How many WS2811 pixel leds can a arduino mega control

Using Arduino LEDs and Multiplexing
1

Hello,

How many WS2811 pixel leds can a Arduino mega control.

I want to use Fastled as library .

I do not need many or fast animation. (most of the time they dont need animation .)

2

A ship load. I mean like hundreds or, maybe, thousands can be controlled by an Arduino. The trick is powering them all. The Arduino can't do that. To fully power 300, you need like 18A.

How many do you want?

FastLED is the library that I have used. It works nicely once you figure it out. The examples and documentation help a lot with that.

3

Around 1000 pieces, i have the 12 volt version.

each led can max pull 0.6 watt when its at full white.

so i have 2 350watt/12volt meanwell powersupply's.
I also have enough power injection point, so powering is no problem here.

i realy dont need animation, they will just be steady burning with some color patern like 200 blue 200 red etc...

My concern is, is the arduino mega capable of controlling +-1000 leds
also does the signal from arduino gets to last led (whats maximum signal cable lengt..

4

The problem is memory for the array that holds the values to send to the LEDs (pixels). Each pixel gets 3 bytes in the array (R, G, B). So 3K bytes for the LED array out of 8K bytes. So enough memory for 3000.

Each LED has a chip that passes the refreshed signals on to the next, so the signal should not degrade from one end to the other. Power is a different story, but you seem to have handled that.

5

Remember that this is the maximum, in practice you will need some of that memory to run the rest of the code of your project.

Also as you use more pixels you will take longer to refresh the strip, even if only one pixel has changed. This time is independent of the number of pixels that have changed. Each byte is sent at a rate of 800K per second.

6

If you want to use FastLED, 1000ish
You can control a lot more with alternate libraries. Check out this thread: WS2812B without fastLED.h - Using Arduino / LEDs and Multiplexing - Arduino Forum

7

12volt addressable strips usually have groups of three LEDs (no individual control).
1200 LEDs = 400 LEDs for the library.
Post a link to make sure.
Leo..

8

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