RGB LED Drivers

Howdy All,

Just joined but I'm wishing I'd found the place a long time ago!

My passion is RGB LEDs and finding ways to make it easier to put them wherever you want and being able to control them from a central point (or not).

To that end, I've designed two RGBLED controllers -- one that control up to 13 RGB LEDs (39 outputs) and a small compact one that can drive 3 RGBLEDs (9 outputs).

All LEDs are driven via PWM (the larger one via some PWM chips, the smaller one done in software) via a PIC processor. The LEDs can be controlled over a serial interface (only needing one serial line and ground) from any computer with a serial port.

Each board has the following:
* Ability to set each LED to 1 of 16 million colors (i.e. 24 bit RGB)
* Ability to define "animations" (more below)
* Ability to program initial LED states (including animation) as power up defaults
* Ability to slave LED outputs (for more current or just driving more LEDs)
* Drive common anode or common cathode LEDs (smaller "mRGBLED" only)
* Drive common anode LEDs at 20ma with no current limiting resistors (larger RGBLED only)

The animation stuff is optional, but you can do things like say "fade LED #0 from red to blue over 2 minutes" or "pulse LED #3 from bright to dim red at 1hz" or anything else. There is a color table that can handle 32 colors and those colors can be allocated in any configuration to the LEDs (so you could have a 32 step color table on LED 0 or have LED 0 and 1 have 10 steps each and LED 2 have 12, etc).

Each controller can have the state of each LED stored in EEPROM for power up defaults. So if you just want to program the color, state (on/off) or even animations for LEDs and then want the unit to run independent/unconnected to a computer, you just download the configuratio, save it and disconnect from the computer. Nice thing is, you can later reconnect and reprogram it. Of course, you can leave the computer connected all the time, if it helps.

I include a Java RGBLED test program that lets you experiment with the boards, test colors, animations, etc and save them as power up defaults. I also include a xPL module that allows control over all your RGBLED drivers from anywhere on a LAN (xPL is a simple network oriented automation protocol that has lots of support for). And for those wanting to interface directly, the control protocol is a simple text based protocol that is full documented.

All source code and PC Board CAD files are available for download free for non-commercial use. I also offer a small store so that if folks want a few PC boards (I make them up in batches) or want pre-programmed PICs (the rest of the stuff you can get locally), they can buy it. But that is only a **convenience** -- you do not need to use/buy things from it at all to get this going -- there are no "hidden" parts to the project. All the files you need to compile it yourself or even get PC Board fabricated is included in the distribution.

Anyway -- sorry for the big windy intro. You can read more about it at www.rgbled.org

Final note: There seems to be folks from all sorts of technical and non-tech backgrounds here. This is definitely more a techie thing, not a "finished product", so while you can get the boards assembled if you don't want to solder, even then it will require some electronics (like calculating dropping resistors (mRGBLED only) or connecting the serial port wires or getting a 5 volt power supply, etc).

Gerry

P.S. If this is the wrong place for this post, please feel free to let me know or just move it. I couldn't quite decide where the best place was, so I looked for the most RGBLED references and this forum seemed to be it

P.S. again -- I'll be posting an updated distribution to the rgbled.org site in the next few days with markedly improved firmware for the smaller RGBLED driver (the mRGBLED driver). So if you decide to play around, go ahead, but before you seal a chip in epoxy, wait until the weekend for the updated firmware

I'm not in a position to make use of this yet, but I'm glad you posted this here -- it looks really cool! I'm planning to build a new workstation later this year, and I want to add lighting effects to it.

Have you considered marketing this device to the casemod community? PC's already have suitable power sources, all you'd have to do is put a Molex on the board for +5/+12 volts and you are off to the races.

I'm suprised this post got all the way to page 3 with only 42 views, but don't let that put you off, I expect there's lots of folks here who'd be interested in this device besides myself.

And, welcome to CPF! Have a look around, I think you'll fit in just fine here.

cool

I have some Zled RGB LEDs for decoration lighting and I use a VLM RGB driver for them. More information on http://www.vlm.it/vlm/main.nsf/indicesezione?openform&sezione=PTDL-DLDC-DLDCC9D610 . I'm very satisfied of this driver, it's very user friendly and works just fine (4 modes : rainbow fade, warm colors fade, cold colors fade, user adjustable output for each color), however the fading between different colors isn't always as smooth as I want. Sometimes you can see one color going a step down and I think this isn't smooth enough if it's visible. I am still looking for some better RGB drivers for further projects, so if someone can supply RGB drivers, feel free to contact me

Very cool. And welcome to CPF. I would like to know how to get started working with this little controller. Do you offer the PC boards ??? Please tell me how I should proceed to build/test this multicolor led light controller. This is something I have interested in for some time now. Cooll Cool Cool .

Gary

Erasmus said:

I have some Zled RGB LEDs for decoration lighting and I use a VLM RGB driver for them.

Click to expand...

Can you connect it to a computer and define colors and such? Or is it more "select a color/option from a predefined list of options" type?

While you can pre-define a set of animations (or just plain colors -- not everything needs to be animated) and have the RGBLED/mRGBLED units work standalone, it's real power comes from being able to connect it to a computer (or anything with a serial port) and adjust LED colors in realtime in response to various things. Sometimes that just means cool effects (I'm building a set of animated light columns for my screening room with these and some high-power RGBLEDs).

however the fading between different colors isn't always as smooth as I want. Sometimes you can see one color going a step down and I think this isn't smooth enough if it's visible

Click to expand...

I've noticed this sort of stuff too. It's odd the number of RGBLED controllers that have this artifact. I was talking to a guy who is planning on opening an LED lighting shop and his moderately expensive DMX controller for the RGBLED rope light flickered quite a bit when fading between colors.

I've spent a lot of time on both the RGBLED and mRGBLED controllers to make them as flicker free as possible. If you are sensitive to 60hz flicker (like from a flourescent), you just might see something when fading amongst low-light colors (less than 25% brightness) on the mRGBLED board, though so far, I seem to be the only one noticing that. The mRGBLED board processor is doing the PWM work (to allow a color to be displayed) and the animation work (to fade from one color to another) which is why it only refreshes colors at 61hz (actually, it refreshes the LEDs at 15khz, but there are at most 61 color "steps" per second on an LED). The RGBLED board uses hardware for the PWM function so technically the fades are even smoother, though again, no one I've showed both units to could see any difference.

Gerry

Canuke said:

I'm not in a position to make use of this yet, but I'm glad you posted this here -- it looks really cool! I'm planning to build a new workstation later this year, and I want to add lighting effects to it.

Click to expand...

I've had a few folks trying this out to some success. They have the colors in the case tied to things like heat, processor load, time of day, etc. Moderately nifty!

Have you considered marketing this device to the casemod community?

Click to expand...

I'm really not marketing it at all, but if I did, that is a good idea. I started the project because I wanted to have RGB LEDs with full color control that I could integrate into all sorts of things (landscape lighting, arcade cabinets, effects lighting, etc) and found that controlling the RGBLEDs was both difficult and resource/time expensive. So after I got it working, I've made all the materials (firmware, CAD/Schematics, etc) available for others who might want to use it. I do have a small "store", but that is because not everyone has the requisite PIC processor programmer or wants to pay to have a single PC board created.

Gerry

COMMANDR said:

Very cool. And welcome to CPF. I would like to know how to get started working with this little controller. Do you offer the PC boards ???

Click to expand...

A couple of ways to start off. The least expensive, if you have the materials, is to download the distribution files from rgbled.org. You'd need to have a programmer that can program a PIC processor chip. With the mRGBLED board, that is basically all you need -- you can wire up the rest (there are very few external components needed). With the RGBLED board, it has surface mount devices that pretty much require you to use a PC board (though the CAD files which be sent right to a PCB prototyping shop are included in that download).

I do have a supply of boards (it's cheap for me to get 100 of them made -- almost cheaper than getting 10 made) and pre-programmed PIC processor chips as well as an option to have the boards assembled and tested. There should be a store link on the main RGBLED page. But I want to make sure folks don't feel I'm trying to sell something here -- as I've said, you can get everything you need in the download files.

Please tell me how I should proceed to build/test this multicolor led light controller. This is something I have interested in for some time now.

Click to expand...

If you have some electronics skills, I'd recommend building the mRGBLED. You can also order it (assembled or not). I'd recommend, at least as a start, buying some RGBLEDs from superbrightleds.com (make sure to get the common ANODE ones and do get the frosted/diffused ones -- the clear ones seem brighter, but the colors do not mix well (so yellow has very distinct red and green halos).

If you do the mRGBLED route, you will need to get some current limiting resistors (150ohm for red, 67ohm for green and blue). The RGBLED board automatically limits the current, so no extra resistors are needed.

You will need to be able to have access to a regulated 5 volt power supply (the 5 volt part of a computers power supply is fine) and be able to hook up a serial port cable (buy a serial port cable, cut the male end off and pick out the wires and screw them down).

If you have any questions, please feel free to ask (here or at the rgbled.org forums).

Gerry

gduprey said:

Can you connect it to a computer and define colors and such? Or is it more "select a color/option from a predefined list of options" type?

Click to expand...

No computer connection at all, however there are DMX versions of this driver available. No one wanted to explain me how DMX works and what other devices and software I need, and what all that stuff costs, so I just took the non-DMX version. On the driver is a push button to choose from 3 predefined color fades : rainbow, warm colors, cool colors. Apart from that, there are 3 turning buttons on the device with which you can set each main color (red, green, blue) to a decent level to get the color mix you want.

gduprey said:

While you can pre-define a set of animations (or just plain colors -- not everything needs to be animated) and have the RGBLED/mRGBLED units work standalone, it's real power comes from being able to connect it to a computer (or anything with a serial port) and adjust LED colors in realtime in response to various things. Sometimes that just means cool effects (I'm building a set of animated light columns for my screening room with these and some high-power RGBLEDs).

Click to expand...

This is really cool and I'm certainly interested, but I want to have a finished product with software with a clear interface through which it is not difficult to explore all possibilities of your creation. If you can supply all this, please contact me Soldering it all together is no problem for me if you provide a plan.

gduprey said:

I've noticed this sort of stuff too. It's odd the number of RGBLED controllers that have this artifact. I was talking to a guy who is planning on opening an LED lighting shop and his moderately expensive DMX controller for the RGBLED rope light flickered quite a bit when fading between colors.

I've spent a lot of time on both the RGBLED and mRGBLED controllers to make them as flicker free as possible. If you are sensitive to 60hz flicker (like from a flourescent), you just might see something when fading amongst low-light colors (less than 25% brightness) on the mRGBLED board, though so far, I seem to be the only one noticing that. The mRGBLED board processor is doing the PWM work (to allow a color to be displayed) and the animation work (to fade from one color to another) which is why it only refreshes colors at 61hz (actually, it refreshes the LEDs at 15khz, but there are at most 61 color "steps" per second on an LED). The RGBLED board uses hardware for the PWM function so technically the fades are even smoother, though again, no one I've showed both units to could see any difference.

Gerry

Click to expand...

Apparently my eyes are quite sensitive to flickering. Even if your solution is not yet completely flicker-free, each improvement is a step forward.

By the way, are you able to supply these drivers for 350mA LEDs? You see, the ZLED is a Luxeon-like LED which is made to be driven at 350mA.

Erasmus said:

This is really cool and I'm certainly interested, but I want to have a finished product with software with a clear interface through which it is not difficult to explore all possibilities of your creation. If you can supply all this, please contact me Soldering it all together is no problem for me if you provide a plan.

Click to expand...

Well, not exactly sure what you call "finished" product, but there are dozens of people using it. The firmware has been in use in one version or another for over a year. The CAD files for sending to a PC board fabricators have been done for at least as long. There is a Java based GUI included that lets you explore virtually every capability of the board including setting up power-up defaults and if you're into automation, there is an included xPL gateway for controlling LEDs via commands over the local area network.

If by finished you mean "in a case, with a manual, serial cable and power supply", that's not likely to happen. I'm not doing this as a business per se. While I will sell assembled boards or parts, that again is mostly meant as a convience for folks.

By the way, are you able to supply these drivers for 350mA LEDs? You see, the ZLED is a Luxeon-like LED which is made to be driven at 350mA.

Click to expand...

I use a bunch of 3 watt prolight RGB leds that take about 375ma per color with this. I did build a power driver circuit (the schematic for which and a PC board layout, if wanted, are included in the distribution files). Just 3 MOSFET transitions, three pull up resistors and three current limiting power-resistors makes a working driver.

Because you are using RGB with PWM drive, keep in mind if you do sell it, you are quite possibly violating Color Kinetics patent and they tend to be pretty aggressive in defending it.

Semiman

SemiMan said:

Because you are using RGB with PWM drive, keep in mind if you do sell it, you are quite possibly violating Color Kinetics patent and they tend to be pretty aggressive in defending it.

Click to expand...

Worth keeping in the back of my mind.

But I can't imagine on what grounds they'd have. PWM has been around as a technique for controlling levels of lights, LED, etc for a long time and whatever controls they implement are pretty unlikely to be remotely similar to what I use. The LED side would mean nearly any thing with a dimmable LED would be a target. Heck, Maxim makes the chip I use and it's specifically designed to control brightness of LEDs.

I'd have to take a look at the patent at some point, should it ever be a concern, to see what they claim.

Gerry

Erasmus,

I just finished my own RGB project with 8 Lux III's (2 x R @ 1A and 3 x B + G @ 700 mA). I used a controller from Barthelme: http://www.chromoflex.com/. Compared to the VLM controller (which I also used in previous projects) this thing is a 1000x better. You can connect it to you PC through the RS232 serial port and use the free software to generate any effect you like. Just download it into the controller, disconnect and ready to rock!

They are also using a special PWM algorithm which smoothes the flickering a lot (a big difference compared to the VLM controller).

I also designed a power LED driver with settable current (it's a linear version...so you have to match you power supply voltage to the LEDs in order to get good efficiencies and not too much heat).

For details where to buy this stuff, just send me an email (no PM please)
Price is a bit less than 90 euro if I'm right.

Groetjes,
Wim

Erasmus said:

No computer connection at all, however there are DMX versions of this driver available. No one wanted to explain me how DMX works and what other devices and software I need, and what all that stuff costs, so I just took the non-DMX version. On the driver is a push button to choose from 3 predefined color fades : rainbow, warm colors, cool colors. Apart from that, there are 3 turning buttons on the device with which you can set each main color (red, green, blue) to a decent level to get the color mix you want.


This is really cool and I'm certainly interested, but I want to have a finished product with software with a clear interface through which it is not difficult to explore all possibilities of your creation. If you can supply all this, please contact me Soldering it all together is no problem for me if you provide a plan.


Apparently my eyes are quite sensitive to flickering. Even if your solution is not yet completely flicker-free, each improvement is a step forward.

By the way, are you able to supply these drivers for 350mA LEDs? You see, the ZLED is a Luxeon-like LED which is made to be driven at 350mA.

Click to expand...

Erasmus said:

I have some Zled RGB LEDs for decoration lighting and I use a VLM RGB driver for them. More information on http://www.vlm.it/vlm/main.nsf/indicesezione?openform&sezione=PTDL-DLDC-DLDCC9D610 . I'm very satisfied of this driver, it's very user friendly and works just fine (4 modes : rainbow fade, warm colors fade, cold colors fade, user adjustable output for each color), however the fading between different colors isn't always as smooth as I want. Sometimes you can see one color going a step down and I think this isn't smooth enough if it's visible. I am still looking for some better RGB drivers for further projects, so if someone can supply RGB drivers, feel free to contact me

Click to expand...

Hi, may I ask you what you think of the SSC ZLED RGB?
I have been looking at the 6-pin RGB Power LED for a while now and I would be glad to know if you reccomend me to use them or not.

gduprey said:

Well, not exactly sure what you call "finished" product, but there are dozens of people using it. The firmware has been in use in one version or another for over a year. The CAD files for sending to a PC board fabricators have been done for at least as long. There is a Java based GUI included that lets you explore virtually every capability of the board including setting up power-up defaults and if you're into automation, there is an included xPL gateway for controlling LEDs via commands over the local area network.

If by finished you mean "in a case, with a manual, serial cable and power supply", that's not likely to happen. I'm not doing this as a business per se. While I will sell assembled boards or parts, that again is mostly meant as a convience for folks.

Click to expand...

It's not necessary to have a completed product like they could be sold in stores, but I do want to have clear instructions on how to assemble everything and how to explore the posibilities of driving them through a computer I don't want a bunch of electronics that I can't use

gduprey said:

I use a bunch of 3 watt prolight RGB leds that take about 375ma per color with this. I did build a power driver circuit (the schematic for which and a PC board layout, if wanted, are included in the distribution files). Just 3 MOSFET transitions, three pull up resistors and three current limiting power-resistors makes a working driver.

Click to expand...

Sounds great! Please send me some information for driving around 10 RGB LEDs, including prices.

Wim Hertog said:

Erasmus,

I just finished my own RGB project with 8 Lux III's (2 x R @ 1A and 3 x B + G @ 700 mA). I used a controller from Barthelme: http://www.chromoflex.com/. Compared to the VLM controller (which I also used in previous projects) this thing is a 1000x better. You can connect it to you PC through the RS232 serial port and use the free software to generate any effect you like. Just download it into the controller, disconnect and ready to rock!

They are also using a special PWM algorithm which smoothes the flickering a lot (a big difference compared to the VLM controller).

I also designed a power LED driver with settable current (it's a linear version...so you have to match you power supply voltage to the LEDs in order to get good efficiencies and not too much heat).

For details where to buy this stuff, just send me an email (no PM please)
Price is a bit less than 90 euro if I'm right.

Groetjes,
Wim

Click to expand...

E-mail sent Thanks buddy!

Opto-King said:

Hi, may I ask you what you think of the SSC ZLED RGB?
I have been looking at the 6-pin RGB Power LED for a while now and I would be glad to know if you reccomend me to use them or not.

Click to expand...

Great LEDs in my opinion. RGB mixing is very good since the three diodes are very near to each other. The 4-pin version is available for a good price on this website : http://stores.ebay.de/LEDSEE-electronics_RGB-LEDs_W0QQcolZ2QQdirZQ2d1QQfsubZ5QQftidZ2QQtZkm

Erasmus said:

Great LEDs in my opinion. RGB mixing is very good since the three diodes are very near to each other. http://stores.ebay.de/LEDSEE-electronics_RGB-LEDs_W0QQcolZ2QQdirZQ2d1QQfsubZ5QQftidZ2QQtZkm

Click to expand...

You may want to also look into the prolight leds. I checked out the Zleds and the specs are nearly the same (angle of beam, primary color wavelengths, current etc. The packages are nearly the same. LCK LED careies them as does a dealer in Europe http://www.lck-led.com/

Gerry

Erasmus said:

It's not necessary to have a completed product like they could be sold in stores, but I do want to have clear instructions on how to assemble everything and how to explore the posibilities of driving them through a computer I don't want a bunch of electronics that I can't use

Click to expand...

Not sure if you had a chance to check out the website (http://www.rgbled.org), but I beleive everything you've asked for is there. The specs, the devices, assembly instructions, parts lists, suppliers and kits.

Sounds great! Please send me some information for driving around 10 RGB LEDs, including prices.

Click to expand...

Hopefully, you'll find everything you need there. If not, just ask!

Have a great evening,

Gerry

Will the high output driver be able to drive the new Lamina Ceramics Titan RGBLEDs? I'm looking for a driver/controller (1ch is ok) capable of driving at least 2, or a set of drivers that can be hooked up with 1 controller so they're all the same color. I believe they will have similar specs as the BL-3000 series for current and voltage, but I haven't seen a spec sheet yet. According to Lamina, they are available now but their first shipment has sold out. I have one of the Atlas RGBLEDs on the way to play around with, I'll probably just hook it up with 3 potentiometers.


http://www.laminaceramics.com/news/052406.aspx