Freescale/NXP MSCAN controller on MPC5200 and MPC5121 SoCs
Support for the on-chip CAN 2.0 A/B controllers built into Freescale (later NXP) PowerPC system-on-chip parts from the MPC5xxx family, including the MPC5200, MPC5200B, and MPC5121e. These SoCs were widely used in early-2000s automotive infotainment, industrial automation, rail, and embedded control gear that needed a CAN bus interface alongside a PowerPC core.
recommendation
Worth keeping but flagging as legacy. NXP has marked both the MPC5200B and MPC5121e as end-of-life or not recommended for new designs, so volumes are dwindling, but the driver still received substantive maintenance as recently as October 2025 and November 2024, and there is no alternative driver for this on-chip CAN block. Long-lived industrial and embedded systems built around these PowerPC SoCs continue to depend on it.
repository signals
sources
- lore.kernel.org
mscan.c was still touched by CAN treewide maintenance in October 2025, indicating ongoing upstream attention rather than abandonment.
- lore.kernel.org
mpc5xxx_can.c received platform-driver modernization work in November 2024, showing the driver still gets substantive upkeep.
- nxp.com
NXP labels MPC5200B as End of Life / not recommended for new designs; the SoC includes two CAN 2.0 A/B controllers.
- nxp.com
NXP labels MPC5121e as not recommended for new designs, placing this supported hardware family in legacy status for new product work.
- cateee.net
LKDDb shows CONFIG_CAN_MPC5XXX remains present through current kernel series and binds to fsl,mpc5200-mscan and fsl,mpc5121-mscan compatibles.
codex reasoning notes (technical)
Real driver directory: platform CAN driver code with module_platform_driver in mpc5xxx_can.c. Local rg/sed on Kconfig and sources identified the hardware as Freescale/NXP MSCAN for MPC5200/MPC5200B/MPC5121. lore_file_timeline on mscan.c and mpc5xxx_can.c produced the cited lore URLs; they show recent 2024-2025 maintenance and no driver-removal series surfaced in the timeline results. Web search produced the NXP product pages and LKDDb page; those indicate the covered SoCs are legacy/NRND or EOL for new designs, but still supported upstream, so this looks like low-volume industrial/embedded legacy deployment. No direct replacement driver exists for the same on-chip controller, so keep support but annotate as legacy rather than deprecate/remove.