I am a total newb and before realizing they weren’t popular and no real controller options exist for them, I purchased $1500 worth of 5 meter high density (720 LED/M) 24v WS2814 RGBW LED Strips from China.
I can’t return them and I can only find one controller, the SP617e, that works with them, but it’s limited to 450 pixels and I need to connect 5 strips together to go around my room in crown molding, so I need to control 600 pixels, at a minimum.
I’m hoping WLED is compatible with these WS2814 strips, but before I go to the trouble to buy boards and learn how to set everything up and use it, I wanted to check and make sure, first.
It looks like BTF Lighting is now selling WS2814 strips on Amazon, too, but they aren’t high density and they come with the same SP617e controller, with no other options.
The reason I bought these strips was because it was the only high density 5 meter RGBW strip I could find at 24v. I sure hope I can control them with WLED.
Not a huge amount of info about those strips, although the controller seems to have “SK6812/WS2814/TM2814” compatibility which is a hopeful sign. They seem to be a variant on the SK6812 protocol.
Seeing as you have already bought the strips it’s worth getting an ESP32 controller and loading up WLED to give it a try, there’s a reasonable chance it will drive those strips.
Just make sure you have proper 5V to the ESP32, 24V to the strip and common ground between them.
Start small and try to work up.
The place I bought them from says the reason no other controller will work (besides the SP617e) is because the white channel ends up as blue, or something like that, and the other channels don’t match, either, so there is no way to control the “W” in the RGBW strips, if I’m understanding correctly.
So what would I pick in WLED to try these, then? The SK6812? I purchased a DIG-QUAD board and a 24v power supply, so now I just have to figure out how to get everything set up and how to use WLED.
Do you have any recommendations for any how to get started videos?
Ok, I received confirmation, the problem with any 6812 controller is that white will be blue and blue will be white. When any dynamic effects mode is chosen, it will light up the strip red, green, white, instead of red, green, blue.
So in WLED could I choose a 6812 controller type and make white blue and blue white, swapping them around?
If so, then I should be able to control the WS2814 strips using the 6812 protocol just fine. But if I can’t swap blue and white channels, it won’t work.
Let us know how it goes if and when you get control of individual leds, be systematic in your testing.
Try to isolate out one colour at a time (set all the other sliders to 0) to prove what the strip does.
If it comes down to just changing the order of RGBW to WRGB, that’s a software fix that should be possible.
As soon as I get my DIG-QUAD board in a few days, I will test each color.
But I was able to get confirmation from the supplier that the issue is that the Blue and the White channels are swapped. Blue is White and White is Blue.
So if that can’t be changed in WLED then I’m kinda freaking out because this was my only other option.
I appreciate the note that the software could be changed, but unfortunately, I don’t know any programming and wouldn’t have a clue how to tackle something like this.
But I’m sure the issue is that the Blue and White channels are swapped, and in order for this to work, I need to be able to swap B and W or I’m afraid it won’t work.
The only other thing I can think of is if someone knows the software and is able to make this change for me, I’d quite happily pay for someone’s time, effort, knowledge, and skill to do so. Let me know if anyone is interested.
I wouldn’t freak out until you actually try the Dig-Quad.
I just found a reference to the issue you’ve mentioned, looks like there’s a fix in the works : RGBW WS2814 issue
When you get your board, try the latest Beta version, or you may need the Blaz fork.
Thank you so much for your help with this. You’re a life saver!!
I clicked the link, but there are about 30 different files to choose from and I have no clue which to choose.
I did purchase the add-on for the Dig-Quad that has an Ethernet port (which I’ll use), a Microphone (so I’ll want a sound reactive version), and an IR Port, so which version should I choose?
Also, what exactly do you mean by 2D support?
I should have my board in the next day or two, so I’m excited to get started! I just have to figure out which version I need from the link you gave and how to load it on since the board I purchased already has WLED 13 on it.
Thank you. The Dig-Quad board is ESP32 based, so I assume any one of those would work then? But there are over a dozen different ones for ESP32. How do you know which one to choose and what the difference between them is? I’ve clicked on every one of them and don’t see anything different except the names??
Start with xxxxx_ESP32.bin as the basic ESP32 version.
This should be reasonably safe and give you most of the functions you want (including SoundReactive - SR).
If you have Ethernet onboard, you can later try xxxxxx_ESP32_ethernet_usermod.bin to see if it will work with a hardwired network connection.
Many of the other files listed are builds that enable various usermods, special use cases as well as particular variants of the ESP32 MCU (ESP32_S2, ESP32_C3 for eg).
You can explore those if needed after you’ve walked with the basic setup.
You can search the forum and/or the docs for more information.
Assuming these versions have the mod to be able to swap the W channel w/ the B channel, too.
I read the docs and installed Python and EspTool, downloaded the bins you recommended directly above, and believe I’m ready to flash the board as soon as I get it in the next day or two.
I’ll then set the strip up as a 6812, swap the W and B channels, do a test, and will report back.
If it sounds like I’m missing any steps, please let me know.
Version 14.0 has the swap W capability under Config->LED Preferences.
The various tools may be useful to have around, but I was able to load those bins directly using the OTA (Over The Air) update facility in WLED.
If your Dig-Quad comes loaded with a recent WLED, go to Config->Security & Updates->Manual OTA Update. Browse for the .bin file you downloaded and click Update!
Should install the .bin file you chose and get you up and running.
Ok, I got my Dig Quad, flashed the newest firmware, set the RGBW to “BRG” and swapped the Green and White (thought it would be Blue and White but it works this way) and plugged two strips in, the first one into the Dig Quad and the second one to the end of the first one, as a first test.
The final configuration will have 5 strips connected end to end for a total of a 25 meter single continuous strip of lights to go around my ceiling in my home theater in crown molding.
Now I’m having difficulty figuring out what size power supply I’ll need if I want to plan for worst case scenario and have enough power to set it to all white via RGB mixing in case anyone ever wants to run it that way since my family won’t know that setting requires more juice. Plus, since it’s in a theater with black ceiling, walls, etc, it would be nice to have the extra brightness when needed since there isn’t much room lighting in here.
I’m using the WS2814 strips and will have 5 total strips connected end to end.
They are 24v and have 720 LED’s per strip, but this is where I’m getting confused. Only every 6 LED’s are addressable, so I don’t know whether to count 6 as 1 when calculating the power requirements or whether to still count each individual LED.
720 times 5 strips is 3600 LED’s total, but only 600 Pixels.
If I’m doing my math right, I’m going to need a much larger power supply than a 30 amp 24v supply, but the Dig Quad board is only rated to 30 amps.
So how do I handle this? What size power supply should I use if I want the option to have full on “white” via RGB mixing and at full brightness, as a worst case scenario?
