I need a little help making the move to Teensy 3.2 from Arduino Mega

Archive FastLED Archive
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I need a little help making the move to Teensy 3.2 from Arduino Mega for control of WS2812s (and SK6812s), and am hoping the community can help me filter some of the noise to find a good tutorial that will help me port my existing Arduino code to the Teensy 3.2.

  1. I also have an OctoWS2811. Given that I’m comfortable with controlling LEDs with the Arduino Mega, should I try to wire things up with the Teensy and the OctoWS2811 first, or should I start by using the Teensy only to control a single strip? Since I think I need to wire a level shifter if I don’t use the Octo, my thought was that I should probably just start out using it?

  2. If I should start out with Teensy + OctoWS2811, then can someone point me to a basic tutorial with wiring + example FastLED code? If not, can someone point me to a basic tutorial with some info, but directly wiring the Teensy 3.2 to LED strips?

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If you’re already controlling a single strip with FastLED, odds are good it will “just work” when you run your existing code on Teensy. If using the Octo board, just set the pin number of any of the 8 outputs, and connect your LEDs to that pair of wires from the CAT5 cable.

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@PaulStoffregen Thanks, I will give the Octo approach a try. I got blink running on the Teensy and tried hooking up the LED strips directly, but it didn’t work (probably because I’m using cheap Aliexpress WS2812 strips).

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I have code that runs on uno and teensy just the same with FastLED, no modifications required.

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@Marc_MERLIN I think it is just the fact I tried without a level shifter. Going to try again with the Octo and hopefully that will fix it.

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I use a teensy and an esp8266 without a level shifter, and they work fine.

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From what I’m reading some WS2812 strips work without the level shifter, and some don’t. Not sure anyone has discovered the reason for this, but apparently the problem I see (LEDs light up initially, but then don’t change with control signal) is a sign that a level shifter is needed.

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Understood. This may indeed be your problem. As for the reason, 3.3V is indeed a bit low for something that expects 5V logic, so I can see how some chips may not work with it. So as you said, level shifter is worthwhile to check.