Posts by D34DC3N73R

Both are in adafruits best practices for neopixels/WS2812b
https://learn.adafruit.com/ada…-uberguide/best-practices

They go on to bold a section stressing the importance.

- Any project with a lot pixels or a large power source should definitely include the power capacitor and data line resistor.

and even give a big red bold warning on the "Powering Neopixels" section
- Adding a 300 to 500 Ohm resistor between your microcontroller's data pin and the data input on the first NeoPixel can help prevent voltage spikes that might otherwise damage your first pixel. Please add one between your micro and NeoPixels!

as well as give some information about why you should use caps
- Before connecting a NeoPixel strip to ANY source of power, we very strongly recommend adding a large capacitor (1000 µF, 6.3V or higher) across the + and – terminals. This prevents the initial onrush of current from damaging the pixels.

Edit: It's really easy to add both so I've never questioned it. They may not make a night and day difference, but they certainly don't hurt anything. And as the old adage goes, better safe than sorry.

I'm not sure how your sk6812's were connected to dreamscreen, but you'll need to bring a data wire from the end of the first strip to the start of the second strip.

You want to bring power to each of the LED strips from your PSU (possibly the start and end of each strip), but the data wire should connect from the end of the first strip to the start of the second strip. This essentially gives you a single strip / hardware instance. Unless there is a specific reason you want them to work independently?

You only need the resistor where the data comes in, not at every connection, but here's what the starting LED looks like. The resistor has heat shrink on it, but they're bidirectional. For the other corners, you'd bring the data wire directly from the end of one strip to the start of the next.

I believe the Pi3B+ is armv7 but run cat /proc/cpuinfo from the command line to be sure. If it is armv7, did you download Hyperion-2.0.0-alpha.9-Linux-armv7l.deb from the github release page?

so first
wget https://github.com/hyperion-project/hyperion.ng/releases/download/2.0.0-alpha.9/Hyperion-2.0.0-alpha.9-Linux-armv7l.deb

after that, you'd run
sudo apt install ./Hyperion-2.0.0-alpha.9-Linux-armv7l.deb

Or, download and flash the hyperbian image to your sd card as davieboy suggested.

Are you using an HDMI 2.0 cable?

Do you have CEC turned on in the shield settings?

I'm not sure what capture card that is. I run from the shield through this 4k splitter, 1 HDMI to the TV, and the other to this capture card. Capture card USB to RPi 4. Did you have CEC detection enabled in your USB capture settings?

I use the 2017 nvidia shield pro 500GB and don't have that issue. What type of capture card are you using? Make sure CEC detection and signal detection boxes are checked in the USB capture settings.

While my setup is "only" 85 inch, I feel like it could handle 100 no problem. I inject power on the front and back of all 4 sides and use 1000uf capacitors at each power connection. I have a 5v 30a PSU with 10 AWG that runs to a distribution block centered on the back of the TV and use 20 AWG to run to all the corners. You'll need to figure out what LEDs you want, then get a rough estimate of how many you'll need, and figure out your max power consumption to get the appropriate amperage PSU. For reference, I'm at 334 WS2812b LEDs and the max current is about 22 amps. https://imgur.com/a/Yp0Y0St

Yes that's correct assuming you made the scripts 'ambilight_on' and 'ambilight_off'. Just save and restart HA. Any edits to configuration.yaml require a restart to take effect. Also, make sure to disable the previous automations you made with input_boolean.ambilight so there isn't conflicting actions.

I also run HA in docker. Your configuration.yaml file will probably be in /mnt/user/appdata/home-assistant/configuration.yaml or something similar. It's wherever you store docker application data. You can check by clicking edit on the container and you'll see what path is mounted to /config. You could even edit using container console in which case it would be /config/configuration.yaml, although I don't believe nano is part of the home assistant container. Vi is installed in the container if you're familiar with that editor. It's probably easier to figure out where the application data is stored and just ssh into your unraid box and use nano /mnt/user/appdata/home-assistant/configuration.yaml

Side note, if you do want a file editor for HA, it's entirely possible, you just have to run a separate container and integrate it manually. I use a VS Code container and it works great

I haven't really seen an input boolean used that way in an automation. It's possible that it could work. But I've only ever used them in conjunction with template switches. Which you could do if you converted those from automations to scripts. Where ambilight_on would turn on solid white LEDs, and ambilight_off would turn on the V4L effect. You may want to use a different naming scheme if you plan to make one that actually turns off Hyperion. I haven't tested this, but I think it would go something like this:

edit: tested and should be working now.

In configuration.yaml

input_boolean:
  ambilight:
    name: Ambilight

switch:
  - platform: template
    switches:
      ambilight:
        value_template: '{{ states("input_boolean.ambilight") }}'
        friendly_name: Ambilight Switch
        turn_on:
          - service: input_boolean.turn_on
            entity_id: input_boolean.ambilight
          - service: script.ambilight_on
        turn_off:
          - service: input_boolean.turn_off
            entity_id: input_boolean.ambilight
          - service: script.ambilight_off
        icon_template: >-
          {% if is_state('input_boolean.ambilight', 'on') %}
            mdi:lightbulb-on
          {% else %}
            mdi:televisionambientlight
          {% endif %}

I believe the effects are case-sensitive. Try Solid instead of solid.

You can edit automations.yaml and add that code manually, or you can use the gui and use that code as a guide. For instance, I've attached a screencap of what the Hyperion Playback automation would look like from the Home Assistant gui.

I would suggest just adding your harmony remote to HA, which would allow you to use button presses on the remote as triggers for the automations. But, I'm not familiar with ST to tell you exactly how it would be best to integrate it with ST. If you just want an actionable button, you can set those up as scripts. Scripts are nearly identical to automations, but have no conditions and no triggers, just actions.

Yes, after the sketch is loaded on the nano, it's D6 to LED data. You also need to change the Hyperion LED controller settings to match that screenshot, replacing the LED count and if need be, the output path.

Since you have the Hyperion integration in HA already, we can use that. Make sure to click "options" on the integration and change the priority to something above 100, but lower than your grabber priority. For instance, my grabber is priority 110. So I'd change the Home Assistant integration priority to 101-109. I'd use an automation like this for start up, making sure to change the entity_id to match your own.

- alias: LED - Hyperion White
  mode: single
  trigger:
  - platform: state
    entity_id: light.first_led_hardware_instance
    from: 'off'
    to: 'on'
  action:
  - service: light.turn_on
    target:
      entity_id: light.first_led_hardware_instance
    data:
      effect: Solid
      rgb_color:
      - 255
      - 255
      - 255

To switch back to the grabber, you just need to call the Hyperion "V4L" effect. For instance, if I wanted the grabber to start on playback, I could use my Nvidia Shield play state. If didn't want it automated, or don't have your media player integrated into HA, you could use a button press on your harmony remote as a trigger to accomplish the same thing.

- alias: LED - Hyperion Playback
  mode: single
  trigger:
  - platform: state
    entity_id: media_player.shield
    to: playing
  action:
  - service: light.turn_on
    target:
      entity_id: light.first_led_hardware_instance
    data:
      effect: V4L

If I wanted the solid color or effect to resume when playback is paused, stopped, or idle, I could use the following

- alias: LED - Hyperion Idle
  mode: single
  trigger:
  - platform: state
    entity_id: media_player.shield
    to: standby
  - platform: state
    entity_id: media_player.shield
    to: paused
  - platform: state
    entity_id: media_player.shield
    to: idle
  action:
  - service: light.turn_on
    target:
      entity_id: light.first_led_hardware_instance
    data:
      effect: Solid
      rgb_color:
      - 255
      - 255
      - 255

And finally, if I wanted Hyperion to turn off when the Shield turns off, I could use the following

- alias: LED - Hyperion Off
  mode: single
  trigger:
  - platform: state
    entity_id: media_player.shield
    to: 'off'
  action:
  - service: light.turn_off
    target:
      entity_id: light.first_led_hardware_instance

That last one may not be necessary depending on your setup, but hopefully, it's enough to get you on the right track.

This is the sketch I use on the nano. Just change the number of LEDs, and make sure the baudrate matches in hyperion settings.

I started off using this video as a guide.

It's in adafruit's best practices for neopixels. This answer goes into a bit more detail.

I keep my power supply on the floor and run power up through the wall, but in that instance, I run 10 AWG wires to a distribution block, and 20 AWG to all corners. I'm not sure how thick or long your wires are, but keep in mind that it's best to use thicker wires if you have a longer distance to travel. So maybe run some thicker 5v + ground wires and split those to the front and back of the LEDs behind the TV.

It may be worth trying out a longer USB cable for the nano. That way you could keep the data wire short and just mount the nano behind the TV. Assuming you power the pi with the same power supply as the LEDs. If that's not possible, I'm not exactly sure how long the data wire can be off of a nano. I guess you won't know until you try.

Edit: adafruit best practices also say data at 1-2 meters is usually fine.

Yes, I can control the lights with the app. It appears the HA Hyperion integration only allows power on/off. But adding some shell commands is easy enough. For instance, If I wanted I could use the following HA automations.
When TV turns on, start a Hyperion effect or solid color.

When TV starts playback with a specific app (or multiple apps, or all apps) stop the effect. Which would then allow the standard bias lighting / ambilight.

When playback stops, resume effect or solid color.

When TV turns off, turn off Hyperion.

You could also make those trigger with the harmony remote if you didn't want the light change to be automatic.

The arduino nano just runs a set block of code and gets instructions from the pi/Hyperion. There is no way to control the arduino outside of Hyperion. IMO the arduino is better than running directly off the pi when it comes to the WS2812b LEDs.

While I haven't tried running Hyperion with nodeMCU, I do have a couple of other nodeMCU's running WLED for other LED projects around the home. I could definitely see the benefit if my pi wasn't set up behind my TV already.

I'm not sure exactly how much it matters, but my data wire is about 3.5 feet long and I have a 330 ohm resistor soldered in right before the LED strip. Each of the 4 sides is powered from the front and back with 1000uf capacitors right before the LED strip. You can see my set up here: https://imgur.com/a/Yp0Y0St

Quote from Jbrown705

That is the one of have too. But it keeps dropping being recognized by the pi and I have to unplug and plug the usb from the pi

That would seem to indicate an issue with the hdmi capture card, not the splitter. Lighting-guy77's post might help with that.