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Allwinner A10 : Is XBMC ported to MALI-400MP ? - Printable Version

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+--- Thread: Allwinner A10 : Is XBMC ported to MALI-400MP ? (/showthread.php?tid=126995)



RE: Allwinner A10 : Is XBMC ported to MALI-400MP ? - cnxsoft - 2012-11-12

(2012-11-12, 00:52)rfreiha Wrote: Hi All

Anyone has compiled xbmc successfully for linaro armhf?
how does it look like?is it usable?

Thanks

Compiled successfully yes... The problems appear when you start to play videos, and to a lesser extend the performance in the GUI.
On PengPod Tablet video this looks pretty smooth however.



RE: Allwinner A10 : Is XBMC ported to MALI-400MP ? - mtx512 - 2012-11-12

(2012-11-12, 04:05)cnxsoft Wrote:
(2012-11-12, 00:52)rfreiha Wrote: Hi All

Anyone has compiled xbmc successfully for linaro armhf?
how does it look like?is it usable?

Thanks

Compiled successfully yes... The problems appear when you start to play videos, and to a lesser extend the performance in the GUI.
On PengPod Tablet video this looks pretty smooth however.

This might help you out, I've successfully created a working armhf build for my Hackberry, more details here. Based on my limited testing it plays videos well, the GUI is relatively smooth although can result in high CPU because of framebuffer rendering. Overall I'm impressed with how well it runs (there's a short video on the link).

Big thanks to all who contributed in getting us this far.


RE: Allwinner A10 : Is XBMC ported to MALI-400MP ? - cnxsoft - 2012-11-12

(2012-11-12, 08:28)mtx512 Wrote:
(2012-11-12, 04:05)cnxsoft Wrote:
(2012-11-12, 00:52)rfreiha Wrote: Hi All

Anyone has compiled xbmc successfully for linaro armhf?
how does it look like?is it usable?

Thanks

Compiled successfully yes... The problems appear when you start to play videos, and to a lesser extend the performance in the GUI.
On PengPod Tablet video this looks pretty smooth however.

This might help you out, I've successfully created a working armhf build for my Hackberry, more details here. Based on my limited testing it plays videos well, the GUI is relatively smooth although can result in high CPU because of framebuffer rendering. Overall I'm impressed with how well it runs (there's a short video on the link).

Big thanks to all who contributed in getting us this far.

Thanks, I've downloaded your image, and will give it a try again in a few hours.




RE: Allwinner A10 : Is XBMC ported to MALI-400MP ? - Rok1337 - 2012-11-12

Hi and Tanks for the Image. I was able to boot it on my gooseberry but it takes very very long to boot approx 2 minutes. I can login and the load average is good. Many other images I had tried had a load av of 2 while the system was actually idle. I get a default when starting xbmc but that's probably down to the different hardware of the gooseberry?


RE: Allwinner A10 : Is XBMC ported to MALI-400MP ? - mtx512 - 2012-11-12

(2012-11-12, 23:25)Rok1337 Wrote: Hi and Tanks for the Image. I was able to boot it on my gooseberry but it takes very very long to boot approx 2 minutes. I can login and the load average is good. Many other images I had tried had a load av of 2 while the system was actually idle. I get a default when starting xbmc but that's probably down to the different hardware of the gooseberry?

Its taking longer to boot because it's trying to get an ip address through dhcp for ethernet. You should disable this /etc/network/interfaces. Also did you replace script.bin with one for the gooseberry if you haven't done so and if possible the uboot.



RE: Allwinner A10 : Is XBMC ported to MALI-400MP ? - drachensun - 2012-11-13

(2012-11-06, 20:08)pszab Wrote: It runs linux+xbmc. Is the xbmc their development with support for vpu or not? Anyone?
http://www.cnx-software.com/2012/11/05/pengpod-700-1000-linux-tablets-based-on-allwinner-a10/

(2012-11-11, 18:02)davilla Wrote: Humm, AllWinner reinvents itself as Penpod in the hopes that the bad taste goes away ?

I'm involved in the project and we don't have any assocation with Allwinner other than buying their chips.

I haven't read all the old post but from what I understand the main developer attempting this was saying the libraries wouldn't work and needed something else. Well since, another guy, empat0 came along, tried again and the same libraries were working and giving us HD playback. After that Allwinner compiled the same libraries with hard float support so they also work with the most current root file systems.

So I know everyone on here was pretty bitter about Allwinner not giving them exactly what they wanted but it seems they did provide something that would do the job. Just to clear, I dont think its right that they wont release the source and wont provide a library to match a standard acceleration interface but I think it should be noted that what they provided did work.
(2012-11-11, 08:34)servili007 Wrote:
(2012-11-09, 20:55)drachensun Wrote: I got a request for my binary via email so I've uploaded it. However Guillaume's page looks a lot more complete.

http://pengpod.com/pengwiki/index.php?title=XBMC

was hoping that these were armhf builds, but they are not, they are armel.

I think the packager is not yet setup right for the HF build so I've uploaded a tar of my binaries. By default this installs to the root, there is a script that will start xbmc up. The system setup is a little tricky right now. To get this working I had to use the older u-boot before the dram settings, which will be the default with miniand or similar image. You need a new kernel though, it was a staging but I think it got merged last week. So you need the latest kernel in sunxi-3.0 from https://github.com/linux-sunxi/linux-sunxi and you need the atag memory hack on in the config.

http://pengpod.com/images/ul/xbmca10.tar.gz

Please let me know if this works for anyone.


RE: Allwinner A10 : Is XBMC ported to MALI-400MP ? - wolfgar - 2012-11-13

Hi Drachensun,

I have to agree with you.
I am not at all affiliated with allwinner but just a casual hacker who was attracted by such cheap tablets which are impossible to brick (thanks to FEL mode) and which have the great flexibility to redirected UART signals to sdcard connector. It enables to have a real product (with a touchscreen a battery,a real case and not a simple dev board) and to hack with it (as long as you don't need IOs of course)

At the beginning I though that libvecore (cedarx) was simply unable to do the job and I had to forget about hw video decoding because of its very bad reputation
At the end, thanks to empat0, it is quite obvious that this lib can be used to decode and render efficiently videos.

Of course I think it is a REAL shame that libvecore source code is not open especially when it is so obvious (just extract strings from the lib to be convinced) that it is linked with GPL code and so it simply has to be GPL.
Of course it is also very frustrating to wait for weeks to get a armhf version when it only requires 5 minutes to recompile
Of course while this library remains closed we will have hard times to solve bugs (and I think I have hit one as I reported earlier in this thread )

But, it is unfair to accuse anybody who comes with good initiatives like pengpod to be affiliated with allwinner and to have secret or malicious plans...

Best regards

NB : By the way, for now I run my own image based on linaro but i consider seriously joining your effort




RE: Allwinner A10 : Is XBMC ported to MALI-400MP ? - cnxsoft - 2012-11-13

(2012-11-12, 09:49)cnxsoft Wrote:
(2012-11-12, 08:28)mtx512 Wrote: This might help you out, I've successfully created a working armhf build for my Hackberry, more details here. Based on my limited testing it plays videos well, the GUI is relatively smooth although can result in high CPU because of framebuffer rendering. Overall I'm impressed with how well it runs (there's a short video on the link).

Big thanks to all who contributed in getting us this far.

Thanks, I've downloaded your image, and will give it a try again in a few hours.

Finally, this image does not work on my mele (even after updating uboot, spl, and script.bin). I can access the command line, and start XBMC, but it will just show the logo, and reboot the board.
It looks like XBMC detects I press the shutdown key... http://pastebin.com/2BCrS3mJ

Brad Linder (liliputing) also tried it on his MK802 with apparently the same result.


RE: Allwinner A10 : Is XBMC ported to MALI-400MP ? - Rok1337 - 2012-11-13

Just noticed something strange. It reports 800mb ram while the goose only has 512? Any idea what is causing this? Maybe that is the reason for the segfault.
(2012-11-12, 23:42)mtx512 Wrote:
(2012-11-12, 23:25)Rok1337 Wrote: Hi and Tanks for the Image. I was able to boot it on my gooseberry but it takes very very long to boot approx 2 minutes. I can login and the load average is good. Many other images I had tried had a load av of 2 while the system was actually idle. I get a default when starting xbmc but that's probably down to the different hardware of the gooseberry?

Its taking longer to boot because it's trying to get an ip address through dhcp for ethernet. You should disable this /etc/network/interfaces. Also did you replace script.bin with one for the gooseberry if you haven't done so and if possible the uboot.

I will try that once I get back from work. Actually I'm not sure if I should replace the script.bin, because this image is the only one that has booted 100% up to now. The goose has a temperamental boot problem. Most of the images I have used only boot once and never again. It has loaded the Realtek driver for wireless but I don't see a wlan0 interface. I might have to recompile the kernel.


RE: Allwinner A10 : Is XBMC ported to MALI-400MP ? - servili007 - 2012-11-13

Finally got a solid working build on my oval elephant starting from jesbir's work and making a frankenstein mix of what was and was not available in terms of kernel, booloader, and rootfs since the OE is no longer set up in the sunxi-boards. The only downside that is annoying me is that I have to open my wifi security because wpa_supplicant was giving me issues (WEP works though, but either way it has to be set beforehand). The current Network Manager add-on within XBMC didn't work for me either, but oh well. Played with the Youtube add-on and played some videos. CPU usage was always hovering around 40-50% even when not doing much, but it was pretty smooth. The audio settings within XBMC needed to be cycled to the working setting, but they work too.

I played with it on a motorola lapdock, 720p since the screen maxes out at 1366x768


Picture of my setup -

Image



RE: Allwinner A10 : Is XBMC ported to MALI-400MP ? - mtx512 - 2012-11-13

(2012-11-13, 08:16)Rok1337 Wrote: Just noticed something strange. It reports 800mb ram while the goose only has 512? Any idea what is causing this? Maybe that is the reason for the segfault.

You need to replace uboot with one compiled for the gooseberry,
(2012-11-13, 04:38)cnxsoft Wrote: Finally, this image does not work on my mele (even after updating uboot, spl, and script.bin). I can access the command line, and start XBMC, but it will just show the logo, and reboot the board.
It looks like XBMC detects I press the shutdown key... http://pastebin.com/2BCrS3mJ

Brad Linder (liliputing) also tried it on his MK802 with apparently the same result.

As you pointed out log file indicates a shutdown, I'll check my log files to see if there is anything obivious. May be worth compiling a kernel to see if that helps.


RE: Allwinner A10 : Is XBMC ported to MALI-400MP ? - nutt318 - 2012-11-13

I've got a Goosberry, has someone got a version working for it?


RE: Allwinner A10 : Is XBMC ported to MALI-400MP ? - Rok1337 - 2012-11-13

(2012-11-12, 09:49)cnxsoft Wrote:
(2012-11-12, 08:28)mtx512 Wrote:
(2012-11-12, 04:05)cnxsoft Wrote: Compiled successfully yes... The problems appear when you start to play videos, and to a lesser extend the performance in the GUI.
On PengPod Tablet video this looks pretty smooth however.

This might help you out, I've successfully created a working armhf build for my Hackberry, more details here. Based on my limited testing it plays videos well, the GUI is relatively smooth although can result in high CPU because of framebuffer rendering. Overall I'm impressed with how well it runs (there's a short video on the link).

Big thanks to all who contributed in getting us this far.

Thanks, I've downloaded your image, and will give it a try again in a few hours.

(2012-11-13, 16:34)nutt318 Wrote: I've got a Goosberry, has someone got a version working for it?

I have a gooseberry two and successfully booted the image from mtx512. But I have to recompile or replace the uboot. Once that is done I can upload the image. Maybe you want to try it?



RE: Allwinner A10 : Is XBMC ported to MALI-400MP ? - nutt318 - 2012-11-13

(2012-11-13, 23:35)Rok1337 Wrote: I have a gooseberry two and successfully booted the image from mtx512. But I have to recompile or replace the uboot. Once that is done I can upload the image. Maybe you want to try it?

Yeah, I would love to give a shot. As for getting it on an SD card can I use something like win32diskimager?

Thanks!


RE: Allwinner A10 : Is XBMC ported to MALI-400MP ? - Rok1337 - 2012-11-14

Yes, you can.