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i915 is still the main kernel mode driver on Linux for every Intel GPUs up to Alchemist. xe kmd is used by Battlemage by default (as of 6.12).

There's a Mesa DRI driver, called i965 (originally made for Broadwater chipset, thus the 965 numbering), which has since been replaced by either:

- Crocus for anything up to Broadwell (Gen 8)

- Iris for anything from Broadwell and newer

Then there's a Video Acceleration driver, which is (also) called i965. I think this is what you're referring to. There are:

- i965 (aka Intel VAAPI Driver), which supports anything from Westmere (Gen 5) to Coffee Lake (Gen 9.5)

- iHD (aka Intel Media Driver), is a newer one, which supports anything from Broadwell (Gen 8)

- libvpl, an even newer one, which supports anything from Tiger Lake (Gen 12) and up

Battlemage users had to use libvpl until recently because Media Driver 2024Q4 with BMG support was only released 2 weeks ago. Using libvpl with ffmpeg may requires rebuilding ffmpeg, as some distro doesn't have it enabled (due to conflict with legacy Intel Media SDK, so you have to choose).

I have B580 for my Linux machine (6.12), and xe seems pretty stable/performant so far.



I am always confused about which drivers need installing to fully enable all hardware acceleration features on Broadwell. Also not all distros maintain the drivers equally resulting in mismatches between the vaapi driver or some other driver.


My rough mental Intel driver matrix is something like this (might not be entirely correct):

    iGPU:

    | Arch                                         | KMD     | DRI (Mesa)  | Vulkan (Mesa)  | VA         |
    | -------------------------------------------- | ------- | ----------- | -------------- | ---------- |
    | <  Broadwater (Gen4)                         | i915    | i915        | N/A            | N/A        |
    | >= Broadwater (Gen4), < Westmere             | i915    | i915        | N/A            | i965       |
    | >= Westmere (Gen5), < Haswell                | i915    | crocus      | N/A            | i965       |
    | >= Haswell (Gen7), < Broadwell               | i915    | crocus      | hasvk          | i965       |
    | == Broadwell (Gen8)                          | i915    | iris/crocus | anv/hasvk      | iHD        |
    | >= Skylake (Gen9), < Tiger Lake              | i915    | iris        | anv            | iHD        |
    | >= Tiger Lake (Xe/Gen12), < Lunar Lake (Xe2) | i915/xe | iris        | anv            | iHD/libvpl |
    | >= Lunar Lake (Xe2)                          | xe      | iris        | anv            | iHD/libvpl |

    dGPU:

    | Arch                                  | KMD     | DRI (Mesa)  | Vulkan (Mesa)  | VA         |
    | ------------------------------------- | ------- | ----------- | -------------- | ---------- |
    | >= DG1 (Xe/Gen12.1), Battlemage (Xe2) | i915/xe | iris        | anv            | iHD/libvpl |
    | >= Battlemage (Xe2)                   | xe      | iris        | anv            | iHD/libvpl |
Usually, KMD/DRI/Vulkan should work as-is if you use a reasonably recent kernel and mesa, but video acceleration sure is a bit of a mess.




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