Addressable LED's - an example

[matsadona]

There seems to be a little hype about addressable LED's here lately (finally), so I just want to share an example of what can be done.
Not very arcade related this example, but it is a good showcase of the technology.

[Felsir]

I'm a wrong to think that this is what ledblinky and ledwiz/pacled64 does? Or am I missing something important here?

[drventure]

I'm a wrong to think that this is what ledblinky and ledwiz/pacled64 does? Or am I missing something important here?

Nope, that's exactly what LEDBlinky and Pacleds (and the other arcade related led controllers) are meant to do.

Shoot, have a look at the hall of fame thread to see individually controlled LED buttons that light based on their use in the current loaded mame game.

I like this project though. Maybe it uses an arduino or something to control the LEDs? Although that looks like a full mobo in the background.

[Nephasth]

I'm a wrong to think that this is what ledblinky and ledwiz/pacled64 does? Or am I missing something important here?

The major difference with addressable LEDs is the amount of wiring. With non-addressable RGB LEDs, you would need 4 wires (3 if you daisy chained the + lead to each LED) running back to the controller. With addressable RGB LEDs, all the wires are daisy chained from one LED to another, leaving you with 3 or 4 wires (depending on LED type) coming from the controller, instead of a crap ton.

[drventure]

Ahhh... Each LED is paired with a micro controller and current limiter. Interesting.

Hadn't seen anything like that before, but it'd make wiring much nicer for certain!

Sparkfun has strips like that on which each LED is addressable, but those might be tough to wire.

Just found this though

http://www.ebay.com/itm/50PCS-WS2801-RGB-Full-Color-12mm-Pixel-digital-Addressable-LED-String-DC-5V-2801-/221278492861

much easier to separate for more distance between the leds

[RandyT]

The major difference with addressable LEDs is the amount of wiring. With non-addressable RGB LEDs, you would need 4 wires (3 if you daisy chained the + lead to each LED) running back to the controller. With addressable RGB LEDs, all the wires are daisy chained from one LED to another, leaving you with 3 or 4 wires (depending on LED type) coming from the controller, instead of a crap ton.

Of course, for this difference, you end up with more wires actually connected to each individual light, as there are the incoming wires and the outgoing wires.  So, six wires on each light unit vs. four for conventional lighting.  Power wiring also tends to need to be bulkier, as it needs to be sized for the entire load of the string.   Also, any wiring or functional issue on one unit in the chain, will cause issues for every unit past it, whereas issues with conventional light units are local only to that light unit.  Conventional controllers are also more versatile as to the types of devices they can control.

Each type has advantages and disadvantages.

[stigzler]

Like the multi-meter - very festive. 

[matsadona]

Thanks for your comments.
And yes, the idea and benefit with addressable LED’s are the convenient wiring and its quite simple protocol (even though I used a pre-programmed controller).
Since this is based on the WS2811 chip, it only uses three wires (+5V, GND and DATA). WS2801 uses a fourth wire (CLOCK). So instead of doing a lot of parallel wiring from a traditional controller you only need to have a daisy chain of three/four wires.

For this particular project I used a pre-made little boards that I found on EBay (picture below). Just added the wires and a 4-pin RGB LED.

The mobo in the background is a Bishi Bashi game board that will be one of my coming projects.