Going large - Has anyone had experience with large installations?
Im currently brainstorming some festival LED installations and want to go big (bigger than last year https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLuB2Xzgyc1qKJKEXaxsSNBD0AnfUIGSg8)
Has anyone reach some capacity issues with certain length of strips /number of leds)?
maybe something like 8 strips at 450 leds each.
power aside, do i need to look at something more powerful than teensy?
Locus was 24 strips of 120-150 LEDs each, run in parallel off of an Arduino due.
My largest project to date is an LED suit with 2300 pixels. Only issue I had was that the rpi couldnt go above 5-6mhz. Working on an instalation now for a music festival that has 1900 leds also using an rpi, no real issues. Power deliver seems to be the biggest headache for most.
I would also think that distance between the Arduino and the LED strips would be an issue, or driving 2 or more LED strips with a single pin would also be an issue.
In the meantime, I told someone today the story of the dude with an LED tree and the 70 amp power supply. Boggles the mind.
Locus had 30’ cable runs from the controller to some of the LED strips - combination of level shifters between the due and the strips and using cat5e cable for the long runs with 16 gauge wire for the power.
My biggest to date is 2000-2200 pixels (2200 defined, slightly less used - was using octo and the area didn’t divide perfectly). No real problems but it was a screen layout and thus no long runs for data or power. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RS4fIGitxLo
I ran it full white for a while pre-install and had to replace 2 pixels which died during that, then a couple of months later 1 more but it’s been fine since. Frame rate was decent, my laptop maxed out before the lights at approx 30fps and it was getting 40+ on the final install which i locked to 40 so their machine didn’t sweat too much.
My OIJ project was 2560 pixels, a little under 1kW at the wall. The strips were split into 16 separate sticks of 160 LEDs each, intended to be distributed around the stage.
Something to look out for, especially in the US: I used 4 × 250W PSUs, which pulled something like 2A @ 220VAC each at their full rated output. It was a massive pain running 12VDC over intermediate cabling and then dropping that to 5V when it hit the strips, but smaller 5V PSUs are so much less efficient that 16 of them in aggregate would have drawn over 10A at the mains, which is the most a typical domestic circuit can support!