I present to the world, the Super LED MASK-inator 2000!
Actually, not really, this lovely gadget is – an, App Controlled Facemask –
from Wavors Store on Aliexpress for about £17 odd
it’s essentially a 36 x 12 RGB LED Matrix on a flexible PCB – with Bluetooth!
Just think, that’s 432 LED’s, 3 colours….Which is 1296 individually controllable outputs!..
Inside we have a flexible PCB and a couple of types of IC
| 8 off | TC5020A | 16 CHANNEL CONSTANT CURRENT LED DRIVER | https://lcsc.com/product-detail/LED-Drivers_TC5020AP_C126197.html |
| 2 off | TC7258GN | 8 Channel Blanking Control Driver IC | http://www.superchip.cn/Private/ProductFiles/6367951653906382691338697318.pdf |
there’s also a custom Module on board, that kinda looks like a generic bluetooth module, but has been made specifically for this device – having the text ‘Mask Core V1.1″ on it
the module has 14 castellated through hole connections to the flex PCB below.
I’ll ‘buzz out’ those lines at some point, as i’m really not quite sure how it’s wired up after such a quick look – maybe 12 ‘data’ lines for the rows, an address strobe line for the 32 columns and +V? (with GND hidden below?)
[edit, maybe not – This sparkfun post contains details on how to drive ‘similar’ style matrixes, it seems that it may be an almost fairly standard RGB matrix, just in a different format – gonna be fun finding out!]
As for the plans…….not much yet. BUT, bluetooth is in this. it’s in the Spectrum Next’s DB+ device coming out next year….this beast could put a new spin onto games!
ALso, i’ve purchased 3 more for the wife and kids – if they don’t arrive in time for Halloween, we’ll use them for some Christmas Joviality 🙂
