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Webcam, Cheese, GStreamer and UVCVideo problems in Intrepid
I bought a new webcam, a Logitech E 3500 and it works great on Skype. Unfortunately, on my Ubuntu Intrepid box, Cheese and other GStreamer based programs are not able to make the webcam work.
At the beginning, since it was working with Skype and not working with GStreamer, it seemed a GStreamer bug. It is not. It is a bug with the uvcvideo module loaded in the kernel. As soon as you compile the SVN version of uvcvideo the webcam start working with all the programs which can interface with Video4Linux2.
Here a few steps to make it working.
First of all: you need to install some build tools and the kernel headers:
sudo apt-get install linux-headers-`uname -r` build-essential subversion
Create a folder on which you will work (let’s say it’s in your home, but you can change it):
mkdir ~/uvcvideo
cd ~/uvcvideo
Now download the latest source from the SVN server:
svn checkout svn://svn.berlios.de/linux-uvc/linux-uvc/trunk
cd trunk
and build it:
make
Now you are ready to load the brand-new module, but first unload the old one:
sudo rmmod uvcvideo
sudo insmod ./uvcvideo.ko
Now start Cheese and smile! In my case the resolution selection is still not working, but that’s a minor problem.
Please note that now you are using a module that is hand-loaded. If you want your kernel to load the new uvcvideo module automatically instead of the old one, enter the following commands:
sudo cp ./uvcvideo.ko /lib/modules/`uname -r`/kernel/drivers/media/video/uvc/uvcvideo.ko
sudo rmmod uvcvideo
sudo modprobe uvcvideo
This will overwrite the old module. The classic make install won’t work, since it will install the module in a different folder from the default tree of the kernel in Ubuntu Intrepid.
Personally I hope Ubuntu will soon provide a correct patch: even this worked for me, I don’t really like quick&dirty ways
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9 Responses to “Webcam, Cheese, GStreamer and UVCVideo problems in Intrepid”
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Thanks, works for me. Now I can say “cheese” again
.
excellent post… worked like a charm!
…until i rebooted.
now, it activates the webcam, but it won’t release it.
By that I mean that once it is active, it stays in use by the system. Therefore no other programs/resources can access the camera.
The original behavior (before reboot) was that the (Dell 1525 built-in) webcam would activate (and it’s blue LED would light up) when i opened cheese (or gnome-properties, or whatever) and then go off again once i closed the program.
However, upon reboot the boot process activates the webcam… but the light stays on and nothing can access it.
If I try to rmmod it states that it is being used (‘busy’ if i rmmod -f).
If I remove uvcvideo.ko from the modules path and then manually load it after logon, it works great!
If I place ‘insmod /path/to/uvcvideo.ko’ in my rc.local, i get the same problem.
Intrepid Ibex with current updates, et. al. thanks again for getting me this far….
thoughts?
~t
I have this same problem (and fix worked). Did you post a bug somewhere?
This bug has been reported to Launchpad (Ubuntu):
https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/290506
A fix has been committed and in a few days you should find an updated package in ubuntu-proposed repository.
thanks!!!! works perfect!!
cheeseeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!
Thanks it worked!
THANKS! It works:) Better day thanks to you:)
On the last step i get a problem, I am a newbie so please forgive me.
zack@ubuntu:~/uvcvideo/trunk$ sudo insmod ./uvcvideo.ko
insmod: error inserting ‘./uvcvideo.ko’: -1 Unknown symbol in module
I have the same:
error inserting ‘./uvcvideo.ko’: -1 Unknown symbol in module
Any hints?