Close up of the IC dies inaide the SK9822 and old APA102 pixels! I recently had access to a very good microscope, but it had no camera so these photos were taken with my phone and are not the best. Note that the microscope i used is intended for through-illumination, so i had to gold a very bright torch in one hand and my phone in the other to get these(afterthought, i should have just powered these pixels on at the lowest setting)
The pic on the top is an APA102 pixel from early 2016, its an authentic APA102 before they were impossible to source.
The pic on the bottom left is an SK9822 purchased Jan 2017, the die itself is much amaller,its about 30% smaller than the APA102 die.
Finaly bottom right is what is currently being sold by Ray Wu as APA102. It is infact THE EXACT same die as the SK9822(appart from what looks like 1 more pin?). If you order iether the sk9822 or apa102 from his store, this is what you get. I can confirm that its SK9822 because the strip can be driven up to 30mhz.
Shout out to anyone who has access to a proper DIE microscope, I am willing to pay a $20 bounty to get the IC identified with markings!
