LibreELEC 7 prebuilt images

jernej · Post time 2017-3-28 00:40:43

First goal is to actually have mainline HDMI driver, but yes, having better support for all functionality, including passtrough audio and all resolution support. That should not be hard to implement now that I understand the hardware and most important parts are already mainlined.

You are mixing multiple peripherals. Video playback requires many peripherals to work properly. It all begins when VPU (video processing unit, named Video Engine, better known by driver names - Cedrus, CedarX) decodes video frame. This frame is handed over to compositor (DE2), which crops, resizes and compose final image. This image is then feed to timing controller (TCON) which serializes image and feeds it into HDMI controller. Here is packetized according to HDMI standard and spit out to a cable through HDMI PHY (physical output). Ok, I'm not completely sure if everything here is correct or I missed something, but you get the picture. 10 bit HEVC support depends on VPU capabilities. Unfortunatelly, there is no proof that any Allwinner chip has VPU which can decode 10 bit HEVC. In some Allwinner materials 10 bit HEVC support is mentioned, but that could easily mean that CPU is fast enough for software decoding. Such deception already happened with A80 and HEVC support (8 bit) according to some people on #linux-sunxi IRC.

Currently, community works on DE2 and HDMI parts of this chain. TCON and TV out parts are mostly done. When this is done, mainline kernel will be fully capable of playing software decoded videos. Actually, with some tricks, present in Armbian dev version, it is already possible to watch videos, but not efficiently and with analog audio output only. Somebody already started working on VPU driver, but unfortunatelly, he abandoned the effort. Lets hope someone will pick it up soon.

kaynemo · Post time 2017-3-29 01:27:52

Sorry if I am being an idiot, but does it mean there will be no images for OPI Plus and OPI Plus 2?

jernej · Post time 2017-3-29 02:03:15

kaynemo replied at 2017-3-28 18:27
Sorry if I am being an idiot, but does it mean there will be no images for OPI Plus and OPI Plus 2?

Image for plus and plus 2 is the same: http://down.nu/images/2016-10-26/

There will be no images for H5 SoC, at least for now.

kaynemo · Post time 2017-3-29 02:14:02

I guess I meant something else - the images you are referring too are perfect and I got it running super-smoothly with your Feb update on OPI+2, but didn't you say there will be no more updates to that branch, targeting mainly OPI+2 ? I thought that switching to Libreelec (if there would be an image for that) would provide new Kodi and Jeos for OPI+2 - it feels like I am going to run into add-ons incompatibility issue soon, as they are going to support newer OS and Kodi. I like that board and wouldn't want to switch to RPI. So my question really is, do you think there will be updates to the images you are referring to ? Will there be Openelec/Libreelec 8 with Krypton for OPi+2?

jernej · Post time 2017-3-29 02:41:51

OpenELEC source is same for all boards and I tried to minimize the difference to the minimum (one config file), so it is not appropriate to speak for a specific board, but for all boards at once. Yes, I said I stopped developing OpenELEC for now. If I will resume my work, it will have completely diffrent kernel (mainline).

However, because I published sources publicly, anyone can take a look at them and develop a new version. Attempts were made already, but I'm not sure how successful. Main issue is adapting Kodi to work with CedarX drivers. Kodi 17 and thus any newer version has pretty different decoding interface in comparison to Kodi 16, which means that my patches can't be easily reused. Whoever tries to adapt it, needs to study new interface, which definetly takes a lot of time.

Hard to say, you might or might not get HW accelerated Kodi 17 or 18 (for any board).

kaynemo · Post time 2017-3-29 03:18:47

Kinda what I have feared ))) Thanks for a great job with the current image anyhow. I will try to make it last as long as possible ))) I guess I should wait for RPI to add EMMC and 2Gb of Ram to their design and buy it if and when it comes out - RPIs are definitely better supported when it comes to software then OPIs. Thanks again.

kaynemo · Post time 2017-4-11 03:06:28

Edited by kaynemo at 2017-4-11 03:33

I have downloaded the Libreelec image for opiplus2e (although I have opiplus2). How different is it from openelec build from jernej? Is it going to be updated?

JRios · Post time 2017-4-11 18:35:54

Edited by JRios at 2017-4-11 18:38

kaynemo replied at 2017-4-11 03:06
I have downloaded the Libreelec image for opiplus2e (although I have opiplus2). How different is it ...

Hi,

In functionality, the only differences between these LibreELEC images and the OpenELEC, are the rtl8188 Wi-Fi driver inclusion and the completly shutdown (instead suspend) when Kodi shutdown button is pressed. Kodi and the others stuff are just the sames that OpenELEC images has.

So, if you have an OpenELEC system running in your OPi does not make too much sense to change It to LibreELEC, unless you want one of the 2 above changes...

These images will not be updated, at least from me.

kaynemo · Post time 2017-4-11 18:39:02

Are there going to be updates to that Libreelec image? Such as an updated OS or, maybe even an updated Kodi, I am not much for Krypton, but Leia looks promising.

fredy · Post time 2017-4-20 00:32:59

jernej replied at 2017-3-28 00:40
First goal is to actually have mainline HDMI driver, but yes, having better support for all function ...

I'm sorry, I do not remember, but does the legacy HDMI driver support a maximum of 1920x1080@60 output? No 4k? And about Android build, does it support 4k@30?
Thanks in advance