Hacked Gadgets Forum

November 27, 2006

PIC based Serial Controlled RGB LED PWM Driver

at 5:24 am. Filed under DIY Hacks, Electronic Hacks

 

If you want to play around with some LEDs, why not hook them up to some brains (a PIC chip) and have some fun. Pete provides all the details you will need to create your own Serial Controlled RGB LED PWM Driver. The provided firmware will run on the following PIC chips: 12F629, 12F675 and 12F683.

“If you want to build your own multiple RGB LED display that you can control from either a PC or a dedicated controller then this project will let you do just that.

The project on this page came about when while I was developing a more complex intelligent driver. During that work I put together a simple Red/Green/Blue Pulse Width Modulation LED driver that has a serial interface. The RGB values to control the LED brightness are sent to the PWM driver over this serial interface.

With both the original and revised versions of the RGB PWM driver there was one big shortcoming when you want to have several drivers working together. Even when they’re running the same sequence, the small differences in the frequency of the internal RC oscillator cause some to run the sequence slightly faster, others slower. The result, well sometimes it’s quite effective, but mostly it just looks awful.

With the controller / driver presented here it is possible to connect multiple drivers to the same serial cable, all attached units then appear to operate synchronously since they’re all receiving the same control data. The PCB for the RGB PWM Driver has been designed so that it can be used with both the serial control firmware on this page, or the standalone firmware here

The serial data can be sent from the serial COM port of a PC or using a small dedicated controller that I’ve put together. The Controller code is based on the standalone RGB driver code described elsewhere on this website. The controller uses the same format for the sequence data as the standalone RGB driver so any SequenceData.inc files you have for the standalone driver can be used with the Serial RGB Controller.”


 


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14 Responses to “PIC based Serial Controlled RGB LED PWM Driver”

  1. zedomax.com Says:

    DIY HACK - PIC based Serial Controlled RGB LED PWM Driver

    View This Video on You Tube
    Cool little LED control using PWM of PIC.
    If you want to play around with some LEDs, why not hook them up to some brains (a PIC chip) and have some fun. Pete provides all the details you will need to create your own Serial …

  2. M4RC.US » Blog Archive » PIC based Serial Controlled RGB LED PWM Driver Says:

    […] « MAKE open source MP3 player (daisy) - getting started guide PIC based Serial Controlled RGB LED PWM Driver [via:PIC based Serial Controlled RGB LED PWM Driver] Pete has made a RGB LED PWM Driver, thedriver will run on the following PIC chips. 12F629, 12F675 AND 12F783. More information after the jump. […]

  3. nukilan.web.id » Blog Archive » Simple serial RGB LED controller and driver Says:

    […] The project on this page came about when while I was developing a more complex intelligent driver. During that work I put together a simple Red/Green/Blue Pulse Width Modulation LED driver that has a serial interface. The RGB values to control the LED brightness are sent to the PWM driver over this serial interface. “ [via] - Link. […]

  4. Zedomax DIY125 - HOWTO make a Music Syncing Light Orb Alarm Clock! | zedomax.com - blog about DIYs and Review on reviews of gadgets and technologies... Says:

    […] Okay, we have seen some really cool Light Orbs while trying to make this Music Syncing Light Orb Alarm Clock. We started with Tod’s creation and soon realize that 1 LED will not be bright enough in slightest light conditions though his Light Orb is tight let us say. So we checked out RGB lights at Hackedgadgets.com. Which is cool and uses 4 Red, 3 Green, and 3 Blue LEDs. Well during our google search for Light Orb HOWTOs, we came to the Ambient Devices schematic and their technical notes. Well it says that with the right voltage, you don’t need to use resistors. […]

  5. simon Says:

    Hey,view this video on your web,I am interesting in your project,can u provide some details to me?
    E-mail:572info@gmail.com
    thanks

  6. Alan Parekh Says:

    Hi Simon,

    Your best bet is to click on the link in the article, there more information available on the authors site.

  7. simon Says:

    Alan,Thank u for your reply

    Right now,I have 3 led,PIC 12F629…,i try many times,but i failled!
    i need some help with the coding,can u give me some source codes(assembler or C)?

  8. Alan Parekh Says:

    Hi Simon,

    The source code can be found here.
    http://www.petesworld.demon.co.uk/homebrew/PIC/simplergb/index.htm#Code,_Constuction_&_PCB

  9. simon Says:

    i am sorry Alan,i can’t open the site,
    (http://www.petesworld.demon.co.uk/homebrew/PIC/simplergb/index.htm#Code,_Constuction_&_PCB)
    i don’t know why.

  10. Alan Parekh Says:

    Try to copy and paste it into your address bar.
    If that doesn’t work click on the link in the article for the project and click on “download code”

  11. simon Says:

    sorry,can’t find the web host.
    maybe,i am forbidden to access this source in our country
    can u download the code and mail to me?
    E-mail:572info@gmail.com

  12. simon Says:

    Thank you for your help!

    You can see the schematic of my project(http://www.hlwjx.com/sch.jpg)

    maybe,i need your help later in programing

    thank u again!

  13. Landlord Says:

    Simon, if you need more help with programing your LED controller. You may get some idea from these people. Check it out here www.lunaraccents.com/technology-programmable-LED-controller.html
    I have talked with a couple people there. They are cool but my project is too small and I don’t have enough budget to do business with them.

  14. links for 2007-09-07 « Rob Edwards: Collection of my daily bookmarks: roedward Says:

    […] Hacked Gadgets - DIY Tech Blog » Blog Archive » PIC based Serial Controlled RGB LED PWM Driver Posted by roedward Filed in Uncategorized […]

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