RGB LED's Now Consumer Grade - Hackable?

[Livermore-Dad]

Congrats that board looks great and much more than many of us NEWBs could do. Well done, and thanks for posting!
Tory

[dirknerkle]

I just wanted to say thanks to everyone who has figured these lights out. I've never done anything with my Arduiono besides blink pin 13 since I got it years ago, but I have just completed (for me) an ambitious project to use two 50 light sets to make a scoreboard type clock / New Year's Eve countdown timer.

Again, thanks everyone for all the tips. I own a bar, so I'll be putting this up tomorrow to ring in the New Year.

Way to go -- and Welcome to DIYC! Wow, what a terrific first project! That you posted your code was a terrific idea -- any other photos of the inside of the board, construction, closeups, etc. would really be great, too.

[diamaunt]

I just wanted to say thanks to everyone who has figured these lights out. I've never done anything with my Arduiono besides blink pin 13 since I got it years ago, but I have just completed (for me) an ambitious project to use two 50 light sets to make a scoreboard type clock / New Year's Eve countdown timer.

Again, thanks everyone for all the tips. I own a bar, so I'll be putting this up tomorrow to ring in the New Year.

Bravo Sir! and well done... I'm trying to figure out how I can quickly and easily whip up some way to mount the bulbs so I can use your idea tonight.... at the house, just for fun... *grin*.

I have a few notes on the code that might help though.

you wouldn't need delay_x.h and digitalWriteFast, if you'll change the two calls in the setup() function to pinModeFast and digitalWriteFast to simple pinMode and digitalWrite, and change the two calls of _delay_s(1) to... well, just delete those, they're not needed, nor is the delay(500). and you can cut the delay(5000) down to 500, or less, the nodes just need to get power before being enumerated, but you don't need much of a delay.

you've got the pins hard coded in there, somewhere, but when I was looking at the code last night, and trying to get it to work, I couldn't figure out where *grin*, I just know when I tried to change the pin assignment, it failed.

overall, though, very nice.... and a great idea.

[pmcpa]

so here's the question.... What control board would be the best for what software? maybe a spreadsheet with features of each board?

[vinhtvu2]

I was at Lowes and saw a set of these at 75% off!!! They came out to be $21 and some change!!! It was so cheap I couldn't resist. I remember seeing something about these being hacked on Hackaday, so I got them.

Brought them home, read up on Darco's blog a little to get a little history about them, then saw Chris' arduino code.

Put a little bit here, and little bit there together, and here's the result:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8A79czegvQ

it's a simple sketch for now, but the control on the RGB is very good, timing is good as well, there is a slight flickering if you notice in the video, but to the eye, there's no flickering. I cant see it anyway. Links in the description has my codes, and thanks to all those that contributed!!

[ags0000]

I was at Lowes and saw a set of these at 75% off!!! They came out to be $21 and some change!!! It was so cheap I couldn't resist. I remember seeing something about these being hacked on Hackaday, so I got them.

How long ago, did they have any more, where are you, and would you consider shipping to CA? I need one set.

[Livermore-Dad]

Can't believe there were any left, great price!

Tory

[vinhtvu2]

You can check yourself...

http://www.lowes.com/pd_25042-25734-...E%2Bmulticolor

Change store at the top to your local area, then it'll search and see. Most I see now are temporarily unavailable... but a few with "limited availability", which mean they have one or two unit left. Totally worth it to make a run for it.

I'm going to pick up another one tomorrow about 20 miles away... not too bad.

Sorry, no, I will not be selling these... I have lots of plans for them.

[Livermore-Dad]

ya have 6 sets myself. Now just interested in a board/vixen/renard/DMX solution. Hope something like the Ren48LSD will power/ground them and just need to work on the data portion.

Love the way these look and the fact they can do lots of cool stuff. Including what I consider to be a pretty bright nice lil strobe effect.

[erm213]

FYI, the snowflake lights are confirmed to be the same. I have these, and hooked them up. They have white wire, and the diffuser is not as pointy, but the lights are the same.

Erik