Baldrick down under

[darylc]

The firmware claims to output close to 3X the pixels at 40fps than WLED. (The YPS one claims 500 per pin, but not with every pin running at the same time).

Thanks thats a pretty major difference!

 

[AAH]

Alan, can you help us understand how Baldrick is different to something like https://yourpixelstore.com/product/pixel-controller-advanced-eight-port-ethernet-controller/

The only difference I can see is Baldrick supports slightly more pixels/port at 40FPS?

-2 30A power inputs rather than a single one. 60A capacity rather than 30. 7.5A per output compared to 3.75A (average)
-Universal 5-24V input
-Ability to run 2 different voltages on the 1 controller
-"Power good" leds
-3 inputs that can be used to trigger test modes or the FPP API's that the board is compatible with
-DDP, E1.31 and Artnet support (no idea what the "Pixel Controller – Advanced 8-Port Ethernet Controller (12v Version)" supports)
-Xlights support for controller uploads. No idea if the "Pixel Controller – Advanced 8-Port Ethernet Controller (12v Version)" has xlights support as there's no info on the YPS page and YPS isn't on the Ethernet vendors and there doesn't appear to be an ESP model that matches.
-Simple and easy to use web interface. No idea on "Pixel Controller – Advanced 8-Port Ethernet Controller (12v Version)" as there is no info
-User manual linked direct from QR code on the board as well as the product pages.
-750 pixels at 40fps per output across all outputs. No idea on "Pixel Controller – Advanced 8-Port Ethernet Controller (12v Version)" as it's not documented

IF the "Pixel Controller – Advanced 8-Port Ethernet Controller (12v Version)" uses wled as it's firmware then it looks like it is limited to under 512 pixels per output due to the ethernet. Somewhat less than Baldrick that will do 750 at 40fps (6000 total and 12000 at 20fps).

The documentation on "Pixel Controller – Advanced 8-Port Ethernet Controller (12v Version)" and Wled is somewhat lacking unlike what the developers of what the Baldrick developers have put in.

 

[MikeKrebs]

The documentation on "Pixel Controller – Advanced 8-Port Ethernet Controller (12v Version)" and Wled is somewhat lacking unlike what the developers of what the Baldrick developers have put in.

WLED is fully documented and open source. Most WLED controllers including the Wasatch 8 port (for which the Advaned 8-port Ethernet Controller appears to be a clone) don't need "full documentation" as there is a great github and multiple forums that have been talking about WLED for years.

The Baldrick board has a lot of nice features and is designed specifically for seasonal lighting needs. It is not WLED and if one were looking for features that WLED has like running standalone "the rest of the year", then find a WLED board and not this one. There are a bunch of boards that run WLED including the Wasatch/YPS controller but many others as well. https://kno.wled.ge/basics/compatible-controllers/

Is the Baldrick firmware open source?

 

[MikeKrebs]

The firmware claims to output close to 3X the pixels at 40fps than WLED. (The YPS one claims 500 per pin, but not with every pin running at the same time).
Also - the dual power inputs helps to do the full 7.5A /port.

Thanks thats a pretty major difference!

Fear Uncertainty and Doubt and wrong. Where did you get not every pin running at the same time and what math do they teach down under?
The YPS/Wasatch controller fully supports 8 outputs while running WLED including in E1.31 mode:

Recommended maximum number of pixels per pin:
– 40 Frames Per Second: 500 pixels/pin (has been tested to 600 pixels/pin)
– 20 Frames Per Second: 800 pixels/pin

If we assume 600 IS the max (and that isn't what it says), the Baldrick at 750 is close to 125% of the YPS controller -- not even close to 3x.

 

[AAH]

WLED is fully documented and open source. Most WLED controllers including the Wasatch 8 port (for which the Advaned 8-port Ethernet Controller appears to be a clone) don't need "full documentation" as there is a great github and multiple forums that have been talking about WLED for years.

The Baldrick board has a lot of nice features and is designed specifically for seasonal lighting needs. It is not WLED and if one were looking for features that WLED has like running standalone "the rest of the year", then find a WLED board and not this one. There are a bunch of boards that run WLED including the Wasatch/YPS controller but many others as well. https://kno.wled.ge/basics/compatible-controllers/

Is the Baldrick firmware open source?

I stand by my lack of documentation statement. It wasn't saying that Wled isn't documented. I stated that the "Pixel Controller – Advanced 8-Port Ethernet Controller (12v Version)" that Daryl linked isn't documented. The board appears to be a clone of a Wled controller but the documentation (that isn't included) doesn't say that.

https://wasatchpixels.com/advanced-eight-controller/ has far more information and actually has setup information that is entirely missing from https://yourpixelstore.com/product/pixel-controller-advanced-eight-port-ethernet-controller/
https://wasatchpixels.com/product/advanced-eight-controller/ which is the product page for the above controller doesn't link directly to the setup information for xlights or any configuration information for Wled. Whether that is a dedicated page of wasatchpixels or on a support forum.

I am highly passionate about users having all the information that they require all in the 1 place. On neither of the 2 Wled ?? controllers linked is there definitive specifications on how many pixels per output, whether the number of pixels per output causes any sort of throttling or anything like that.

I'm not saying that there is any issue with any of the Wled based designs. There certainly is lots of people using ESP32 based designs as it's an incredible powerhouse at an incredibly low cost. I don't know anything about Wled as I've never used it. My comments were that the Baldrick has outstanding specifications and the documentation that the team put together is fairly comprehensive. I submitted a number of changes for them to add once I got onboard with distributing them because I am passionate amount the info being complete and correct.

Baldricks firmware is proprietary (as far as I know) and I don't even know who the coder is who wrote it is.

 

[thewanderingpine]

Fear Uncertainty and Doubt and wrong. Where did you get not every pin running at the same time and what math do they teach down under?
The YPS/Wasatch controller fully supports 8 outputs while running WLED including in E1.31 mode:

If we assume 600 IS the max (and that isn't what it says), the Baldrick at 750 is close to 125% of the YPS controller -- not even close to 3x.

I get that from real world experience running WLED. And from the official documentation. Where do you get your assertion from?

Here is a direct quote from WLED:

• ESP32 can calculate about 65k-85k LEDs per second (that means 1000 LEDs @~70fps, 2000 LEDs @~35fps, 4000 LEDs @~18fps)

Source: https://kno.wled.ge/features/multi-strip/

Here is a photo of WLED (A ESP32 based dig-quad running the latest firmware as of last Christmas driving 2520 pixels split evenly across 4 outputs) driving the 4 window panes on my house. You can see the top-right window lagging out.

I haven't tested the baldric board. But they claim that it can do 6000 pixels at 40fps. And WLED claims it can't quite do 2000.

If a version of WLED has come out in the last few months that can drive significantly more pixels - please let me know. I'll send a donation to air cookie and edit my previous post. Otherwise - please don't insult my maths skills.

 

[domhodgson]

Hey folks, Dom here from the Baldrick team, we've had a LOT of questions about WLED and I've tried to answer them here - https://baldrickboard.com/docs/common-questions/is_this_wled

The board as it is now is locked to 750 pixels at 40FPS but by the time the @AAH edition arrives in AUS, you will be able to run more at lower FPS (we are doing more longer run testing on these before we give out a firm number)

 

[Skymaster]

Thanks for the update Dom. That's good info.
Out of interest, will the board support higher framerates than 40fps as well as lower?

 

[domhodgson]

Thanks for the update Dom. That's good info.
Out of interest, will the board support higher framerates than 40fps as well as lower?

We aren't limiting the FPS on our side, (a quick xLights test on one of our boards is right now outputting 50FPS on a smaller number of pixels but our main focus has been 40FPS as that is the xLights default and we are trying to focus on the majority of use cases.

 

[KiwiPhil]

oh these would be a game changer if they had a 2 port eth switch for daisy chain