Skype Video call performance on IMX6q

[saurabh206]

Hi,

Our Setup is as follows:

Hardware :- Custom hardware based on imx6q

Jellybean 4.3

USB camera connected.

Skype Video call performance on IMX6q based Android device is very poor.

It seems that Skype is not able to use the Hardware encoder/decoder and it is trying to used software codec.

Because of this all cpu core occupied and chip temperature will increase rapidly.

System is too hot. GPU3D will work at 3/64 clock.

cooling: cpu cur freq is 996000000

cooling: cpu max freq set to 792000000

W/AudioFlinger( 2349): RecordThread: buffer overflow

D/dalvikvm( 3442): GC_CONCURRENT freed 2174K, 24% free 9581K/12492K, paused 4ms+22ms, total 168ms

Hot alarm is canceled. GPU3D clock will return to 64/64

cooling: cpu cur freq is 792000000

cooling: cpu max freq set to 996000

How can we improve the performance?

Thanks

Saurabh

[SergioSolis]

I just tried it with our i.MX6Q Sabre Board and it didn't have any problems at all.

Have you tried with a "non usb" camera?.

[saurabh206]

Hi

SerchMX

What is your resolution of camera which have tested?

And in which format it gives the output?

Thanks

Saurabh

[saurabh206]

Hi,

I have not tried the non USB camera.

We are also able to do video call without an issue for VGA camera.

I have connected HD camera (USB) , which creates an issue after 10 to 15 min of video call.

Temperature detail is as below.

After boot completed :- 50 C

Skype Video call, Call is not received at other end, Just preview your camera in screen. :- 60 C

Skype video call, with both video display :- 67 C

Skype video call, with both video display after 1 min :- 75 C

Skype video call, with both video display after 5 min :- 80 C

If you look at the CPU utilization during this process

Skype takes around 50 % of CPU.

Media server takes around 35 to 40 % of CPU.

Thanks

Saurabh

[Chris1z]

I don't think I've seen the USB camera trigger thermal cooling, but I've seen video performance issues (glitches) with the SabreSD and our custom board with an iMX6Q.  Android JB 4.2.2-1.1.0-ga.  The glitches usually appear on the local side preview of the USB camera in Skype and on the far end.

[saurabh206]

Hi,

I found than any video calling application takes more than 80% of time.

Any update from Freescale team member on this issue?

Thanks

Saurabh

[varsmolta]

VP8 encoding is not supported by the VPU (VP8 decoding is). H.264 BP/CBP encoding + decoding is supported by the VPU. Can you configure skype to use H.264?

Also USB camera may not use VPU by default (openmax android layer). It may be doing the encoding in software. Try running with a camera that uses the freescale mxc camera interface (and hence the OpenMax layer)

[saurabh206]

Hi,

Thanks for the reply.

I need to check how to configure skype. And verify which codec it uses for the encoding + decoding.

I don't have skype source code, I have just install skype from google play store.

Can you explain the "USB camera may not use VPU by default (openmax android layer)"? From debug i only found that Due to UVC camera camera frameworks is doing software color conversion. 

Thanks

Saurabh

[varsmolta]

I did some research and according to this: http://www.pathpartnertech.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/PathPartner_Case_Study_Skype_OMAP4_ICS1.pd...

Skype for Android uses H.264 for encoding + decoding but does it all in software. These guys used SkypeKit API to support accelerated encoding + decoding on an OMAP4

Alas, Skype discontinued SkypeKit API recently:

https://aragonresearch.com/microsoft-kills-skype-desktop-apis-leaves-developers-scrambling/

https://support.skype.com/en/faq/FA12322/what-is-skypekit

So looks like you can't get accelerated skype performace anymore.

Linphone is an open source SIP video conferencing solution (http://www.linphone.org/eng/download/packages/linphone-for-android-2.0.html). I have played with it on i.mx6 running android but have not used the video capability and so I don't know  if it uses VPU for accelerating encoding+decoding.