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Linux kernel 6.14 has arrived today, and a day later than it was expected. As usual there's lots new from supported hardware to various improvements.

Writing about the release Linus Torvalds said:

So it's early Monday morning (well - early for me, I'm not really a morning person), and I'd love to have some good excuse for why I didn't do the 6.14 release yesterday on my regular Sunday afternoon release schedule.

I'd like to say that some important last-minute thing came up and delayed things.

But no. It's just pure incompetence.

Because absolutely nothing last-minute happened yesterday, and I was just clearing up some unrelated things in order to be ready for the merge window. And in the process just entirely forgot to actually ever cut the release. D'oh.

So yes, a little delayed for no good reason at all, and obviously that means that the merge window has opened. No rest for the wicked (or the incompetent).

One of the interesting inclusions in kernel 6.14 is enabling the new ntsync driver as it's ready, after being in kernel 6.13 but disabled. The idea is for it to better match Windows behaviour for compatibility tools like Wine to run Windows games and apps on Linux. In some cases it can have much better performance than what Wine was originally doing, although it hasn't yet been pulled into Wine but a merge request is open.

For Valve's Proton however, don't go expecting much here with ntsync. As Valve developer Pierre-Loup Griffais replied to a user on Bluesky to note:

We already include fsync, which should be as fast or faster as ntsync. We developed ntsync as a general solution that'd be acceptable in upstream Wine, but there's no urgency in including it in the Deck / SteamOS kernel.

Some other random cherry-picked highlights:

  • A fix for Steam Deck OLED potentially entering an unrecoverable faulty state when resuming from suspend.
  • Faster suspend and resume for some systems.
  • Lenovo Go S microphone and controller support.
  • Support for Microsoft's Copilot key on some devices.
  • SteelSeries Arctis 9 support.
  • Controller support for the ZOTAC Gaming Zone.
  • Support for the TECNO Pocket Go.
  • Support for the Nacon Evol-X Xbox One Controller, 8BitDo SN30 Pro, Hyperkin X91 and Gamesir G7 SE controllers.
  • Support for the Wooting Two HE.

Of course there's absolutely loads more including various other improvements to support newer and upcoming hardware from laptops to processors and graphics cards. See more in the full changelog.

Anything in this release you're particularly happy to see?

Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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13 comments Subscribe

poke86 a day ago
  • Supporter
pure incompetence
I thought Linus was about to tear some poor contributor a new one for not being up to his high standards, but nope, he just got distracted. Happens to all of us.
bisbyx a day ago
I remember that for a long time on arch you needed the zen kernel for fsync? Is that not the case anymore? Am I already using fsync even on the stock kernel? Or is "We already include fsync" referring to the SteamOS kernel?
Darke a day ago
I'm impressed...he's just as hard on himself as he is on any other person.
Doktor-Mandrake a day ago
I want a new controller, ever since last year when my series x controller I had for about a year and the RB button suddenly crapped out

The 8BitDo SN30 Pro does look appealing, especially if it has official support in the current kernel

But I really want one of those 8bitdo ultimate controllers

But from what I read they register as a dinput nintendo controller on PC through BT, which results in no analog triggers (bummer for racing games)

I could use their official adapter, but I have their original adapter from when I picked up the m30 and sf30 controllers years ago and I found the adapter terrible in terms of range distance, even if 2.4ghz is meant to have lower latency

For now my go-to has been the official xbox wireless adapter, one thing I really love is that I can unplug the adapter and put it into another device and the controller still connects to it without manual pairing everytime, even when switching between linux and windows

But I don't want to be confined to Microsoft, and the fact ultimate controllers has hall effect joysticks make me really want one. I get tired of having to deal with terrible dead zones and want something more sustainable and reliable
Klaas a day ago
That quote is weird. The whole issue was and is not about speed. The problem is that fsync is broken by design, so no more manual disabling to avoid crashes in certain games.
Pyrate 22 hours ago
But from what I read they register as a dinput nintendo controller on PC through BT, which results in no analog triggers (bummer for racing games)

Why don't you use the USB dongle and play off that wirelessly ? it's way better than Bluetooth stability wise, (and range too, concerning the rest of your comment) and when connected with that dongle it works in X-input with the analogue triggers and everything.

I have the not-pro controller and it's my favourite controller for modern games, highly recommend.

Edit: I totally misread that the controller in question is the SN30 Pro, because they had their new Ultimate controller which just came out so I subconsciously replaced that with the SN30 Pro when reading the article. My bad.

So, to answer your question, just get the Ultimate controller (non Bluetooth model). It has hall effect sticks, is x input, and the dock is super sweet.


Last edited by Pyrate on 24 Mar 2025 at 11:32 pm UTC
Shmerl 21 hours ago
fsync was never upstreamed, and applying fsync patches over Wine was a mess. I used esync from staging instead. So it would be nice to finally replace it with upstream ntsync.
Shmerl 21 hours ago
I remember that for a long time on arch you needed the zen kernel for fsync? Is that not the case anymore?

I think that should be in upstream, but named as futex2.
Shmerl 21 hours ago
Tried to build wine + ntsync, but those patches can't be applied on top of wine 10.4. I guess we'll have to wait until it's rebased.
hardpenguin 13 hours ago
I want a new controller, ever since last year when my series x controller I had for about a year and the RB button suddenly crapped out(..)

@Doktor-Mandrake may I suggest GameSir
Cyril 7 hours ago
Torvalds, what a guy.
F.Ultra 5 hours ago
  • Supporter
I think that should be in upstream, but named as futex2.
Exactly that, fsync was unofficial patches that never made it upstream. Those patches then slowly moved to what became futex2 in the kernel since v5.16 and the fsync side in proton moved over to use the new futex2 interface in the kernel if available, but for some reason kept the name fsync in proton.


Last edited by F.Ultra on 25 Mar 2025 at 4:39 pm UTC
Doktor-Mandrake 4 hours ago
@Pyrate

Sorry should of elaborated, I wanted to use BT so I could use multiple controllers, the official adapter only supports one controller at a time

Though tbf I can't think of any splitscreen games I play that make use of analogue triggers so it's probably a non-issue
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