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LEDWiz wiring to exceed 500ma
VicBond007:
--- Quote from: Haterot on March 30, 2009, 11:25:20 am ---Is the 500ma restriction per LEDWiz? Can you add another LEDWiz, and then possibly plug those into a powered USB-Hub?
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Powered USB hub is a viable option, just get a good one. Check the amps on the power supply (1a = 1000ma). That amperage is distributed between all of the ports, but if the hub is designed properly, it will never feed more that 500ma per port (so if you buy a 4 port hub with a 2a power supply, don't expect to plug one device in and get 2a from it. You won't.) This means that yes, you can buy a powered USB hub, hook up 2 LEDWizes, and get 500ma of power to each one, even though that hub is plugged into 1 port on your pc. Because the hub is powered, it's only using the USB port on your PC for it's connection, not for power. You can have up to 127 USB devices on one bus, so don't worry if you decide to split one port over and over. As long as you've got enough powered hubs to run your devices, everything is golden.
Don't confuse this with sticking 2 LEDWizes into 2 different USB ports on your computer. Multiple ports can share the same bus, and each bus shares it's power with every port on that bus. You can however stick one in the front port and one in the back (or even one of those PCI expansion brackets that connect to the motherboard with the 9 pin connector) because each of those are USUALLY on different buses.
It's a cleaner solution, but costly, especially if you have enough connections on one LEDWiz and your only reason for buying 2 is for power.
The other thing to consider is whether all the lights will be on all the time. LEDs only consume power when lit. If you're lighting your panel per-game rather than leaving everything on full-blast, there's a good chance that you'll never light every button (4 players games AFAIK top out at 4 buttons, so you might have 3-4 buttons on players 1 and 2 off, leaving you with only 24-26 lights on). It's pushing the limits of 1 USB device, but you probably can't notice the difference in brightness between a 20ma LED and a 19.23ma LED. You just won't be able to set up an attract-mode with all lights on at once.
ivwshane:
Maybe my thread can help you:
http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=87419.0
drventure:
The comments about powered vs unpowered USB hubs is spot on.
And esp make sure the PS will output the max amps necessary. There's a lot of 7 port hubs out there with PS's that can't drive all 7 ports at 500ma (or even close).
I had a pile of props with my spinner, trackballs and u360s till I got a hub with a PS that could really handle them all.
Kayden:
I have 12 RGB LEDs hooked up and running off one USB port; that's 36 LEDs at 20ma = 720. Are they dim and I just don't notice? I haven't installed them yet, I just had them out and I was testing.
I was going to add some 5v goodness to the banks, but I wasn't quite sure what I was supposed to do. As I understood it, I'm supposed to put the external 5v in bank 1 along with all the anodes that connect to something in 1-8, yes? Is that screw terminal just acting as some kind of solder-less connection?
VicBond007:
--- Quote from: Kayden on March 30, 2009, 05:05:27 pm ---I have 12 RGB LEDs hooked up and running off one USB port; that's 36 LEDs at 20ma = 720. Are they dim and I just don't notice? I haven't installed them yet, I just had them out and I was testing.
I was going to add some 5v goodness to the banks, but I wasn't quite sure what I was supposed to do. As I understood it, I'm supposed to put the external 5v in bank 1 along with all the anodes that connect to something in 1-8, yes? Is that screw terminal just acting as some kind of solder-less connection?
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It depends what color your RGB LED is running. If you're making it fully red, then it's only going to light the red led, the green and blue leds will draw no power. If you start cycling colors and mixing shades, then you'll have more lights on. if all 3 colors in your RGB LED are burning at full strength, then yes, it's pulling 60ma. Any other combination and it's pulling less. An RGB LED is just 3 separate LEDs shoved into one bulb.
Do NOT put the external 5v power line into bank 1, or any bank for that matter. Put it into the bank labeled x5v (the one that is probably currently jumped to the u5v pin). Just un-jump it before you hook it up, otherwise you'll be feeding who-knows-how-many amps BACKWARDS through the board, and into your USB port, and i assure you that none of your stuff will survive. All of your +5v leads coming off of the LEDs also go in x5v. A screw terminal block will help with a lot of wires but with only 12, you should be able to stick them all right in there. If you're going to use external power, you also need an external ground (the black wire on your PSU's 4-wire connector) and that goes in the screw terminal marked G. The ground in the USB cable will not be able to take the heat.
This is based on the V1 documentation with the large chip. if you have a V2 board, the documentation is more confusing to me, but I could work it out easily if you provided a top-down photo of the board. It "looks" like GGG just divided up ports 1-8 and 9-16 when it comes to where the power is coming from, by splitting the old x5v port into what's essentially x5v1 and x5v2 (or 12v for that matter). Can't say for sure until I actually see a v2 board.