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Standalone LED system?

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johnnysmitch:
^ a computer power supply might be kind of an overkill for just lighting up some LEDs for your panel... depending on how much lighting you have in mind, you might want to look into just battery powering it (LEDs have very low draw, even the ultrabrights), or getting a small AC adaptor or something along those lines (check out mouser.com, allelectronics.com), which would save you a bunch of space, and possibly even some wires. If you're really feeling adventurous, you could rig it up to power the lighting off the USB port, too.

Trimoor:
Don't bother with a spare PC power supply for just a few LEDs.  Use a 5-12V DC adapter, commonly called a wall wart.  They are cheap and extremely simple to use.

Or you could use batteries.  Buy a 12V rechargeable lead acid battery, and it will drive LEDs continuously for months before needing a recharge.

NoBonus:
How do I rig up a switch and leds to a battery?  Do I find a LED flashlight and rip it apart? If so, where do I get one for cheap?

oldsage:
I've been thinking about adding an extra PSU for my "interface box"... You guys make it sound horribly unneeded, but I'll keep mine because of extendability - might want to add a "shocker module" to my cab one day... :)

Back to the topic - do i need an individual resistor for each led if i power them off a PSU? I'm not that familiar with this stuff... What do you need a resistor for anyway?

(sorry if I'm hogging your thread... If this is unrelated feel free to ignore me...)

tetsujin:

--- Quote from: oldsage on April 05, 2005, 05:17:50 pm ---Back to the topic - do i need an individual resistor for each led if i power them off a PSU? I'm not that familiar with this stuff... What do you need a resistor for anyway?

--- End quote ---

You need the resistor to prevent too much power from going to the LED.  Too much power will cause it to burn out.  You need to have one resistor per LED if they're in parallel - if they're in series, you can use just one.

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