Remove linux-firmware-meta package?

[mkb]

Continuing the discussion from [Stable Update] 2025-07-12 - Kernels, Systemd, GNOME, NVIDIA, Plasma, Firefox, VLC splits:

@philm

linux-firmware got split into smaller packages. A meta-package ensures basic firmware installation. For stripping it down you may remove it after you have done the upgrade.

As I’ve asked and discussed in the topic, we’re recommended to remove the ‘meta’ package after the update. Therefore I’ve tried to sudo pacman -R linux-firmware-meta only to get a warning about optional dependencies for the linux kernel meta packages:

sudo pacman -R linux-firmware-meta                                                                      ✔ 
checking dependencies...
:: linux61 optionally requires linux-firmware: firmware images needed for some devices
:: linux612 optionally requires linux-firmware: firmware images needed for some devices
:: linux66 optionally requires linux-firmware: firmware images needed for some devices

Packages (1) linux-firmware-meta-20250708-1

:: Do you want to remove these packages? [Y/n] 

I’m asking myself if I’d run into potential issues with initramfs generation during updates if I really remove the meta package or is it a different matter?

I’ve also noticed the warning about marking firmware packages as ‘explicitly installed’ after removing the meta-package:

@discobot

If you wish to uninstall the firmware packages that you don’t need — e.g. linux-firmware-nvidia — including the meta package itself, then be sure to mark the firmware packages you wish to keep as explicitly installed, or else pacman will regard them as orphans, which would be dangerous when cleaning out your real orphans.

Is it really a good idea to remove the ‘meta’ package after all? Would it complicate things in the future if I don’t remove it now? Is there a list of all the newly installed firmware files so that I don’t forget to mark any of them as explicitly installed? Is it as simple as checking pacman.log for files starting with linux-firmware-…?