Linus Torvalds has revealed that the first Release Candidate for Linux kernel 4.2 has arrived and that it's one of the biggest ever to land. It's big because it comes with AMD GPU register description headers, among other things.

The merge window for Linux kernel 4.2 has been opened for a while now. Thus, it was about time to get the first RC, and it looks like it's going to be a memorable release. Sure, it's big, and that might stand out, but it also comes with some pretty important AMD GPU improvements, which should make Linux and AMD fans quite happy.

The only problem is that it's going to take a few weeks until this version of the kernel becomes stable, and then distro developers will have to adopt it. Also, it's quite possible that this part of the kernel will be backported for older versions, but it's not sure if that will happen.

Linux kernel 4.2 RC1 is now ready for testing

As usual, Linus Torvalds is inviting everyone to test the new release. This is especially important now with all the changes that have been made. When you have a million lines of extra code in the kernel and a quarter of a million removed, you need to see if everything is still working as it should.

"If you count the size in pure number of lines changed, this really seems to be the biggest rc we've ever had, with over a million lines added (and about a quarter million removed). That beats the previous champion (3.11-rc1) that was huge mainly due to Lustre being added to the staging tree. The reason for that huge number of lines is largely a single source: the bulk of this by far is from the new amd GPU register description headers," said Linus Torvalds.

The kernel doesn't just implement the new AMD changes. It also brings new drivers for the new Renesas H8/300 architecture, support for various ARM devices, and clean-up changes. You can download the latest Linux Kernel 4.2 RC1 right now from Softpedia and give it a try, but please keep in mind that it's not stable and that you will have to compile it.