Android slow

[fykos]

Hello, I have a RaspberryPi that works seamlessly with Raspbian "wheezy". But with android 2 or 4 (gingerbread image) keeps crashing too, is very slow, can not even move. I leave just connected the HDMI and USB keyboard. What can it be? Thank you.

[jamesh]

Android is not accelerated by the GPU at this stage, which is pretty essential to get any sort of performance out of it.

[fykos]

Android is not accelerated by the GPU at this stage, which is pretty essential to get any sort of performance out of it.

How Do I Activate from the GPU acceleration?

[ghans]

You can't. There is an internal build by Broadcom ,
which they might release , at their own discretion.

The "community" builds are being worked on , but they
are doing it in their free time. Check the Android Pi Wiki or
their IRC Channel.


ghans

[duCin0]

Android is not accelerated by the GPU at this stage, which is pretty essential to get any sort of performance out of it.

That doesn't really answer the question though. The GUI stack as found in Raspbian isn't accelerated either. Yet it's faster (i.e., it works), despite all the X11 overhead and comparably bloated libs and toolkits.

Android before Honeycomb only uses limited HW acceleration. 2.* should have acceptable performance even with SW rendering only (at least on small resolutions), given that other comparably specked devices run Android just fine, with, as mentioned, very limited HW support.

I can only speculate, I'm not familiar with the razdroid code but the answer could be that their SW compositor isn't optimized at all because pretty much nobody ever used it:
"Android has always used some hardware accelerated drawing. Since before 1.0 all window compositing to the display has been done with hardware."
Interesting read: https://plus.google.com/105051985738280 ... FXDCz8x93s

It could also be down to some differences in the Android vs raspi kernels.

[jamesh]

Android is not accelerated by the GPU at this stage, which is pretty essential to get any sort of performance out of it.

That doesn't really answer the question though. The GUI stack as found in Raspbian isn't accelerated either. Yet it's faster (i.e., it works), despite all the X11 overhead and comparably bloated libs and toolkits.

Android before Honeycomb only uses limited HW acceleration. 2.* should have acceptable performance even with SW rendering only (at least on small resolutions), given that other comparably specked devices run Android just fine, with, as mentioned, very limited HW support.

I can only speculate, I'm not familiar with the razdroid code but the answer could be that their SW compositor isn't optimized at all because pretty much nobody ever used it:
"Android has always used some hardware accelerated drawing. Since before 1.0 all window compositing to the display has been done with hardware."
Interesting read: https://plus.google.com/105051985738280 ... FXDCz8x93s

It could also be down to some differences in the Android vs raspi kernels.

Well, I think you have answered your own question with your speculation. Latest versions of Android need HW acceleration as the compositing and 3D tasks are really quite intensive, and a 700Mhz CPU isnt up to the job.

[fykos]

What I could see the link posted by duCin0 is that really the reason for this slowness is via hardware acceleration.
I wonder what can be done to improve?

[4thdwarflord]

haven't broadcom released the gpu drivers?

[ghans]

They have , but Android needs still some other parts to work with the GPU.
For example a so-called gralloc module.
All in all it is simply a big task to get Android hardware-accelerated. Mobile phone
manufacturers an simply pay a horde of developers to do this over some months , the Razdroid guys can't.


ghans

[CoolApps]

They have , but Android needs still some other parts to work with the GPU.
For example a so-called gralloc module.
All in all it is simply a big task to get Android hardware-accelerated. Mobile phone
manufacturers an simply pay a horde of developers to do this over some months , the Razdroid guys can't.


ghans

You got to remember that the gralloc module can mess up on stock Android on Android devices has that causes visual artifacts.
Also custom roms do not always take that long and also you do not need too much Android developers to do the job.

[ghans]

AFAIK custom ROMs always rely on the fact that the
manufacturer did the work of GPU acceleration.
And every serious mobile phone manufacturer does that.
Then you can simply copy binaries from the original
firmware.

That is completely different if the device was never a mobile
phone , but has powerful GPU and display capabilities.

ghans

[CoolApps]

AFAIK custom ROMs always rely on the fact that the
manufacturer did the work of GPU acceleration.
And every serious mobile phone manufacturer does that.
Then you can simply copy binaries from the original
firmware.

That is completely different if the device was never a mobile
phone , but has powerful GPU and display capabilities.

ghans

The thing is that the Raspberry Pi has More RAM then by phone and it has Armv6, same has The Raspberry Pi.
The only problem is the kernel modules and the hardware acceleration which will require the Broadcom VideoCore IV driver.

On Android the libs use .so file extensions while the kernel modules use .ko

[Warg]

Also custom roms do not always take that long and also you do not need too much Android developers to do the job.

Not to be rude or anything, but this project is far more than just a custom ROM. This is actually PORTING Android onto a new device, which involves a whole bunch of coding as opposed to making a custom ROM where most of the 'dirty work' has already been done by the OEM.

The only problem is [...] the hardware acceleration which will require the Broadcom VideoCore IV driver.

Yes, and we DO currently have a non-accelerated Android port available for the public, thus I fail to see your point here.


For anyone else that feels like questioning the time it takes to get this working 100%:
I am merely a man. One man. If some part of this project takes too long, it's because I have other obligations. Want to change that? Start paying me so that I can ditch everything else and spend time doing this for you all. The main other thing that could change the speed is if more people get involved in the coding aspect of the project. As stated, I am just one man.

</rant>
Warg

[Hofie]

Paying, that sounds fair. Kick Starter Project?

[MrSlacker]

Paying, that sounds fair. Kick Starter Project?

Man, you guy's sure do miss a point. I don't think Warg is gonna be able to quit his job(or school?) and dedicate all his free time to the effort based off a kick starter project. $5, 10 or even $50 here and there wouldn't cut it for me, i'm sure it wont for him. I guess the funds could be used to bring coders over here and there. I think a better option would be to try and get a project submited to GSOC.

For those making blind suggestions. Wanna know how you can help? It's simple, fork the source and help code. Can't do that? Well then you're gonna have to be patient and stop nagging. If you look at the project on github you can see the progress.

Warg, I applaude you're efforts! I've been watching the github for awhile and from what I can gather it looks really close to having something tangible! Kudos.

[Warg]

I wish this forum had a 'like'-function so that I could like the above post. MrSlacker, you really got the point I was trying to make.

[6677]

Warg has kindly decided to do this in his own free time. He has no obligations to do it but has anyway.

Peoples bitching and moaning does not speed up the process in any way.

[jamesh]

Warg has kindly decided to do this in his own free time. He has no obligations to do it but has anyway.

Peoples bitching and moaning does not speed up the process in any way.

Odd how so many people don't realise that.....and in fact, it can slow things down!

[kaikeraut]

Any updates on this post.?

[fruitoftheloom]

http://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewt ... 73&t=78012

Not a hope till hell freezes over......

[Joe Schmoe]

Has anyone, ever, anywhere given a REASON why they want Android on the PI, other than either "because it would be kewl" or "because it is always better to have more choices (OSes) available" ?

I don't think I've ever seen one.

And, in fact, all the Android whiners just keep asking for Android, not explaining why they want it.

Or am I just missing something obvious? I really don't see any reason to have it; if you want Android, you know where to find it.

Edited to add two comments regarding the discussion of "netflix" which arose below:

• 1) If we ever get past the technical and legal issues that would allow us to view Netflix on the Pi, it would certainly apply equally well to regular Linux as to Android. I.e., Android would not be the magic bullet to getting Netflix working.
  
  2) As illustration of this, note that the Roku, which is based on the same SOC as the Pi, can (obviously) display Netflix, so it is clearly possible for this SOC to display Netflix - and they (the Roku) obviously aren't running Android.

[mikerr]

One reason: netflix

[fruitoftheloom]

One reason: netflix

Will NetFlix work on devices not Google Certified and do not therefore have Google Play Store ??

NetFlex are very strict with DRM !!

[Douglas6]

One reason: netflix

That just begs the question

[jamesh]

One reason: netflix

Will NetFlix work on devices not Google Certified and do not therefore have Google Play Store ??

NetFlex are very strict with DRM !!

That's the big issue. I cannot see Netflix working without the required GPU support for DRM, which would not be available. (YMMV, just my opinion)

Any other use cases for Android?