RGB Led matrix - 16x32 - 5mm spacing

A 16x32 RGB LED matrix to create innovative displays

Would you like to add a display to show the news or other house's info... some kind of display similar to thoses used in the Piccadilly Circus (at London) but sized for your living room? You will certainly love this RGB LED matrix. This hardware is reallly cool.

This version of the RGB matrix has 16x32 LEDs with 6mm spacing. Please, note that it is not possible to drive a so big matrix with an Arduino UNO! You will need to use an Arduino Mega, Raspberry Pi, BBB or other peripheral offering enough memory to drive such hardware.

This matrix is made of 512 bright RGB LEDs ordered in a matric of 16x32 on the front. The back of the display has 2 IDC connectors (one for input signal and one other for the output signal). In theory, you can daisy chain those panels and 12 latchs of 16-bit can drive the panel with 1:8 scan rate.

Theses displays are 'chaînable' - connect the output of one panel to the input of the next panel - however, the Arduino Code of Adafruit only drive one panel.

This panel requires 12 digitals pins (6 data bits and 6 control bits) and a good 5V power supply. Each panel draws up to 2 amps.

Supplied with:

• Only one 16x32 RGB panel,
• An IDC cable
• A power supply cable
• 4 assembly screw with small magnet (those panels are often assembled on a magnetic base).

Please, keep in mind that this product has been designed to work with FPGAs and high speed processors: the panel doesn't have any kind of PWM driver. Instead, your code should have to draw the screen again and again. With an Arduino Mega @ 16 MHz you can handle 12-bits colors (4096 colors) with a CPU usage around 40% but this display would offer the best when controlled by a multi-core microcontroler, FPGA, CPLD, Propeller, XMOS.
A good news about this panel is it offers a 'preconfigured' white balance which is uniform... so if you turn on all the LEDs its not a particularly tinted white.

You will find a tutorial with wiring and usage (including library for Arduino). You will be able to display pixels (dot), lines, rectangles, circles and text. You will be able to displays brightly colors within an hour! On the Arduino, you will need 12 digitals pins and 800 bytes of RAM to store the picture (with its 12 bits colors - to up to 4096 colors per pixel).

Please, note that the display are remaind stock from factories that makes huge display project. So, the look and sizing may vary a bit from one batch to another, the basics operating stays the same.

Technical details

Here the factory's specification.

• Dimensions: 192mm x 96mm x 12mm
• Panel weight with IDC and power cables: 170g
• Input voltage: 5V DC, 2.5A max (with all leds turned on)
• Logic level: 5V data logic
• 2000 mcd LEDs with 6mm spacing
• Scan rate: 1/8
• Visibility: 150°
• The displays are chainable - connect the output of one panel to the input of the second panel - this feature is not managed by the Arduino library.