Armbian kernel for IMX.6 missing VPU / CODA960 support?

milord · March 14, 2021

Hello,

I have recently tried a more recent kernel 5.10.x for my HummingBoard with imx6 solo. After playing with GPU/OpenGL acceleration I have noticed that there is no H.264/MJPEG Video acceleration present in the kernel. The video codec Chips&Media 960 driver module (kernel option VIDEO_CODA) is simply not build in.

Why is that? Can it be enabled by default for future IMX6 builds?

Thanks for your support!!

Igor · March 15, 2021

Someone has to research if this is possible and enable here:

https://github.com/armbian/build/blob/master/config/kernel/linux-imx6-current.config

milord · March 15, 2021

Hi Igor,

I reckon this "someone" could be me?

I have build cubox kernel with the below diff on the "linux-imx6-current.config" and it apparently works.

+CONFIG_MEDIA_PLATFORM_SUPPORT=y
+CONFIG_V4L2_JPEG_HELPER=m
+CONFIG_V4L_MEM2MEM_DRIVERS=y
+CONFIG_VIDEO_CODA=m
+CONFIG_VIDEO_IMX_VDOA=m

1. Kernel boots and is detecting the codec

[   29.911784] coda 2040000.vpu: Direct firmware load for vpu_fw_imx6d.bin failed with error -2
[   29.961350] coda 2040000.vpu: Using fallback firmware vpu/vpu_fw_imx6d.bin
[   29.964619] coda 2040000.vpu: Firmware code revision: 46063
[   29.964636] coda 2040000.vpu: Initialized CODA960.
[   29.964645] coda 2040000.vpu: Firmware version: 3.1.1
[   29.969814] coda 2040000.vpu: encoder registered as video0
[   29.970090] coda 2040000.vpu: decoder registered as video1
[   29.970348] coda 2040000.vpu: encoder registered as video2
[   29.970715] coda 2040000.vpu: decoder registered as video3

2. v4l2-ctl reports the devices as being CODA960

CODA960 (platform:coda):
    /dev/video0
    /dev/video1
    /dev/video2
    /dev/video3

imx-capture (platform:ipu1_csi0):
    /dev/video4

imx-capture (platform:ipu1_csi1):
    /dev/video7

imx-capture (platform:ipu1_ic_prpenc):
    /dev/video5

imx-capture (platform:ipu1_ic_prpvf):
    /dev/video6

3. GStreamer has plugins for V4L2 video decoder, so finally lets give it a try with some h.264...

gst-launch-1.0 filesrc location=Big_Buck_Bunny_720_10s_30MB.mp4 ! qtdemux name=demux demux.video_0 ! queue ! h264parse ! v4l2h264dec ! kmssink

The video is ok, cat /proc/interrupts shows activity on the VPU, and the CPU load is low (5%-10% on i.mx.6 SOLO!), so the video acceleration is there!.

Igor, can you take it from here and integrate it or should I dare and make a PR for this?