It looks like AMD's next-gen SoCs not only will be exciting on the CPU side with the much anticipated Zen 6 cores but the AMD Audio Co-Processor "ACP" IP looks to be going through some significant updates.

Merged as part of the sound subsystem changes for the Linux 7.2 kernel is AMD ACP7.D/7.E/7.F driver support for that updated audio co-processor IP block. While not outlining what AMD products this AMD ACP7.D/7.E/7.F tech will appear in or any other product details, the patches do make known that there are some big changes compared to existing generation AMD audio co-processors. The patch cover letter noted:

"This series adds initial AMD ACP 7.x support for ACP7.D / 7.E / 7.F platforms.

Compared to earlier ACP generations, ACP7.x includes substantial design changes, including an updated register set/layout. For that reason, the ACP7.x implementation is placed under a separate sound/soc/amd/acp7x/ directory instead of extending older-generation code paths, keeping ACP7.x-specific logic and register definitions cleanly separated and easier to maintain.

This initial version is intentionally focused on the core PCI driver bring-up: register definitions, probe/remove, basic helper wiring, and system sleep + runtime PM integration. A follow-up series will add support for additional Audio I/O blocks, including SoundWire and the ACP PDM controller."

That ACP7.D / 7.E / 7.F bring-up in initial form is around 3k lines of code but as noted more bring-up work is still to come. Given the timing of this ACP7.x audio work, this is more than likely for forthcoming Zen 6 SoCs/APU products.

The sound pull for Linux 7.2 also includes various fixes, improving SoundWire enumeration, and enabling sound support on the Everest Semi ES9356 (SDCA), Mediatek MT2701 (on-chip HDMI) and MT8196 SoCs, Renesas RZ/G3E, SpacemiT K3, and TI TAC5xx2/TAS67524. Of that hardware, nice to see Linux 7.2 having audio support now for the SpacemiT K3 RISC-V RVA23 SoC.

There are also a number of device-specific quirks added, improvements to Qualcomm USB audio offloading, and adding support in the Oxygen driver for the HT-Omega eClaro. The HT-Omega eClaro is a decade old PCIe sound card finally seeing mainline Linux kernel support.

All of these sound changes have been merged for the in-development Linux 7.2 kernel that will debut as stable later this summer and be found in the likes of Ubuntu 26.10.