{"version":1,"type":"rich","provider_name":"Libsyn","provider_url":"https:\/\/www.libsyn.com","height":90,"width":600,"title":"episode 44: DMX512, ground reference and LED decoration stuff","description":"Hi, and an extremely good 2021 to all of you. We start off this brand new year talking about some totally unrelated and slightly more related new year's resolutions, a miniscule car fix, and glueing with a 3D printing pen. All in not much more detail than stated here. Continuing on last episode's VGA generator board, I added a DMX512 interface as suggested by some people - thank you for the idea. I found Q Light Controller Plus (qlcplus) a nice and so far solid piece of software for controlling DMX devices from a laptop + USB\/RS485 converter cable. A potential issue (or at least in my head) when making interlinked devices like these, is potentially different ground-potentials depending on which power outlets you use to power networked your device. (See what I did there?) We talk a bit about how to guesstimate the possible magnitude of this difference. Just for fun I made an xmas LED star-shaped decoration using an existing DIY LED driver board. Reuse everything, recycle success. Also, made a modular transparant acrylic home LED decoration: shine light into the edge of an engraved piece of acrylic. Of course there was failure, this time in the form of hygroscopic LEDs + laziness + oven = damage. Finally, I made a small power switch PCB, to be placed in between USB power source and USB device: automatically switch the device off when the environment goes dark. And remember: if YOU want to make this podcast suck less, please send comments, rants, complaints, threats and\/or praise. :-) &amp;nbsp; Relevant links:  Generic info on stray garbage and some cleanup initiatives (or Dutch version). Q Light Controller Plus : software for controlling DMX512 devices. The USB-to-RS485 cable I happen to use: USB-RS485-WE. Video of DMX512 VGA generator in action Tweet (*sigh*...) of star-shaped LED xmas decoration. Another tweet (*groan*...) of engraved acrylic LED decoration.&amp;nbsp;  &amp;nbsp; Pics of things talked about: &amp;nbsp;  DMX512 VGA generator boards. &amp;nbsp;  Engraved acrylic LED decoration PCB in action. &amp;nbsp;  ...in its base, open... &amp;nbsp;  ...and closed up. &amp;nbsp;  LDR USB power switch board... &amp;nbsp;  ...and schematic. ","author_name":"CBA Podcast","author_url":"http:\/\/podcast.cba.si","html":"<iframe title=\"Libsyn Player\" style=\"border: none\" src=\"\/\/html5-player.libsyn.com\/embed\/episode\/id\/17581151\/height\/90\/theme\/custom\/thumbnail\/yes\/direction\/forward\/render-playlist\/no\/custom-color\/88AA3C\/\" height=\"90\" width=\"600\" scrolling=\"no\"  allowfullscreen webkitallowfullscreen mozallowfullscreen oallowfullscreen msallowfullscreen><\/iframe>","thumbnail_url":"https:\/\/assets.libsyn.com\/secure\/item\/17581151"}