Red Hat Releases RHEL 5.4
Announced at the Red Hat Summit in Chicago, the Red Hat Enterprise Linux version 5 update intends to set the groundwork for future virtualization products and cloud computing.
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.4 concentrates foremost on virtualization and cloud computing. The new version should become the basis for the Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization product still planned for release this year. According to the company's announcement, with RHEL 5.4 it is the first provider to support Intel's VT-d virtualization technology and PCI-SIG's Single-Root I/O Virtualization (SR-IOV) specification. However, Red Hat assures customers still using Xen virtualization that they can continue with it through the full lifecycle of RHEL 5 releases.
RHEL 5.4 is still only an update to the major release with the minimum of changes. The Kernel version continues to be 2.6.18, albeit with a series of backported patches such as for the WLAN stack, ext4, XFS and virtualization support. Red Hat provides details on the changes in their Kernel technical notes for RHEL 5.4. The release also includes the newest GNU Compiler Collection (GCC) version 4.4.
On the desktop, Red Hat improved audio and video card support and fixed the rebooting on undocking/docking problem. Some of the version numbers are rather archaic: KDE users will get 3.5.4 and GNOME is in version 2.16.
Customers with active RHEL 5 subscription will get the new version as an automatic update. New buyers for server products can expect to pay from $349 for a basic subscription; the desktop version starts at $80.
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Digital Autonomy
• The Answer Was Already on the Shelf
• Changing the Chip Industry: How Public Investment Has Grown Open Silicon
• United Nations Open Source Portal Goes Live
• EU Open Source Strategy Plays Key Role in Tech Sovereignty Package
• France Says “Au Revoir” to Microsoft
Support Our Work
Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you’ve found an article to be beneficial.
News
-
AI Fixes Linux Bottlenecks Using “Hideous” Code
A Linux developer used AI to fix bottlenecks that caused problems when building the kernel. The resulting AI-generated code needed a lot of work.
-
Advanced Video Coding Still Under Patent
Brazilian patent BRPI0109962B1 has expired, which means that DivX and Xvid are no longer problematic for Linux, but it doesn’t mean that video is all of a sudden fully unleashed.
-
2,000 Vulnerabilities per Linux Release
Thanks to AI bug hunters, the Linux kernel is seeing record numbers of vulnerabilities, and it's overwhelming developers.
-
Linux Exempt from California’s Age Verification Law
So long as Linux is distributed under the GPL, MIT, BSD, and Apache licenses, the OS is exempt from being required to verify the age of its users in California.
-
Roll Out the Cake: Linux Turns 35
35 years ago, a Finnish student began a humble project that would forever change the course of technology.
-
China Switching from Windows to Linux
China has ordered several government agencies to drop a Chinese-developed version of Windows 10 in favor of either KylinOS or UOS.
-
Pine64 Halts Production of Linux Devices
With continued DRAM and eMMC shortages, Pine64 has decided to discontinue production of Linux devices.
-
The Bullet-Proof KDE Software Initiative Is Coming
KDE, Techpaladin, and Kubuntu Focus have announced a new initiative that will provide at least three years of support for KDE Plasma 6.6 LTS and related software.
-
Linux Mint Shares a Possible Kernel Cleanup Solution
For those on Linux Mint who like to keep multiple kernels around but don't want them to take up too much space, you might be getting a new automated tool.
-
CachyOS Gets an Update
CachyOS August 2026 release is now available with the latest version of KDE, some new features, and plenty of improvements.