Trinket M0 and DotStar 8x8 matrix

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Lukasbruh
 
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Trinket M0 and DotStar 8x8 matrix

Post by Lukasbruh »

Hello everybody. I'm very new to tinkering so please forgive me if the answer to my question seems obvious. I purchased a Trinket M0 and I'm trying to use it to drive the DotStar 8x8 matrix. I have soldered the 5 pins to the board on both sides. I then used a few cables to attach GND to GND, USB to +5V, and SDA (or pin "0" on the top of the board) to DIN.

I found the Trinket M0 board in the boards manager. I installed the Dotstar Libraries. I verified the port and the port even says "Trinket M0". I then loaded the MatrixTest example to the Trinket. Everything goes through fine. No errors are thrown and the dotstar on the board changes to a purple color, but the Matrix I attached to the board doesn't light up at all.

I'm wondering if I need to solder the CIN wire to matrix and attach it to the Trinket? I'm not really sure what I could be missing outside of that. Any help is greatly appreciated.

Thank you!

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dastels
 
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Re: Trinket M0 and DotStar 8x8 matrix

Post by dastels »

Yes, Dotstars have a clock and data inputs, whereas NeoPixels just have a data input. See https://learn.adafruit.com/adafruit-dotstar-leds for more information.

Dave

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Lukasbruh
 
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Re: Trinket M0 and DotStar 8x8 matrix

Post by Lukasbruh »

Thank you for your help! I connected CIN > 2 pin. The four wires are connected. The only light that changes is the light on the board itself. I uploaded the matrixtest again and still got nothing. The light on the board changed and the Arduino IDE says "Verify Successful" so I assume that everything has been uploaded correctly.

I was holding the trinket and I realized that when I touch a couple of the pins that the light on the board changes. Does that mean there could be some sort of soldering issue? The Matrix still isn't lighting up at all just the single light of the Trinket.

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dastels
 
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Re: Trinket M0 and DotStar 8x8 matrix

Post by dastels »

I was holding the trinket and I realized that when I touch a couple of the pins that the light on the board changes. Does that mean there could be some sort of soldering issue?
Unlikely. You are either milding shorting some pins and/or introducing some EMF in a similar way a touch input works... except they aren't touch input so you shouldn't touch them.
The four wires are connected. The only light that changes is the light on the board itself. I uploaded the matrixtest again and still got nothing. The light on the board changed and the Arduino IDE says "Verify Successful" so I assume that everything has been uploaded correctly.
Yes, it sounds like it's being uploaded ok. Do the pins you are using correspond to what the code is expecting?

Dave

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Lukasbruh
 
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Re: Trinket M0 and DotStar 8x8 matrix

Post by Lukasbruh »

Ah that appears to have been the issue. However, "Howdy" is scrolling backwards. But either way it's working!

Thank you so much for your help I really appreciate it!

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dastels
 
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Re: Trinket M0 and DotStar 8x8 matrix

Post by dastels »

Excellent! Now the fun begins!

Dave

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