New Product: RGB-Drive

[shawnzilla]

Yep, between RandyT, Myself, Ponyboy, Bob Roberts (Translucent Leaf Switch Buttons), etc... There's a good variety of buttons to light up now.

I must give props to RandyT, talk about a plug-and-play solution! 

[mahuti]

just to clarify, no disrespect to the other button guys. I like the variety... and I do like the idea of havign colred buttons even when the lights are off.

[arzoo]

The RGB-Drive, Electric-Ice, Led-Wiz is probably the most expensive solution (initially and from a cash perspective) But you can have them installed and running all kinds of fancy stuff in minutes. If your time is worth nothing... go with one of the other solutions. I can tell you that the GGG led stuff is fantastic. Well worth the price, (imho).

I'm willing to spend the $$ on the Electric-Ice with the RGB-Drive, but here's my concern; even if I only want to light the buttons one color, I still need to use 3 inputs per button which limits the number of buttons I can uniquely control with the LEDWiz. Ideally I'd like to uniquely control 16 buttons with two colors (say red and blue). I don't think a single LEDWiz can handle that. Or am I missing something?

[RandyT]

I'm willing to spend the $$ on the Electric-Ice with the RGB-Drive, but here's my concern; even if I only want to light the buttons one color, I still need to use 3 inputs per button which limits the number of buttons I can uniquely control with the LEDWiz. Ideally I'd like to uniquely control 16 buttons with two colors (say red and blue). I don't think a single LEDWiz can handle that. Or am I missing something?

Actually, you can do exactly that.  16x2 equals 32, which just happens to be the number of outputs on the LED-Wiz.

And you won't just have 2 colors.  Theoretically, it'll be more like 2304 colors (limited by the 2 colors you select.)

MikeQ already has a DLL for up to 16 LED-Wiz's. A simple app using this DLL affords possibilities of up to 170 individually controlled RGB LEDs, but that's a lot of wires and LED-Wiz's!

RandyT

[mahuti]

if you wanted, you could use one wire per rgb-drive.... for 32 separate leds. If you only used 1 of the wires per rgb-drive, you'd only have a choice of intensity variations of red, blue, green... if you wire up 2 of the wires, then you have choices of variations of red-blue, blue-green, red-green, on a given button.

[Toonces]

The RGB-Drive, Electric-Ice, Led-Wiz is probably the most expensive solution (initially and from a cash perspective) But you can have them installed and running all kinds of fancy stuff in minutes. If your time is worth nothing... go with one of the other solutions. I can tell you that the GGG led stuff is fantastic. Well worth the price, (imho).

I think the nicest thing is that it doesn't have to be the most expensive solution though. While the ready to plug and play solution (just from the button/led/wiring side) is $6.49 per button you can definately benefit from buying the bare board and button and doing some of the work and still end up with a much easier and clean install. I have some of the translucent buttons and used some for a QIX Mini that has the marquee below the control panel so the florescent light illuminates them and they look great. I wasn't really satisfied with my efforts to use LEDs with them though (I don't have the patience to locate and drill rings to hold the LEDs). The LEDs lit the ceiling better than the rest of the button when used from the bottom.

Anyways, with the Electric Ice buttons being about the same price as the Translucent $2.99 w/cherry vs. $2.74 (from ponyboy) and getting the bare RGB-Drive board for another $1.29 you can cut the cost and the RGB-Drive board is easier to solder and wire than directly on the LED leads. Not that it's difficult to solder the LED leads as much as it's time consuming.  Then there's the cost of the LEDs and resistors. Randy's price on those is good, especially considering his price includes labor to solder it all together for you but if you are really trying to cut costs while still maintaining the benefits of the RGB-Drive's simplified and cleaner wiring then here's where you can save some $$. I got 20 RGB LEDs (4 lead, common anode) from an eBay seller for $8 shipped. The Resistors were $1.49 from another eBay seller for 100 100/150 ohm 1/4w, 1% metal film (50 of each). I also chose to not get the cherry switches from Randy only because I have a bunch lying around (not to mention the buttons on my cab were fairly new) so that lowered my cost to $2.25 per button for a total cash outlay of $4.21 per button if I were to discard the left over LEDs and resistors ( divided the total cost by 14, the total number of buttons my cab has). I'll have 6 leftover LEDs to figure out where to put them in the cab or other project and a bunch of resistors too.  Overall this is a nice savings of $2.28 per button over the plug and play. It's great that Randy offers that option. He could have just as easily made it all up or nothing.

You get all the benefits of using the RGB-Drive (neat wiring, less time soldering) and at a cost at around the same price as rolling your own and you don't have to try to find the material for making a ring to hold the LED and the time involved in that.

BTW, if you want a good price on LEDs, email mckenkenken@gmail.com directly. Tell him what you want and you'll get a better price than he offers on eBay (mckenkenken). He also sells resistors and precut heatshrink too although I didn't buy them from him (don't need em!). For those in the US, he ships from the US so the wait time isn't weeks.

Of course you could use the RGB-Drive with the translucent buttons as well but it won't be much different in lighting as an led stuffed inside the button. You do get pretty colors on the ceiling though!

Just my .02,

Toonces

[Toonces]

The RGB-Drive, Electric-Ice, Led-Wiz is probably the most expensive solution (initially and from a cash perspective) But you can have them installed and running all kinds of fancy stuff in minutes. If your time is worth nothing... go with one of the other solutions. I can tell you that the GGG led stuff is fantastic. Well worth the price, (imho).

I'm willing to spend the $$ on the Electric-Ice with the RGB-Drive, but here's my concern; even if I only want to light the buttons one color, I still need to use 3 inputs per button which limits the number of buttons I can uniquely control with the LEDWiz. Ideally I'd like to uniquely control 16 buttons with two colors (say red and blue). I don't think a single LEDWiz can handle that. Or am I missing something?

You don't have to wire up all 3 inputs. You can wire 1, 2 or all 3. An RGB LED is essentially 3 LEDs in a single package. Just wire up the colors you want to use i.e. Red and Blue. Leave the 3rd input unwired and just run the ones you wired to the LEDWiz. 32 inputs is enough for 16 buttons with 2 colors all individually controlled.

Toonces

[arzoo]

Everyone, thanks for the info and clarification on how the RGB LEDs work. I'm convinced that the ICE w/RGB-Drive is the way to go. I gotta say, I've been a member of many on-line forum/communities and this is by far the most easy-going and information ready of them all!

[chris_lemasters]

Anyone have any experience yet with the RGB-Drive and the FXButtons buttons? 

Chris

[method]

The RGB-Drive, Electric-Ice, Led-Wiz is probably the most expensive solution (initially and from a cash perspective) But you can have them installed and running all kinds of fancy stuff in minutes. If your time is worth nothing... go with one of the other solutions. I can tell you that the GGG led stuff is fantastic. Well worth the price, (imho).

Yeah i was looking to pick up a set of this equipment and yeh it is pretty expensive, can anyone point me to some other possible products that'll do the same job. (Just standard LED lighting, nothin fancy).

[freddykreuger666]

call be an idiot , but im lost.
wot i want - 16 buttons to be lit
1) do i have to have the colours to "change" or cant u just have a consistent colour that slowly pulses or just stays the same colour. cos the quick flickering of them will get annoying, a slow pulse / constant + easily changeable colour would be good
2) to change the colours what would u need to do (software/hardware)? e.g go on ur computer and mess around with em?
3) what would i need to buy to get them to work
4) how much would it cost + ship to the uk?

thanks
hopefully shud buy some soon for my upcoming cab

[Kremmit]

call be an idiot , but im lost.

Hey, Be- you're an idiot.

1) wot u wan 2 du iz ez
2) u would need an LED-Wiz and u would go on ur computer and mess with em.
3) u would need an LED-Wiz and 16 of the RGB-Drive units this thread is discussing.
4) du ur own shopping, dood.

[Zakk]

Dammit, I lost the link for the AOL translator, and can't figure out what's being asked here.