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LED light strips with IR remote


CSquared

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We recently rented a condo where one of the switches near the stairs turned on a flexible LED light strip embedded in a channel in the underside of the handrail. It looked verrrry nice. My internet shopping has found a kit with the added bonus of a remote to change the colors. Installation is straight forward and I would put it on a switch as well. It's the color changing option that is a bit tougher as the box would be in the basement and I don't want to have the IR eye showing.

http://www.ledshelf.com/flexibleledstrip.html

Any thoughts on how hard (ie how long and therefore how much $$) it would be to integrate into control4? I don't know/understand the process for 'learning' the remote and drivers and stuff.

Thanks.

PS The same website also has bulbs that change color to music. You can always use your children as an excuse to buy one.

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It's cool, but how hard do you think it would be to get C4 to control the color changes? When the light is switched on/off it is supposed to come back on to the last color, so a switched plug would make it inegrate nicely into things. For color changes I would have to go to the basement with the remote. Doable, but not preferred. Since it's an IR remote, it should be possible in theory, but how much would reality cost?

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I don't think it's any different than controlling a TV or a AVR. Like you said, clone the IR codes and drag them into a psuedo piece of equipment in the project. Hourly rate for someone- why so concerned about cost, is there something I'm missing here?

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I'm like you sorta, I don't really know but it seems like you could take an exisiting driver and substitute the IR codes and make it work. Of course, you still will need to consider the proximity of the device that is receiving the codes and your controller.

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  • 1 month later...

Just got my two sets of led lights from these guys. Haven't written a "driver" yet, but they work as advertised.

Surprisingly small for how intense they are / can be.

FYI, these can be switched on / off via an outlet / c4 switch and then can be controlled via IR to set any color and intensity.

They also have programmable flashing / changing color patterns and it looks like you can program it.

My head is spinning with all the cool options you can do with these.

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I've had mine for a little while, but didn't install them yet. We plan on recessing them into the underside of the handrail on the stairs. They are super bright even when turned down so we may have to experiment with the depth of the recess so we don't cause any retinal damage!

I'll probably start by using an outlet switch and manually change the color...ie can get it up and running without running extra wires, drivers etc. Since I don't expect to make color changes that often using the remote won't be too annoying. If you go to the trouble of using the IR then you can use the IR for turning them on and off as well as color changes, liberating the outlet switch for other duties.

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  • 1 year later...

Has there been any more thoughts on a custom driver for this. I am less concerned about creating a driver that works. My dealer has done this several times. My bigger question is , can I make it easy to control from a remote or touchpad with buttons that make sense?

I am building a wine cellar and hope to use these omy setup. Also adding a contact sensor to the door to use in programming as well.

Thank you in advance

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For a custon driver for the product that the OP mentioned?

I would guess not.

What buttons on your remote "would make sense"?

If you want a one off flash app and driver it would probably cost you more than you want to pay.

I do not see alot of interest in the OP's product so I imagine it would not be a big seller.

Brent

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I wrote a driver for an IR LED controller. It worked okay, but i found for some reason that the commands wouldn't always work. Or IR from other devices in the shop would trigger it to turn on. Since then i switched to one of these http://www.nuleds.com/nuleds-products/led-controllers/item/107-sd-232.html

Way better then a shitty IR driver. I can directly select any color based on RGB color mixing technics. You have 0-255 of brightness control on each color. Its also addressable, so you can run 16 of them on one RS232 line. The same company is coming out with POE LED fixtures. Ill be buying a couple as soon as they come out to work on a driver for them in my own house.

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I was just thinking of a driver that would display details on the Ipad or Touchscreen that would make sense to crontol the LED vs a TV driver that would require a decoder ring.

I agree with the cost of a custom app, etc would'nt be worth it.

For a custon driver for the product that the OP mentioned?

I would guess not.

What buttons on your remote "would make sense"?

If you want a one off flash app and driver it would probably cost you more than you want to pay.

I do not see alot of interest in the OP's product so I imagine it would not be a big seller.

Brent

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Pretty cool option. Unfortunately I don't have an open RS232 port to use. It may be an option if I buy the IO extender I have been debating.

I wrote a driver for an IR LED controller. It worked okay, but i found for some reason that the commands wouldn't always work. Or IR from other devices in the shop would trigger it to turn on. Since then i switched to one of these http://www.nuleds.com/nuleds-products/led-controllers/item/107-sd-232.html

Way better then a shitty IR driver. I can directly select any color based on RGB color mixing technics. You have 0-255 of brightness control on each color. Its also addressable, so you can run 16 of them on one RS232 line. The same company is coming out with POE LED fixtures. Ill be buying a couple as soon as they come out to work on a driver for them in my own house.

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Its totally worth it! Get the IO extender. Or wait for an IP version to come out from someone. I've been working on a driver for an open source platform(arduino) to do RGB color mixing like the SD-232 does, but i have run into some issues i have yet to figure out. So as i have more time i will continue to work on that.

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Love the touch faucet, have one in the kitchen upstairs too. Its kinda funny, you get used to them and it makes you stupid once in a while - my island sink in the kitchen does not have one and I find myself touching it and then remembering its a normal faucet (got to get that one changed too).

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