Datasheet hunting time! APA has three interesting chipsets out there. There’s the APA-102, which as far as I’m concerned is the best thing to happen since we started getting addressable leds.
There’s also the APA-104, which is basically their clone of the WS2812B.
Then there’s the APA-101/APA-101B. I can’t find any datasheets on the protocol used by this one. I have a fear that this one is the 5-bit per pixel chipset (more compact data protocol, sure, but wow, how about that loss in color resolution?), but I want to find a datasheet to be sure.
And before anyone here goes buying APA-101’s, don’t - if they are 5-bit per pixel, we aren’t going to support it because, well, that’s just going backwards while rubbing your face with 100-grit sandpaper.