What type of smart RGB strips to use

[fiona scott]

Hi I am going to start for next years lights. I am going to use Smart RGB Strips in 12v power supply. I have got my eyes on ws2812b or ink1003 strips. Have never used these lights before so dont know much about them anybody that knows witch one's are good or better than the other . Any ideas would be great . Thanks Scott

 

[AussieDoug]

Hi Scott,
The main thing you need to consider is how much definition you think your going to need for your display & distance from the road. Anything over about 5m from the road and the 2811/2812 12v strip will be perfect. As I found out this year the INK1003 strip is very bright.
In this video all the house is 2811/2812 strip & the trees are INK1003. This is just running on the PixLite test mode.
http://youtu.be/wyAzohnKXCU
Cheers
Doug

 

[fiona scott]

Hi thanks for your reply I didn't even think about how close the house is to the road. Our house is only about 5m from the road I will have to take that into consideration also. Thanks Scott

 

[BundyRoy]

Also depends on what you want to do with the strip. If you plan on making a matrix/mega tree where you want to show picture images etc, then there might be some benefit in using the ink1003 as it has more more pixels/m so you can get a better resolution image on the lights. If you are wanting to run strips to outline your house or do arches then the 2812 will do the job just as well and is cheaper (I think).

Then there is the issues with operating voltage. I think 2812b is 5V and the ink1003 is 12V. The 12V strips give you as bit more room to play with in terms of voltage drop through your power cables. (eg A 5% drop in 12V is 0.6V, and a 5% drop in 5V is 0.25V. This means that when using 5V strips it becomes more important to ensure your power supplies are mounted close to the strip so that you don't get voltage loss in the transmission of power through long cables. The benefit of 5V is that it is cheaper and that it is more reliable (don't hold me on this, others will need to back me up, as I haven't ever used 5V strip). You can also run 5V strip with a 12V power supply and cables and then put a buck convertor near the strip to convert the voltage from 12V to 5V. The buck convertors are only worth a few dollars.

So it depends a bit on what you want to do and how you want to set it up. eg do you need/want to put power supplies/controllers in waterproof boxes and mount them on your roof/lawn or did you want to mount everything in the garage and run it from there.

Hope I haven't just confused all the issues and made it harder. At least you have heaps of time to go through things for next year. I started on Anzac day this year and remember being bamboozled for the first couple of months. Ask heaps of questions before you buy is my advice. Don't be afraid to ask. I did it the other way round and whilst I haven't bought anything that I can't use, it has cost me more than it should of. Welcome to ACL, you will love it when you get your first show going.