Smartalec pihat & rasbpi3 setup

Hello,
Firstly I am a complete noob and have been playing with a rasbpi3 and a smartalec pihat.

(I figured it was a cheap and easy way to control a string or two of ws8212 led strips (60 led pm) (300 per string) (5m)

I so far have been able to get FPP setup on the pi
And can use the test sequence and the test sequence panel all seem to work 100%, no issues with flickering or anything,

I have not been able to use vixen at all as I cannot work out how to setup the controller,

I have managed to get xlights working and can upload sequences to the fpp, it mostly works and can control it all, but I seem to get flickering (data issues - bits of strip flash different colours even if I don't have the full strip programmed into xlights.

I'm puzzled as to why the test sequence fpp tool has no issues but sequences do,

(I am using the 10cm connecter that comes from the strips to plug directly into power supply and pihat so I don't think the wiring/length is the issue?) (Did have longer wires between but switched to short connection to try and diagnose this issue)

Many thanks for your help in advance

Ben

are all your grounding points solid? ive found that can cause issues, an how long is the pixel run?
also what brightness are you testing them at as well also might help solve issues

I believe the grounding is solid, For this test i am only using 1 strip,
5m WS8212 12v (60 led per meter - 300 total)

I am patching the wires directly from the strip into the Power Supply (both ends, so it is back enjected/grounded)

Brightness Im guessing is 100% as i have not worked out how to lower this??

is the pi cape gnd tied to the power supply gnd..

Yes I did,

I had the power and ground from the strip directly plugged into the power supply (10cm of wire)

I then had the data run to the pi Cape
And a ground wire from the pi Cape to the PSU ground.
I also had the strip in a loop on the floor and had the end of the string power and ground into the power supply, (to add extra power and ground to end of string)



But I will take your advice first and think I will pickup some new cabling, and retest again, IV also got a second strip now to also test,

If I continue to have issues I will grab video and pics of the issue and setup and post online,

Many thanks
Ben

I have managed to fix my data issues,
I replaced the cabeling with 6 core security cable but was still having issues,
I am only using 1 of the capes outputs,
For some reason in the FPP setup, (Channel Outouts > Other > RPIWS281X)
if you set pixels on 1 of the outputs (I have set it to 1000 on both) (I am only using 300)

If i put 0 into the second output, It would cause the 1st output to glitch occasionally, if I put a number in, it works fine,
No idea why, but seems to work great now,