Arduino questions..

[wantafastz28]

Not sure what forum this falls in.... looking into led addressable strips and see people are using arduino boards to program these.. where would I even start to figure out which board I would need, and how much of a learning curve the programming would be? I suck at coding and scripting.. if it is something similar to basic html, I'll be fine.. anything more and I'll probably go another route... I'm more into reading/forums than youtube vids... ideas? Opinions?

 

[wantafastz28]

Fuq... arduino questions.. I can't fix the title.

 

[tangent]

Auto-correct fail.

Most LED strips I've seen aren't addressable they're just PWM controlled. Elaborate a bit more on how you intend to use the LED strips / maybe a link to something you're considering.

Not sure if xenforo lets you but try editing your post and then clicking more options that might let you change the title.

 

[Fastb]

to edit title:
From Mike: "Yes, they can edit the title. That's done within the thread, then click "Thread Tools", then Edit Thread."

IIRC, small spot on the top right of the thread.

Fastb

 

[wantafastz28]

I'm thinking of a lighting setup for my kitchen, and possibly permanent outdoor lighting for holidays if I can make it discrete enough. I want to start small, and work on the kitchen, having led strips for above the cabinets, below the cabinets, and possibly the baseboard, to where I can adjust lighting, more make patterns with them of my choosing... it wouldn't be anything SUPER complex, but I would like to have the ability for example to have green and red lights in a chain, and chase each other at a certain speed for xmas or something. Would like wireless access, something that can control multiple zones.. a mix of these features basically...

 

[wantafastz28]

Thanks @Fastb , I only looked in the edit post area. Fenderman handled it before I could address it.

 

[tangent]

Addressable strips use some form of serial communication to change the color of each light effectively there's a super basic micro controller on each led you can change the colors of the lights individually.

Most strips are just RGB or RGBW and the entire strip stays the same color. Your controller uses pulse width modulation to vary what % of the time each color is on to make whatever color you want.

Arduinos aren't too hard to use and there are tons of examples. You'll need to pay attention to how much current things are drawing and design around that carefully.

 

[tangent]

If I were you the first thing I'd do automation wise would be to get a zwave usb stick and load domoticz or homeseer (not free) onto your blue iris machine. Then start adding some z-wave devices.

There are zwave controllers for RGB led strips if you don't wan't to program something. A raspberry pi is more involved to setup than an arduino, but does have wifi.

 

[wantafastz28]

Then that is where I will start my research and buying. Thanks.

 

[vincenttor]

Pixel led stip is probably what you want. Sorry if I'm wrong but I did not read everything nor is my native language English. Read it rather quick since I have to sleep.

Verstuurd vanaf mijn SM-G930F met Tapatalk

 

[wantafastz28]

Somewhat ya, I found a forum with adafruit... I have a good chunk of reading to do it appears.

 

[tangent]

I'm thinking of a lighting setup for my kitchen, and possibly permanent outdoor lighting for holidays if I can make it discrete enough. I want to start small, and work on the kitchen, having led strips for above the cabinets, below the cabinets, and possibly the baseboard, to where I can adjust lighting, more make patterns with them of my choosing... it wouldn't be anything SUPER complex, but I would like to have the ability for example to have green and red lights in a chain, and chase each other at a certain speed for xmas or something. Would like wireless access, something that can control multiple zones.. a mix of these features basically...

Many of the locations you're talking about putting led strip lights you might not see the individual LEDs, so there may not be that much benefit to the addressable ones. Although if you want to be able to create color sequences and not just one color or another you'd need addressable leds. Find pics/videos of other people's installs and learn from their mistakes

Under cabinet, above cabinet, and toe kick is likely to be a bit over the top. You (or your wife) may not like the way it looks. Start with under cabinet since it's the most practical / useful and expand from there. RGBW gives you nicer white/off white/pastel colors and you may like it better.

I was suggesting you start building a bit of a home automation system because it's nicer to control stuff like this from an integrated platform and you can do useful things like use your LED strip light to notify you of random things around the house. You may also want to stick something like this on the wall in the kitchen to control the under cabinet lights: Wireless Z-Wave wall switch
or get a zwave motion sensor and automatically turn the leds on when you walk into the kitchen at night. you get the idea, but you don't want to always pull out your phone or hunt for the ir remote to control these lights. Z-wave is a mesh network so as you build it works better
Bottom line: you can make them a lot more useful than what most ir/rf/wifi controllers you see are capable of with some planning.

@nayr runs domoticz on a cubox iirc (still an arm board of some kind if it's something else): nayr's home automation build out... but you have more that enough horsepower left on your blueiris machine to run it (though you'd need to keep your zwave adapter out of your enclosed rack) and accept occasional downtime for windows updates. domoticz is probably the best open source automation software out there currently. If you wanted something simpler you could consider vera or homeseer.

 

[wantafastz28]

Yeah, I know what direction you were pointing too earlier, and that made another light bulb go off for me as well. I'd love to have this all intertwined, and I'm not having to hassle with a controller hidden in a cabinet. I'd rather do it all on a comp... Zwave stick out of the server case is no big deal, I can get a usb extension and put it in a optimum position, so I have no metal interference(kind of figured that would be needed anyways). Like the cameras, once I get the minimum parts figured out, I'll buy a 1m strip, and see where it looks good before doing a final install. Homeseer pricing is out of question for me, so I'll most likely take a gander at domoticz more to see what is involved. I don't quite have my "vision" figured out yet, but im almost there.

 

[tangent]

There are lots of choices as to how you install led strips, for example simply peel and stick or aluminum channels they fit in with diffuses.

You'll get maximum control of an addressable strip with a DIY led controller. This could be a pi or an ESP8266 running arduino code (not sure what timer/pwm outputs look like on these for sure never used one for that), lots of learning required. A board with mosfets that are capable of switching the led channels would be required as these devices can't switch enough current directly.

The simplest option for basic RGBW strips would be Fibaro RGBW Micro Controller Z-wave, Works with RGB/RGBW LED Strips - - Amazon.com and your future zwave automation system.

Just another thought, you should be able to use @nayr's dahua api and domoticz to actually trigger blue iris on IVS events from your camera.

 

[wantafastz28]

Well if you ever make it to phoenix, I owe you lunch and/or a beer... you sure are helpful. so with lights turning on and off based on motion... with home automation(zwave, domestics, etc), is it a simple solution to adjust a time setting for when motion would turn it on?(night vs day) I love trying to run before I can walk, but I feel like I'll be doing some crawling on this project.

 

[tangent]

Well if you ever make it to phoenix, I owe you lunch and/or a beer... you sure are helpful. so with lights turning on and off based on motion... with home automation(zwave, domestics, etc), is it a simple solution to adjust a time setting for when motion would turn it on?(night vs day) I love trying to before I can walk, but I feel like I'll be doing some crawling on this project.

Yeah just a little scripting and you can do all sorts of things. It's also possible to directly associate sensors without the controller. The Fibaro RGBW controller also has inputs you can wire to switches or analog sensors as another means of control.

 

[wantafastz28]

Yeah just a little scripting and you can do all sorts of things. It's also possible to directly associate sensors without the controller. The Fibaro RGBW controller also has inputs you can wire to switches or analog sensors as another means of control.

Welp my aeotex zstick gen5 showed up... domoticz installed... fuq i have a LOT of learning to do...

 

[hotwire]

Welp my aeotex zstick gen5 showed up... domoticz installed... fuq i have a LOT of learning to do...

I'm considering going down the same path, keep us posted on how it goes. Currently an Indigo user trying to decide if I want to upgrade to version 7 or move onto something else.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[wantafastz28]

I can tell you right now it is gonna be a minute... I'm already getting impatient lol

 

[logbuilder]

Just gonna put in a plug for HomeSeer.

I started with BI on a Win10 machine. Got it working well in two different locations. Mobile app is -ok-. Started researching home automation and, after long deliberation, decided on HomeSeer. First it works really well with BI on the same Win10 server. So much so that I now control BI exclusively from HS. Few limits to the types of devices you can use. Great community and forum. I'm just now moving into Arduino and there is a clear path to add it to HS.