers-5.9.0-050900-generic_5.9.0-050900.202010112230_amd64.deb wget -c https://kernel.ubuntu.com/~kernel-ppa/mainline/v5.9/amd64/linux-headers-5.9.0-050900_5.9.0-050900.202010112230_all.deb wget -c https://kernel.ubuntu.com/~kernel-ppa/mainline/v5.9/amd64/linux-image-unsigned-5.9.0-050900-generic_5.9.0-050900.202010112230_amd64.deb wget -c https://kernel.ubuntu.com/~kernel-ppa/mainline/v5.9/amd64/linux-modules-5.9.0-050900-generic_5.9.0-050900.202010112230_amd64.deb

sudo dpkg -i *.deb

- After installation, reboot the system.

The Linux Kernel 5.10 also began to develop after this stable release. The upcoming Linux Kernel 5.10 will be the final kernel of 2020.

Micah Soto

Update 06 November 2020

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