Renesas RZ/G2L Camera Receiver Unit and MIPI CSI-2 capture
Video capture support for the Camera Receiver Unit and MIPI CSI-2 input found on Renesas RZ/G2L, RZ/G3E, and RZ/V2H application processors, which are 64-bit Arm SoCs aimed at industrial, vision, and embedded Linux systems sold from the early 2020s onward. It lets cameras attached to these chips deliver frames to user-space through the standard Linux video capture interface.
recommendation
It should stay in the kernel because the hardware is current and actively shipping. Renesas lists the RZ/G2L, RZ/G3E, and RZ/V2H as active parts with product longevity into the late 2030s, partner boards still ship with Linux support, and the driver itself received feature work and new SoC enablement through 2025 and 2026. There is no alternative in-tree driver for this capture block.
repository signals
sources
- spinics.net
June 23, 2025 linux-media patch series '[PATCH v5 0/6] Extend RAW format support for rzg2l-cru driver' shows active upstream feature work rather than removal.
- lore-kernel.gnuweeb.org
Patchwork summary page references multiple 2024-2025 rzg2l-cru series, including a 23-patch cleanup/feature series and 2025 fixes, indicating continued subsystem attention and no visible removal direction.
- renesas.com
Renesas lists RZ/G2L as Active with product longevity through 2037 and explicitly advertises camera input plus a Verified Linux package.
- renesas.com
Renesas lists RZ/G3E as Active and includes MIPI-CSI camera interface support, matching newer SoC enablement added to this driver family.
- renesas.com
Renesas lists RZ/V2H as Active and includes multiple MIPI CSI-2 camera interfaces, matching recent rzg2l-cru support work for newer vision SoCs.
- renesas.com
Renesas partner page shows an RZ/G2L SoM still marketed with Linux support and multimedia/camera interfaces, supporting ongoing real-world deployment.
codex reasoning notes (technical)
Local shell inspection (`rg`, `git log`) confirmed a real V4L2 platform driver with fresh 2025-2026 commits including RZ/G3E/V2H support. Web search found active mailing-list traffic via spinics and patchwork-summary pages instead of removal talk. Web search also found Renesas product pages marking RZ/G2L, RZ/G3E, and RZ/V2H as Active, plus an RZ/G2L partner SoM page, so hardware is still current in industrial/embedded deployments. No natural upstream replacement driver exists for the same CRU block; this driver is the in-tree support path.