The following diagram illustrates the software stack and underlying hardware architecture of the Mali-G78AE GPU. The top layer represents a graphics or compute application, which can be traditional graphical applications or non-graphical headless rendering processes. These applications interact with the system through various APIs, including OpenGL ES, Vulkan, and OpenCL™ , along with display protocols such as FBDEV and Wayland, when appropriate. All applications use the Mali common user space library for seamless integration with the underlying system. The middle layer represents the kernel space, encompassing the Mali kernel driver responsible for managing the hardware. Key components within the driver include the memory management unit (MMU), shader cores (SC0-SC3), Level 2 cache, power management unit (PMU), partition manager, and Mali arbiter. These components work together to efficiently schedule and execute workloads on the GPU, while also managing power consumption. Finally, the bottom layer depicts the Mali-G78AE hardware, featuring a multicore architecture with dedicated partitions for workload distribution. Each partition houses a Level 2 cache, control logic, and multiple unified shader cores, showcasing the parallel processing capabilities of the GPU. This layered architecture provides a comprehensive view of the software and hardware components involved in graphics processing on the Mali-G78AE, supporting both graphical and headless rendering workflows.
Figure 1.
Arm
Mali-G78AE Software Stack
Architecture
