CachyOS

CachyOS provides enhanced kernels that offer improved performance and other benefits.

General Information about kernels
- linux-cachyos
- Features
CachyOS repositories
Other GNU/Linux distributions
- Gentoo
- Fedora
- NixOS
Revert changes
Support

General Information about kernels

The Schedulers listed below are supported

linux-cachyos

We have provided all these CPU schedulers because each scheduler performs differently depending on usage. We recommend testing each one to determine which best suits your specific requirements.

(BORE) Burst-Oriented Response Enhancer Scheduler by firelzrd (BORE) linux-bore / linux-cachyos-bore / linux-cachyos
(EEVDF) Earliest Eligible Virtual Deadline - linux-cachyos-eevdf
(SCHED-EXT) BPF extensible scheduler class - linux-cachyos-sched-ext

CachyOS default kernel

(BORE) Burst-Oriented Response Enhancer Scheduler by firelzrd (BORE) linux-cachyos

📚 Archived schedulers

CacULE and CacULE-RDB by Hamad Marri, supported by CachyOS in the past as - linux-cachyos-cacule
ATTENTION: Not supported after version 6.1. If you still want to use it, you can get it from the archive repository - linux-cacule
(CFS) - Standard Scheduler Completely Fair Scheduler - linux-cachyos-cfs
(BMQ) - BitMap Queue by Alfred Chen - linux-cachyos-bmq
(PDS) - Priority and Deadline based Skiplist multiple queue by Alfred Chen - linux-cachyos-pds ATTENTION: Not supported after version 6.6.

📚 Temporarily archived kernels

(TT) - Task Type Scheduler by Hamad Marri - linux-cachyos-tt / linux-tt ATTENTION: Not supported after version 6.6. If there will be patch updates, they will most likely be updated to the latest version.

The CachyOS repositories provide prebuilt kernels in three different march versions: x86-64, x86-64-v3, and x86-64-v4. In addition, the repositories also offer LTO-enabled kernels.

Features

Here is a list of features of Linux kernels prebuilt in the CachyOS repositories for x86-64-v4, x86-64-v3, and x86-64.

🛠️ Advanced building & compiling

Very customizable PKGBUILD with many features and improvements.
GCC/CLANG Optimization with automatically found CPU architecture or also selectable CPU architecture.
Choose between LLVM/LTO & Thin-LTO or GCC.
Choose between 300Hz, 500Hz, 600 Hz ,750Hz and 1000Hz. Defaults to 500Hz for BORE/CFS/EEVDF and 1000Hz for other schedulers.
Kernel Control Flow Integrity (kCFI) selectable when using LLVM

🧮 CPU enhancements

3 Different scheduler are supported,SCHED-EXT,BORE, and EEVDF scheduler.
AMD P-State Preferred Core and enabled as default
SCHED-EXT Schedulers prebuilt in the repository # https://lwn.net/Articles/922405/ (only for linux-cachyos-sched-ext)

📑 Filesystem & memory

Latest BTRFS/XFS/EXT4 improvements & fixes.
ZFS Filesystem Support and prebuilt in the repository.
NVIDIA Module Support - Build the nvidia module together with the kernel
Latest & improved ZSTD 1.5.5 patch-set.
UserKSM daemon from pf.
Improved BFQ Scheduler.
support for bcachefs.

🖧 Network

BBRv3 tcp_congestion_control.

⤵️ Other features

partial Clearlinux Patchset.
Back-ported patches from linux-next.
Scheduler patches from linux-next/tip.
General improved sysctl settings and upstream scheduler fixes.
LRNG Framework - default disabled
OpenRGB and ACS Override support
maple-tree, MG-LRU and per-VMA-locks fixes from upstream
kvm-lru patches from upstream

CachyOS repositories

The repositories contain both Arch Linux and CachyOS packages, which have been re-built with flags optimized for performance, stability, and security.

x86-64-v4 - currently only kernel packages + LTO.
x86-64-v3 - all Arch Linux packages + LTO.
x86-64 - all Arch Linux packages + LTO.

How to add CachyOS repositories

Option 1: Automated Installation of cachyos repositories

We've made it easy for you! Simply run the following commands to use our helper script that does all the work for you. 😉

Run the following commands:

Get archive with script

wget https://mirror.cachyos.org/cachyos-repo.tar.xz

If you don't have wget, install it with sudo pacman -S wget

Extract and enter into the archive

tar xvf cachyos-repo.tar.xz && cd cachyos-repo

Run script with sudo

sudo ./cachyos-repo.sh

Behaviour of script

Script will auto-detect CPU architecture, if CPU has x86-64-v4 or x86-64-v3 support, script will automatically use the repositories which are optimized with this flag > and some other flags.
Script will backup your old pacman.conf.

For more information, check out our GitHub or join our Discord community.

Option 2: Manual Installation

Install the cachyos keyring

sudo pacman-key --recv-keys F3B607488DB35A47 --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com
sudo pacman-key --lsign-key F3B607488DB35A47

Install required packages

sudo pacman -U 'https://mirror.cachyos.org/repo/x86_64/cachyos/cachyos-keyring-3-1-any.pkg.tar.zst' 'https://mirror.cachyos.org/repo/x86_64/cachyos/cachyos-mirrorlist-18-1-any.pkg.tar.zst' 'https://mirror.cachyos.org/repo/x86_64/cachyos/cachyos-v3-mirrorlist-18-1-any.pkg.tar.zst' 'https://mirror.cachyos.org/repo/x86_64/cachyos/cachyos-v4-mirrorlist-6-1-any.pkg.tar.zst' 'https://mirror.cachyos.org/repo/x86_64/cachyos/pacman-6.0.2-14-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst'

Check CPU compatibility

If you want to add our repositories manually, you must check the compatibility of the CPU with cachyos repositories.

If you are using the script above to add cachyos repositories, you can skip the check.

1. Check support by running the following the command

/lib/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 --help | grep supported

2. Understanding of command output

Pay attention to the following text with brackets. (supported, searched)

If you see x86-64-v4 (supported, searched), that means the CPU is compatible and can use x86-64-v4 instruction set.
If you see x86-64-v4, that means the CPU is incompatible and can't use x86-64-v4 instruction set.

Example of CPU compatible with x86-64-v4 instruction set

> /lib/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 --help | grep supported
  x86-64-v4 (supported, searched)
  x86-64-v3 (supported, searched)
  x86-64-v2 (supported, searched)
  haswell (AT_PLATFORM; supported, searched)
  tls (supported, searched)
  avx512_1 (supported, searched)
  x86_64 (supported, searched)

Example of CPU incompatible with x86-64-v4 instruction set

> /lib/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 --help | grep supported
  x86-64-v4
  x86-64-v3 (supported, searched)
  x86-64-v2 (supported, searched)

3. Adding cachyos repositories

You need to edit pacman.conf and add repositories.

sudo nano /etc/pacman.conf

if your CPU supports `x86-64`, then add only `[cachyos]` repositories

# cachyos repos
[cachyos]
Include = /etc/pacman.d/cachyos-mirrorlist

if your CPU supports `x86-64-v3`, then add `[cachyos-v3]`,`[cachyos-core-v3]`,`[cachyos-extra-v3]` and `[cachyos]`

# cachyos repos
## Only add if your CPU does v3 architecture
[cachyos-v3]
Include = /etc/pacman.d/cachyos-v3-mirrorlist
[cachyos-core-v3]
Include = /etc/pacman.d/cachyos-v3-mirrorlist
[cachyos-extra-v3]
Include = /etc/pacman.d/cachyos-v3-mirrorlist
[cachyos]
Include = /etc/pacman.d/cachyos-mirrorlist

if your CPU supports `x86-64-v4`, then add `[cachyos-v4]`, `[cachyos-v3]`, `[cachyos-core-v3]`, `[cachyos-extra-v3]` and `[cachyos]`

# cachyos repos
## Only add if your CPU does support x86-64-v4 architecture
[cachyos-v4]
Include = /etc/pacman.d/cachyos-v4-mirrorlist
[cachyos-v3]
Include = /etc/pacman.d/cachyos-v3-mirrorlist
[cachyos-core-v3]
Include = /etc/pacman.d/cachyos-v3-mirrorlist
[cachyos-extra-v3]
Include = /etc/pacman.d/cachyos-v3-mirrorlist
[cachyos]
Include = /etc/pacman.d/cachyos-mirrorlist

Finally, update your system with CachyOS packages:

sudo pacman -Syu

Enjoy improved system speed with CachyOS packages!

Debug packages

We provide a debuginfod server for easy access to debug symbols via gdb. Set the following environment variable:

export DEBUGINFOD_URLS=https://debuginfod.cachyos.org

Debug packages are available in the cachyos-debug-v3 repository. Add it with the following configuration:

[cachyos-debug-v3]
Server = https://debug.cachyos.org/repo/$arch_v3/$repo
[cachyos-core-debug-v3]
Server = https://debug.cachyos.org/repo/$arch_v3/$repo
[cachyos-extra-debug-v3]
Server = https://debug.cachyos.org/repo/$arch_v3/$repo

Uninstalling CachyOS repositories

Option 1: Automated Removal

Run these commands to remove the CachyOS repos from your system:

wget https://build.cachyos.org/cachyos-repo.tar.xz
tar xvf cachyos-repo.tar.xz
cd cachyos-repo
sudo ./cachyos-repo.sh --remove

Option 2: Manual Removal

Backup or remove the config file at /etc/pacman.conf.
Run this command:

sudo mv /etc/pacman.conf.bak /etc/pacman.conf

Switch to default Arch Linux packages with this command:

sudo pacman -Suuy

Other GNU/Linux distributions

Complete patch for simple patching on the kernel
It is planned to implement into our kernel builder from cachyos buildsystem, which works also on other distributions.

Gentoo

Its a community maintained ebuild from a user, which can be used for a dynamic building right here

Or simply run:

eselect repository add CachyOS-kernels git https://github.com/Szowisz/CachyOS-kernels
emaint sync -r CachyOS-kernels

Fedora

Port of kernel linux-cachyos-bore and linux-cachyos-bore-lto by bieszczaders

Only x86_64_v3 versions are available. Check support by the following the command

/lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 --help | grep "(supported, searched)"

If it does not detect x86_64_v3 support do not install the kernel. Otherwise you will end up with a non-functioning operating system!

Installation Instructions:

Fedora Workstation

sudo dnf copr enable bieszczaders/kernel-cachyos

and next

sudo dnf install kernel-cachyos-bore

sudo dnf install kernel-cachyos-bore-eevdf

Fedora Silverblue

cd /etc/yum.repos.d/

sudo wget https://copr.fedorainfracloud.org/coprs/bieszczaders/kernel-cachyos/repo/fedora-$(rpm -E %fedora)/bieszczaders-kernel-cachyos-fedora-$(rpm -E %fedora).repo