The Adafruit NeoPixel FeatherWings bring 32 x pixels of individually addressable RGB ultra-bright bling to your Feather project. It's hard to believe that all these NeoPixels can be controlled from a single GPIO and you get 24-bits of colour too. There are rows of solder jumpers on the bottom of each board so that you can select which GPIO is going to do all the hard work. If you are using one of the Feather Huzzah ESP8266 boards (73-5299) then you will need to use pin 15, it's a very simple change. There's an onboard level-shifter to convert this signal to 5V for greater reliability and for the Dout signal to daisychain to other boards. For those times when 32 x LEDs isn't enough.
The NeoPixels take their power either from the USB or from the battery power line, whichever has the higher voltage, thanks to a pair of Schottky diodes. This will give you up to 1A of constant current drive and up to 2A peak, more than enough for a colourful light show, but be careful if you're trying to light your lounge.
Adafruit have published a driver library to save you the trouble and let you get on with designing eye catching displays. They have a reputation for the quality of their supporting documentation and you will find their Uberguide to NeoPixels and their Best Practices guides invaluable. In particular the Best Practices guide will help you prolong the life of your NeoPixels and avoid common mistakes.
- 4 x 8 NeoPixel matrix
- Data out signal for daisy chaining to more NeoPixel boards
- Uses a single GPIO pin (user selectable)
- Adafruit part no.: 2945
*Customers looking to resell on eBay or Amazon should contact Adafruit directly.
