Newbie needs help

[scharbon]

All,
Great Forum. I have always wanted to control my Christmas lights and never knew how - I stumbled across CC and Vixen and realize now that I can do it. With your patience and help, I'll be the first on the street (3 other guys are waiting for me to do it before they start). I am pretty excited about getting started. Just need to wait for my mouser parts to come in so I can start building. I hope to use this thread as a journal of all the beginner questions I have and the answers I need. Assuming I don't burn down the house, I will consolidate everything into a detailed How-To that the next newbie can use.

I am building an Olsen 595 using Brian's board - I intend to load my boards into a discarded computer case. I will use the power supply that is part of the discarded case to power my boards. I think hooking up my board to this power supply will be my biggest challenge (cause I really don't know what I am doing with the power supply).

My first question is about hooking into the power supply. To get the power, I think I should use the peripheral power connector (4 pin connector) and use Pin 4 (+5 volts) and Pin 3 (COM - which I believe is the common or ground). Is that right?

Thanks for any help you can provide.

[Macrosill]

If it is an ATX power supply the the red wire should be 5v positive and the black wire should be the ground. These are the wires that go to the drives and fans. Those are the ones you need to tap for the 5v supply to the 595 board.

You will also need to "load" the psu if the controlling pc will not be inside this case. Read below:

"ATX power supplies are "switch-mode supplies"; they must always have some load to operate properly. The power resistor is there to "waste" energy, which will give off heat; therefore it should be mounted on the metal wall for proper cooling. If you will always have something connected to the supply when it is on, you may leave out the power resistor."

You will also need to bond the grounds from the controlling pc together with the grounds from the psu for the 595 boards. You can do this by connecting any one of pins 18-25 of the controlling pc's parallel port through the cat5 cable to the input jack pin 3. The grounds from the pc and separate psu are tied together through the pcb.

If you need more info about the load resistor check out the link in the How To section http://www.christmasinshirley.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=96

Good Luck,

[scharbon]

Next, cut the red wire -- but first cut the blue one!!!

Finally got to the power supply unit this weekend (ANTEC SL400). The directions on the link you provided were pretty helpful, but my PSU is a little newer than the one in this set of instructions.

Instead of one brown sensing wire, I have two sensing wires. An orange one that senses the load for the 3.3V power connections and a red sensing wire that checks the loads on the 5V connections.

Found directions that have me connecting the orange sensing wire to the cluster of orange wires, but I don't know what to do with the red sensing wire.

Shoud I just connect it to the power resistor along with one of the 5V lines and a ground so the PSU determines it is under a constant load? Should I just bind it with any red wire(similar to how the 3.3V sensing wire is hooked up)? Or should I connect it to the 5V wire I intend to hook up to the 595?

I think I should either hook it up to the power resistor along with one of the 5V lines or the wire I intend to hook up to the 595. Any suggestions?

[klanger]

Hi Scharbon
http://web2.murraystate.edu/andy.batts/ps/POWERSUPPLY.HTM
Try this site as well, i used both sites for info on makeing mine, read the "Design Guide Update" as this covers the sense wires.

Kevin

[scharbon]

Thanks all, and I am done with my power supply for my 595 - and it works too! This was the first time I have ever done anything like this with electronics. My two primary concerns were burning down the house and/or waking up in the hospital with my wife telling me I couldn't play anymore. Neither happened so I am still a go for building my Olson.

My Mouser parts came in but they were short LEDs and 18 PIN sockets (no estimated delivery date on the sockets), so I ordered from Futurlec. The balance of my parts should be in sometime around the 16th of June. Then I get to start building. Looking forward to it.

Thanks for your help and patience. My next set of questions should actually be about building or unbreaking my 595.

Steve