Holiday Neopixel Strip

EL Wire/Tape/Panels, LEDs, pixels and strips, LCDs and TFTs, etc products from Adafruit

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bcochran1
 
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Holiday Neopixel Strip

Post by bcochran1 »



I am enjoying this 2-meter Neopixel strip -- it is product number 1138.

2 meter neopixel strip, operated by a Sanguino clone
2 meter neopixel strip, operated by a Sanguino clone
2_meter_neopixel_strip_operated_by_sanguino_small.jpg (298.2 KiB) Viewed 179 times
The strip needs to be powered by a 5v, 10a power supply. I purchased one from Adafruit and followed the wiring instructions given in the Uberguide for Neopixels. The microcontroller part is an Atmega644A which is set up as a Sanguino clone. It is on the breadboard. It has the Optiboot loader on it, and for this photo, the Adafruit-supplied "strandtest" sketch is running.

I will post a detail of the power supply tomorrow. I know it is hard to see with all that blue tape. I get very nervous about short circuits.

One high-impact lesson I learned while setting this up: don't try to power the microcontroller and breadboard from the computer. I think I miswired something; I am not sure exactly what I did wrong, but the moment I plugged the USB cable from the Mac to the programmer on the breadboard, with the 5v 10A power supply also connected to the NeoPixels and supplying live power to them, the Mac crashed instantly and displayed this very ugly black-and-white text message. Then the Mac restarted itself, and everything seems okay, thankfully. Thank you, Apple, for building the Mac tough and strong! I am still sweating in fear from that one.

Now what I do is -- if I use the 5v 10A supply brick, I power the microcontroller from a powered USB hub which is not connected to a host computer. The entire purpose of the hub is to supply power to the breadboard. When I want to upload a sketch, I totally disconnect the 5v 10A power supply, and the neopixel data and ground connections, and then I upload the sketch normally, through the programmer. (It is a "USB BUB" built by Modern Device.)
The microcontroller, power brick, and USB hub
The microcontroller, power brick, and USB hub
5v_power_brick_for_neopixels_small.jpg (220.05 KiB) Viewed 179 times
Bob

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adafruit_support_bill
 
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Re: Holiday Neopixel Strip

Post by adafruit_support_bill »

Nice work bob! Thanks for posting.

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bcochran1
 
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Joined: Mon Jan 21, 2013 10:46 pm

Re: Holiday Neopixel Strip

Post by bcochran1 »


Thank you!

Unfortunately the tree fell down late last night. There was quite a mess. We need to re-decorate it again.

Bob


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