[Buildroot] imx6 solo VPU support in Buildroot

[Juan A. Rubio]

Hi,

I'm still chasing the issue of hw-accelerated video playback on my
imx6 solo custom board.

I'm now using the IMX6Q platform in my Buildroot config but I have not
switched to a mainline kernel, and I'm still using the nxp kernel
(imx6dl-sabresd.dts device tree with a few modifications, none of them
related to the VPU or GPU).

In the BSP I can see that the VPU firmware files are in the expected location:
# ls /lib/firmware/vpu/
vpu_fw_imx27_TO1.bin  vpu_fw_imx51.bin      vpu_fw_imx6d.bin
vpu_fw_imx27_TO2.bin  vpu_fw_imx53.bin      vpu_fw_imx6q.bin

I've verified that video decoding works using a software decoder with
this pipeline:
'$ gst-launch-1.0 filesrc location=video.mp4 ! qtdemux ! avdec_h264 !
imxeglvivsink'

However, when I use the hw decoder, I get errors:
'$ gst-launch-1.0 filesrc location=video.mp4 ! qtdemux ! imxvpudec !
imxeglvivsink'

 'failed delayed linking some pad of GstQTDemux named qtdemux0 to some
pad of GstImxVpuDecoder named imxvpudecoder0'

Someone on #gstreamer told me that the 'h264parse' should have been
added before 'imxvpudec', but 'h264parse' is not present in the
gstreamer1 Buildroot package (I can see it is there in the gstreamer
0.x package).

Any ideas on what is the actual problem here?

Thanks in advance.
Juan






On Fri, Jan 11, 2019 at 5:42 PM Juan A. Rubio <jarubio2001 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Gary,
>
> Yes, I've seen this overlapping naming convention in other places.
> Makes sense. I'll try changing the platform to IMX6Q.
>
> Thanks for the clarification.
>
> BR,
> Juan
>
> On Fri, Jan 11, 2019 at 5:27 PM Gary Bisson
> <gary.bisson at boundarydevices.com> wrote:
> >
> > Hi,
> >
> > Otherwise, the reason it has been removed is that IMX6S in NXP's
> > packages doesn't refer to the i.MX6 Solo processors but to the i.MX6
> > SoloLite and i.MX6 Solo X which do not have a VPU.
> >
> > You can see it in the menuconfig or package/freescale-imx/Config.in:
> > config BR2_PACKAGE_FREESCALE_IMX_PLATFORM_IMX6Q
> >     bool "imx6q/imx6dl"
> >
> > config BR2_PACKAGE_FREESCALE_IMX_PLATFORM_IMX6S
> >     bool "imx6sl/imx6sx"
> >
> > So for a i.MX6 Solo processor, you should use the IMX6Q platform as it
> > is meant for i.MX6 DualLite which is equivalent to the Solo.
> >
> > I know it all sounds confusing but that's how NXP/Freescale chose to
> > differentiate their CPU and we decided to match their naming
> > convention.
> >
> > Regards,
> > Gary
> >
> > Gary Bisson
> > Boundary Devices, LLC
> > www.boundarydevices.com
> >
> >
> > On Fri, Jan 11, 2019 at 1:59 PM Juan A. Rubio <jarubio2001 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > Thanks!,
> > >
> > > I'll try this other route.
> > >
> > >
> > > On Fri, 11 Jan 2019 at 12:17 Fabio Estevam <festevam at gmail.com> wrote:
> > >>
> > >> Hi Juan,
> > >>
> > >> On Fri, Jan 11, 2019 at 9:39 AM Juan A. Rubio <jarubio2001 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > >> >
> > >> > Hi,
> > >> >
> > >> > I've noticed that the imx6 solo VPU is not supported in Buildroot
> > >> > starting from 2018.02.x
> > >> >
> > >> > There is some information about this in this commit:
> > >> > https://github.com/buildroot/buildroot/commit/b86b227fda97ef439a3cc0da03da0ebcad5c203a
> > >>
> > >> This is related to the VPU library used by the NXP vendor code.
> > >>
> > >> >
> > >> > Has anyone come up with a solution to successfully enable the VPU
> > >> > libraries on imx6 solo with Buildroot?. Is there any more information
> > >> > about this that might help to get this to work somehow?
> > >>
> > >> I am able to use VPU on mx6 with Buildroot using mainline kernel.
> > >>
> > >> You can use configs/imx6-sabresd_qt5_defconfig as a reference.
> > >>
> > >> Please check this post with the details:
> > >> https://imxdev.gitlab.io/tutorial/Decoding_video_with_a_mainline_kernel_on_i.MX6/
> > >
> > > _______________________________________________
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