Re: [PATCH v2 4/7] drm/panfrost: Add support for a second regulator for the GPU

[Nicolas Boichat]

On Wed, Jan 8, 2020 at 9:23 PM Mark Brown <broonie@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> On Wed, Jan 08, 2020 at 01:23:34PM +0800, Nicolas Boichat wrote:
>
> > Some GPUs, namely, the bifrost/g72 part on MT8183, have a second
> > regulator for their SRAM, let's add support for that.
>
> > +     pfdev->regulator_sram = devm_regulator_get_optional(pfdev->dev, "sram");
> > +     if (IS_ERR(pfdev->regulator_sram)) {
>
> This supply is required for the devices that need it so I'd therefore
> expect the driver to request the supply non-optionally based on the
> compatible string rather than just hoping that a missing regulator isn't
> important.

That'd be a bit awkward to match, though... Currently all bifrost
share the same compatible "arm,mali-bifrost", and it'd seem
weird/wrong to match "mediatek,mt8183-mali" in this driver? I have no
idea if any other Mali implementation will require a second regulator,
but with the MT8183 we do need it, see below.

> Though I do have to wonder given the lack of any active
> management of the supply if this is *really* part of the GPU or if it's
> more of a SoC thing, it's not clear what exactly adding this code is
> achieving.

Well if devfreq was working (see patch 7
https://patchwork.kernel.org/patch/11322851/ for a partial
implementation), it would adjust both mali and sram regulators, see
the OPP table in patch 2
(https://patchwork.kernel.org/patch/11322825/): SRAM voltage needs to
be increased for frequencies >=698Mhz.

Now if you have some better idea how to implement this, I'm all ears!

Thanks.