OpenBSD 7.6 brings ARM64 Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite support & suspend/resume improvements

The OpenBSD project has announced its 57th release with OpenBSD 7.6, introducing a range of significant updates. This version marks the initial support for Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite ARM64 laptops, broadening hardware compatibility. Additionally, support for Suspend-to-Idle has been added on AMD64 and i386 architectures, allowing suspend functionality on systems lacking S3 support.

Network performance sees enhancement with the enablement of UDP parallel input. In the graphics domain, Libva's VA-API (Video Acceleration API) has been integrated into Xenocara. The tar utility now defaults to the “pax” write format, reflecting a shift in file archiving standards.

Security and system monitoring tools receive updates with pfctl and systat now displaying fragment reassembly statistics. A new configurable passphrase timeout for disk decryption at boot aims to conserve battery life. Networking capabilities expand with the addition of local-to-anchor tables in pf rules and the introduction of the rport driver for layer 3 connectivity between rdomain instances.

For IPv6, the dhcp6leased daemon has been introduced, while the older dhclient has been removed in favor of the established dhcpleased. OpenBSD 7.6 also includes the latest OpenSSH 9.9, ensuring up-to-date security protocols.