JH7110 / VisionFive 2 - PowerVR BXE-4-32 GPU + DC8200 display bring-up

Chromium 154.0.8037.57 (Sep 2026) with WebGL hardware accelerated.

Summary

With a few small kernel changes you can get a working GPU-composited desktop on the StarFive VisionFive 2.

• StarFive VisionFive 2 (SoC: JH7110)
• GPU: Imagination PowerVR BXE-4-32 (BVNC 36.50.54.182)
• Firmware: FW version v1.1 (build 6976702 OS)
• Mesa 26.3.0-rc1: Vulkan 1.2, OpenGL 3.2, OpenGL ES 3.1 (OpenGL via Zink)
• CPU: default schedutil cpufreq governor (not performance, which can increase FPS up to 2x in some scenes)

vkmark test results

The following results are from vkmark under three configurations:

1. direct KMS scanout (no compositor, no window)
2. labwc
3. XFCE + labwc: XFCE on Wayland, with labwc as the compositor

The physical screen always runs at its native 1920x1080.

Under labwc and XFCE + labwc, vkmark runs in a 1920x1080 or 800x600 window:

Scene	FPS (KMS, 1920x1080)	FPS (labwc, 1920x1080)	FPS (XFCE + labwc, 1920x1080)	FPS (labwc, 800x600)	FPS (XFCE + labwc, 800x600)
clear	469	63	59	201	221
cube	159	32	31	159	171
shading	92	26	21	72	71
desktop	22	11	8	41	38
effect2d	9	7	5	21	21
texture	84	23	20	95	97
vertex	132	31	28	98	101

Command line invocation and output:

• vkmark_7scenes_kms_mesa26.3.0-rc1_1920x1080_20sec_output.txt
• vkmark_7scenes_labwc_mesa26.3.0-rc1_1920x1080_20sec_output.txt
• vkmark_7scenes_labwc_mesa26.3.0-rc1_800x600_20sec_output.txt
• vkmark_7scenes_xfce_labwc_mesa26.3.0-rc1_1920x1080_20sec_output.txt
• vkmark_7scenes_xfce_labwc_mesa26.3.0-rc1_800x600_20sec_output.txt

glmark2-es2-wayland test results

The following results are from glmark2-es2-wayland (OpenGL ES via Zink) under two configurations:

1. labwc
2. XFCE + labwc: XFCE on Wayland, with labwc as the compositor

The physical screen always runs at its native 1920x1080.

glmark2 runs in a 1920x1080 or 800x600 window:

Scene	FPS (labwc, 1920x1080)	FPS (XFCE + labwc, 1920x1080)	FPS (labwc, 800x600)	FPS (XFCE + labwc, 800x600)
clear	21	24	64	69
shading	18	17	41	41
bump	18	20	51	60
function	16	13	41	47
texture	18	19	45	59
ideas	11	10	14	14
shadow	5	5	13	14
pulsar	13	11	41	40
refract	3	3	5	5
conditionals	13	13	44	45
effect2d	10	8	39	39
loop	14	9	37	36
buffer	9	10	20	21
desktop	3	3	9	9
terrain	1	1	2	2
build	18	20	45	55
jellyfish	5	5	15	15

Command line invocation and output, e.g.:

• glmark2_jellyfish_labwc_zink_mesa26.3.0-rc1_1920x1080_20sec_output.txt
• glmark2_jellyfish_xfce_labwc_zink_mesa26.3.0-rc1_1920x1080_20sec_output.txt

glxgears test results

glxgears renders under labwc at 30 FPS via Xwayland, with OpenGL translated to Vulkan by Zink.

• glxgears_labwc_xwayland_zink_mesa26.3.0-rc1_output.txt

Firmware

The driver loads rogue_36.50.54.182_v1.fw from /lib/firmware/powervr/. Pinned to commit 8a58f818 (FW version v1.1 (build 6976702 OS)).

Install:

wget https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/imagination/linux-firmware/-/raw/8a58f81883f7be458daa34e418cc4079f995b279/powervr/rogue_36.50.54.182_v1.fw

sudo mkdir -p /lib/firmware/powervr
sudo cp rogue_36.50.54.182_v1.fw /lib/firmware/powervr/

Kernel

You need to merge 2 branches into your kernel:

jh7110_dc8200_hdmi_v7.3-rc5 and powervr_on_jh7110_visionfive2_v7.3-rc5

git remote add domibel https://github.com/domibel/linux
git fetch domibel powervr_on_jh7110_visionfive2_v7.3-rc5 jh7110_dc8200_hdmi_v7.3-rc5
git checkout -b test_gpu v7.3-rc5
git merge domibel/powervr_on_jh7110_visionfive2_v7.3-rc5
git merge domibel/jh7110_dc8200_hdmi_v7.3-rc5

and additionally, the following config options:

CONFIG_DRM_POWERVR=m
CONFIG_DRM_VERISILICON_DC=y
CONFIG_CMA=y
CONFIG_ERRATA_SIFIVE=y
CONFIG_ERRATA_SIFIVE_XPBMTUC=y
CONFIG_STARFIVE_STARLINK_CACHE=y  # hack: only way to pull in RISCV_NONSTANDARD_CACHE_OPS below
CONFIG_RISCV_NONSTANDARD_CACHE_OPS=y
CONFIG_DRM_STARFIVE_JH7110_INNO_HDMI=y
CONFIG_PHY_STARFIVE_JH7110_INNO_HDMI=y
CONFIG_SOC_STARFIVE_JH7110_VOUT_SUBSYSTEM=y
CONFIG_SOC_STARFIVE_JH7110_HDMI_SUBSYSTEM=y

The display/HDMI ones are =y (built-in) rather than =m so the framebuffer console comes up early enough to show kernel boot messages on screen. The GPU driver itself stays a module.

Append them to your .config, then run:

make ARCH=riscv olddefconfig

The DTB arch/riscv/boot/dts/starfive/jh7110-starfive-visionfive-2-v1.3b.dtb is built from the same tree. Where it needs to go depends on how your board's bootloader is set up, on my system it's /boot/efi/dtb/starfive/.

visionfive2-live.dts is the actual devicetree my kernel runs with, dumped with:

sudo dtc -I fs -O dts -o visionfive2-live.dts /sys/firmware/devicetree/base

Compare your own against it if something isn't probing right. I tested this with U-Boot 2025.01-3 (Debian-packaged) and 2026.07.

If your kernel's default CMA reservation is too small, increase it with cma=128M or higher on your kernel cmdline. cma=64M can fail with fbdev: Failed to setup emulation (ret=-12) and no HDMI output at all.

Load the driver to create the GPU node /dev/dri/renderD128

It may already be loaded at boot (nothing blacklists it by default).

sudo modprobe powervr

Check that it's loaded:

lsmod | grep powervr

powervr               720896  0
drm_gpuvm             131072  1 powervr
gpu_sched             217088  1 powervr
drm_exec               24576  2 drm_gpuvm,powervr
drm_shmem_helper       98304  1 powervr

Add the user to render group to grant access to /dev/dri/renderD128

Check whether you can already read and write the device node:

test -r /dev/dri/renderD128 -a -w /dev/dri/renderD128 && echo "can access" || echo "cannot access"

If this prints "cannot access", add yourself to the render group (the group that owns the device node):

sudo usermod -aG render $USER

Log out and back in (group membership needs a new login session), then check again.

Install userspace packages

sudo apt install mesa-vulkan-drivers mesa-utils vulkan-tools vkmark glmark2-es2-wayland labwc

Vulkan and OpenGL driver info

Every GPU program needs two environment variables: PVR_I_WANT_A_BROKEN_VULKAN_DRIVER=1 (Mesa refuses to load its non-conformant BXE-4-32 driver without it) and MESA_VK_DEVICE_SELECT=1010:36054182 (vendorID:deviceID, 36054182 comes from the BVNC 36.50.54.182), which selects the GPU instead of llvmpipe. Add them to /etc/environment, then log out and back in:

printf 'PVR_I_WANT_A_BROKEN_VULKAN_DRIVER=1\nMESA_VK_DEVICE_SELECT=1010:36054182\n' | sudo tee -a /etc/environment

Vulkan:

vulkaninfo --summary

...
Devices:
========
GPU0:
	apiVersion         = 1.2.363
	driverVersion      = 26.3.0
	vendorID           = 0x1010
	deviceID           = 0x36054182
	deviceType         = PHYSICAL_DEVICE_TYPE_INTEGRATED_GPU
	deviceName         = PowerVR B-Series BXE-4-32 MC1
	driverID           = DRIVER_ID_IMAGINATION_OPEN_SOURCE_MESA
	driverName         = Imagination open-source Mesa driver
	driverInfo         = Mesa 26.3.0-rc1 (git-4706512989)
	conformanceVersion = 1.4.3.3
	deviceUUID         = 24b1ada6-eb24-5172-55c6-fa2b276f833d
	driverUUID         = 27bd0902-2c43-66c3-c3a6-58db64a7eddb
GPU1:
	apiVersion         = 1.4.363
	driverVersion      = 26.3.0
	vendorID           = 0x10005
	deviceID           = 0x0000
	deviceType         = PHYSICAL_DEVICE_TYPE_CPU
	deviceName         = llvmpipe (LLVM 21.1.8, 128 bits)
	driverID           = DRIVER_ID_MESA_LLVMPIPE
	driverName         = llvmpipe
	driverInfo         = Mesa 26.3.0-rc1 (git-4706512989) (LLVM 21.1.8)
	conformanceVersion = 1.3.1.1
	deviceUUID         = 6d657361-3236-2e33-2e30-2d7263310000
	driverUUID         = 6c6c766d-7069-7065-5555-494400000000

OpenGL/GLES (via Zink):

eglinfo -B -p surfaceless

MESA: warning: ../src/imagination/vulkan/winsys/powervr/pvr_drm.c:344: FINISHME: Core count fetching is unimplemented. Setting 1 for now.
WARNING: powervr is not a conformant Vulkan implementation, testing use only.
Surfaceless platform:
EGL API version: 1.5
EGL vendor string: Mesa Project
EGL version string: 1.5
EGL client APIs: OpenGL OpenGL_ES
OpenGL core profile vendor: Mesa
OpenGL core profile renderer: zink Vulkan 1.2(PowerVR B-Series BXE-4-32 MC1 (IMAGINATION_OPEN_SOURCE_MESA))
OpenGL core profile version: 3.2 (Core Profile) Mesa 26.3.0-rc1 (git-4706512989)
OpenGL core profile shading language version: 1.50
OpenGL compatibility profile vendor: Mesa
OpenGL compatibility profile renderer: zink Vulkan 1.2(PowerVR B-Series BXE-4-32 MC1 (IMAGINATION_OPEN_SOURCE_MESA))
OpenGL compatibility profile version: 3.2 (Compatibility Profile) Mesa 26.3.0-rc1 (git-4706512989)
OpenGL compatibility profile shading language version: 1.50
OpenGL ES profile vendor: Mesa
OpenGL ES profile renderer: zink Vulkan 1.2(PowerVR B-Series BXE-4-32 MC1 (IMAGINATION_OPEN_SOURCE_MESA))
OpenGL ES profile version: OpenGL ES 3.1 Mesa 26.3.0-rc1 (git-4706512989)
OpenGL ES profile shading language version: OpenGL ES GLSL ES 3.10

Run under XFCE on Wayland + labwc

sudo apt install xfce4 labwc lightdm
mkdir -p ~/.config/xfce4/labwc
cp -n /usr/share/xfce4/labwc/labwc-environment ~/.config/xfce4/labwc/environment
echo WLR_RENDER_DRM_DEVICE=/dev/dri/renderD128 >> ~/.config/xfce4/labwc/environment

Load powervr before you log in, then select Xfce Session (Wayland) on the login screen.

In a terminal:

glmark2-es2-wayland -s 1920x1080 -b jellyfish:duration=20

Run vkmark (headless, KMS or Wayland)

# headless - no root needed
vkmark --winsys headless -s 1920x1080 \
  -b clear:duration=20 -b cube:duration=20 -b shading:duration=20 \
  -b desktop:duration=20 -b effect2d:duration=20 -b texture:duration=20 \
  -b vertex:duration=20

# kms - needs root
# Stop your display manager first, e.g.
# `sudo systemctl stop lightdm`
sudo vkmark --winsys kms --winsys-options kms-tty=/dev/tty1 -s 1920x1080 \
  -b clear:duration=20 -b cube:duration=20 -b shading:duration=20 \
  -b desktop:duration=20 -b effect2d:duration=20 -b texture:duration=20 \
  -b vertex:duration=20

# wayland - inside a running labwc or XFCE on Wayland + labwc session
vkmark --winsys wayland -s 1920x1080 \
  -b clear:duration=20 -b cube:duration=20 -b shading:duration=20 \
  -b desktop:duration=20 -b effect2d:duration=20 -b texture:duration=20 \
  -b vertex:duration=20

Run under labwc (Wayland compositor)

Run this from a real console/TTY, not a terminal inside an existing X11 or Wayland desktop session — a stray DISPLAY/WAYLAND_DISPLAY makes wlroots nest inside that session instead of using DRM/KMS directly.

sudo env XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=/run/user/0 XDG_SEAT=seat0 \
  WLR_LIBINPUT_NO_DEVICES=1 WLR_RENDER_DRM_DEVICE=/dev/dri/renderD128 \
  labwc

sudo env XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=/run/user/0 WAYLAND_DISPLAY=wayland-0 \
  glmark2-es2-wayland -s 1920x1080 -b jellyfish:duration=20

Or just run run_labwc_jellyfish.sh, which does both steps above, checks for the common failure modes (stray DISPLAY, another display server already running) with a clear error message, and cleans up after itself.

Chromium

WebGL runs on the GPU (ANGLE → Zink → PowerVR), at about 2 fps in the WebGL Aquarium. Needs a riscv64 Chromium build (Debian has none yet, see Issues).

Run it as your user from a terminal inside the XFCE on Wayland + labwc session:

chromium --ozone-platform=wayland --no-sandbox \
  "https://webglsamples.org/aquarium/aquarium.html?numFish=1"

--no-sandbox is required; with the sandbox every tab crashes.

For comparison, the StarFive vendor stack (kernel 6.12.5-starfive, closed img-gpu GLES driver, Chromium 142, labwc) runs the same Aquarium at 32 fps (forum thread).

WebGPU via Dawn

You can also use the GPU through WebGPU:

sudo apt install dawn-tools libwebgpu-dawn-dev

The Mesa pvr driver does not meet all WebGPU requirements yet. DEBIAN_DAWN_RAISE_LIMITS=1 makes Dawn accept the GPU anyway. Programs that go beyond the real hardware limits may crash or render incorrectly.

export DEBIAN_DAWN_RAISE_LIMITS=1
<your dawn program>

To find bugs in the pvr Mesa driver, run Dawn's end-to-end tests:

export DEBIAN_DAWN_RAISE_LIMITS=1
dawn_end2end_tests --backend=vulkan --exclusive-device-type-preference=integrated \
  --gtest_filter='BasicTests.*' --gtest_brief=1

 - "PowerVR B-Series BXE-4-32 MC1" - "Imagination open-source Mesa driver: Mesa 26.3.0-rc1 (git-4706512989) [Selected]"
...
[==========] 6 tests from 1 test suite ran. (836 ms total)
[  PASSED  ] 5 tests.
[  SKIPPED ] 1 test.

Full output: dawn_end2end_tests_BasicTests_mesa26.3.0-rc1_output.txt

To run all tests, run each suite in its own process (two suites crash and would end a single run); this takes about 45 minutes:

dawn_end2end_tests --backend=vulkan --exclusive-device-type-preference=integrated \
  --gtest_list_tests | grep -E '^[A-Za-z0-9_/]+\.$' | while read -r s; do
  dawn_end2end_tests --backend=vulkan --exclusive-device-type-preference=integrated \
    --gtest_filter="${s}*" --gtest_brief=1
done

Full run (all 259 suites, 10354 tests, Mesa 26.3.0-rc1): 4367 passed, 5690 skipped, 273 failed, 2 suites crashed. Per suite: dawn_end2end_tests_all_suites_mesa26.3.0-rc1_summary.txt.

Failing tests (number of failing variants)

Suite	Failing tests
BindGroupTests	BindGroupsPersistAfterPipelineChange, DrawThenChangePipelineAndBindGroup, DrawThenChangePipelineTwiceAndBindGroup, SetDynamicBindGroupBeforePipeline (1 each)
CompressedTextureFormatTest	CopyMultiple2DArrayLayers, CopyWhole2DArrayTexture, CopyWithMultipleLayerAndPhysicalSizeNotEqualToVirtualSize, Cube (20 each; GPU page faults)
CompressedTextureWriteTextureTest	WriteMultiple2DArrayLayers (10)
ComputeSharedMemoryTests	AssortedTypes (2)
DepthTextureClearTwiceTest	ClearDepthAspectTwice (30)
MultisampledRenderingTest	ResolveIntoMultipleResolveTargetsWithAlphaToCoverage (3), ResolveIntoMultipleResolveTargetsWithShaderOutputMask (3)
RuntimeTimeoutComputeTest	LargeConstantArrayInLoop (1)
TextureSampleCompare2DTest	Compare2D (2)
TextureZeroInitTest	IndependentDepthStencilCopyAfterDiscard (1)
VideoViewsTests	crashes (segfault)
VideoViewsValidationTests	CreateYUVAViewValidation, CreateYUVViewValidation (1 each), then crashes (segfault)
VideoViewsExtendedUsagesTests	SamplingMultiPlanarYUVTexture (1)
Vulkan/SharedTextureMemoryTests	35 tests (2 each)
VulkanImageWrappingUsageTests	11 tests (4 each)
VulkanImageWrappingValidationTests	DestroyedTextureSignalSemaphoreExport, DoubleSignalSemaphoreExport, SuccessfulImport, SuccessfulImportWithInternalUsageDescriptor (4 each)
VulkanImageWrappingMultithreadTests	WrapAndClear_OnMultipleThreads (4)

With ASTC enabled (mesa!44008, not merged yet), three suites differ:

• CompressedTextureFormatTest: +784 passed, +224 failed
• CompressedTextureWriteTextureTest: +56 passed, +28 failed
• UnalignedCompressedTextureFormatTest: +56 passed, 0 failed

Acknowledgments

Thanks to everyone whose upstream work and advice made this possible, especially:

• Michal Wilczynski
• Icenowy Zheng
• Bo Gan
• Samuel Holland
• Alessio Belle
• Simon Perretta
• Frank Binns

Issues

• Need more user feedback
• Debian has no riscv64 Chromium build - https://buildd.debian.org/status/package.php?p=chromium
• My custom Chromium build took 2 weeks - https://salsa.debian.org/domibel/chromium/-/tree/riscv64-support
• Need better riscv64 hardware to build heavy packages, any companies listening ?