Current best practices for connecting to LED strings

[JNewans]

Hi all and thanks for the great resources.

I got started last year with pixel lights and a Baldrick Board from Hanson Electronics, and this year I was hoping to add some "normal" (2-wire?) strings to the mix. I'm also setting up a display for my church that will similarly be a mixture of pixels and normal strings but over a large property.

Ideally I could easily have them doing similar patterns that the supplied driver provides (various alternating/twinkling/flashing) while also being able to sync them in with the rest of the show - turning whole strings off, pulsing them, etc.

My two questions are:

1. Hardware - It seems like the standard approach for this will be the DMX2-24 then a long Cat5 run to a USB-DMX adapter on the Pi. Otherwise I could use the 2811DC2-30 with a Baldrick or QuinLED controller to go E1.31->WS2811->2-wire. Just checking there's no obvious way to get a bunch of 2-wire outputs responding to a network-based protocol, or "gotchas" with either of those approaches?
2. Software - I've found varying reports on how one would enter these into XLights (Adding every prop twice?), is there a straightforward way that I can add them so that the lights are in the correct positions and respond appropriately to the patterns while still being easy enough to do simple sequences?

Thanks,
Josh

 

[Juddge]

if you already have a baldrick 8 -get the 2811-DC2-30 it will be easier to setup and use - as the 2811-DC2-30 is just extra pixels to setup instead of aldo DMX to setup the 2811is easier to setup than DMX - in my opinion
i have both boards, and i find the 2811-DC2-30 easier to use and connect and setup