Best BASIC Controllers for WLED! (QuinLED, Athom, Smlight, + more)

what's up spart homers my name is Aaron and this video is part one of my two-part wed controller comparison Series in this video we're going to focus on nine of the more basic wld controllers that are out there and in the next video we're going to look at a bunch of more advanced controllers I'm going to walk you through each one of them spending more time on some than others but trying to give you a good idea of how they work and which one is best for your project don't forget that I've left links to each one of these in the description and if you use those links I get a little commission which really helps out the channel and it's no additional cost to you the first one is the atham ls 4p and this one's an es 8266 based controller for wed you've probably seen this in my previous wed video because it's been my goto controller for a long time it has screw terminals for 5 to 24 volts DC power and it can handle a Max current of 60 amps with a built-in fuse and surge protection it has outputs for ground data and VCC for connecting an addressable LED strip but it also has a clock output because it can handle multiple types of LED strip it also has a button on the side which controls the internal relay pressing the button toggles that relay which is what's passing power through to the LED strip like I mentioned my first ever wed video I made using this controller so if you want to see how it works in detail how to wire it up things like that I've made that video so go check that out the one downside to this controller is that it does have an ESP 8266 micro controller where nowadays the more modern controllers are using an ESP 32 which has more memory and so can support more complicated LED effects especially if you're trying to use an LED Matrix for this reason I use it only for more simple LED projects but a single LED Matrix is fine powered by this thing connecting this device to Wed is going to be same for all the controllers that we're looking at in this video and pretty much when you give power to the controller it's going to broadcast a Wi-Fi access point you connect to that and then it will give you option to enter your Wi-Fi credentials once you do that now it's on your Wi-Fi and you can connect to it with the wld app or you can connect to it directly in a web browser when I originally got these they weren't able to be automatically updated via home assistant but as you can see here I can update this thing to the latest version of wld with no issues next we have another athm controller and this one is a bit beefier it has screw terminals for 5 to 24 volts DC input just like the last one but it also has a built-in DC Barrel Jack you also see this other port on the end which is for adding an IR receiver this allows you to add the optional IR receiver so you can control it with a remote on the other side you can see that it actually has two LED outputs rather than one like the previous one did those are screw Terminals and that's how you connect those LED strips we have a button on the top this time which controls the relay for power to both fused outputs and inside this thing we have a microphone this controller is running a special sound reactive Fork of wed so you can get sound reactive effects that react to the sound that the microphone picks up however this isn't the main version of wed so you do not want to update this device via home assistant or it's going to wipe out that sound reactive version and you're going to have standard wed it's ESP 32 based instead of esp8266 like the last one so it should have a lot more memory for handling larger effects also the sound reactive Fork of wed requires you to have an esp32 there is no option for esp8266 like I mentioned before this one connects just the same way you connect to the wireless access point that it broadcast put in your Wi-Fi credentials and then you can find it in the wld app I actually use this controller under my bathroom vanity with some side emitting LEDs to make a nice underglow and since has a microphone it can react with sound I made a video about how I'm using this LED strip in my smart bathroom video so I'll put a link to that in the description you should check it out this third one from atham is one of the smallest that I've seen it really reminds you of some of those magic home controllers that you see on Amazon or you used before you found out about WL it's got two connectors an addressable strip connector on one end and a barrel Jack on the other the body of the sensor has a button to toggle the strip on and off but this one has no relay so it's just telling the pixels not to display anything but power is still active to the Strip This controller can only take 5 volts or 12 volts DC input and it's made for two types of strips 5vt ws2812b strips and 12volt ws2811 strips it has a 2 Amp maximum current and because of this and the underpowered processor you really can't use it with a super long LED strip but it is great for small projects like the Happy Birthday home assistant party hat I made I also don't think it has a built-in fuse so that's something to consider and you really want to keep it for small projects only setting this one up is no different than the previous two again it broadcasts an access Point you're going to connect to that input your credentials and go ahead and find it in the wed app I was also able to update this one via home assistant with no issues this next one is actually a brand new controller from atham and I haven't had a chance to really test it out it actually just arrive a few days before I'm releasing this video but I want to go over some of its features because it is a nice plug-and-play controller this one is called the atham ls 3p and it's this tiny little controller that is powered by USBC on the top you can see that it's got a clicky little button and that button is used for turning the LED strip on and off it has a builtin three wire connector for three wire strips and it's only supporting 5vt strips so you have the USB power supply supplying 5 volts and that's going to be passed right through to the LED strip now there is no internal relay on the Strip nor a fuse so it's passing it right through but this thing does have an ESP 32 in it meaning you should be able to handle some decent lighting effects although although the number of LEDs is going to be limited by how much current your USBC power supply can supply now I don't know what the current limit is on this it's still pretty new so I can't tell you that but I hope to do some more testing on this and see if it becomes my favorite LED controller anyway when it comes to my favorites at the end of this video I really won't be including this one in the running because I haven't tested it for that long next we have this controller from SM light which is a ukraine-based company this one is also pretty small for what's in it and you can tell they've purposely designed this as small as they could it's ESP 32 based which is really nice and it has four output terminals the three typical for an LED strip and another labeled io7 which I assume is probably for clock if you want to set it up that way on one end you can see how it can be powered with a USBC cable which is really cool on the side you can also see that it has an IR receiver so you could program an IR remote to it to control it that way they also say that it has a sensor button but I'm not really sure what that even is it also has a Barrel Jack on the other side for DC power it takes 5 to 24 volts DC and has a max current of 10 amps now I don't think this device has any fuse or relay inside of it meaning power is just passed right to the LED strips and there's nothing to check that current if it gets too high this may be a safety concern so I'd suggest that you have some sort of fuse externally in your LED setup now this device also has a microphone and it's running the sound reactive version of wed again this means you can't update it directly via home assistant or it's going to wipe out that sound reactive version and you'll be back to the regular version I really like that this one is so small yet has so many features in it and it can be powered by USBC which is a really nice bonus and it also says that it supports ESP home this doesn't mean that it also is running ESP home along with wed but you could instead flash ESP home on it instead of wed which to me defeats the purpose of buying a wed controller in the first place I really wouldn't recommend that and if I were them I'd wipe that off the list as one of the features this next one is the gled opto or GED opto controller and it's similar to some of the athm controllers it has spring terminals for 5 to 24 Vols DC but it also has a barrel Jack if you want to go that way on the other side it has two LED strip outputs so you can control two with a maximum of 800 LEDs and a Max current of 10 amps between the two it also has a button on the top that you can use to control the relay that provides power to both outputs there's a little status LED on the top as well and that's pretty much it now this one is running an esp8266 not an esp32 so even though it's got two channels for output it certainly wouldn't be able to handle sound reactive wed but it's not running that it's definitely a nice little controller for some basic projects but I wouldn't go crazy with any major pixel displays if you compare this one to the atham LS4 P the two outputs is nice but it only has a 10 amp maximum current where the atham had a 16 Amp Max meaning you can control more LEDs with the athm than you could with this one the domestic automation controller looks kind of complex but it's pretty simple and it just gives you some modular features which I'll explain it has an LED strip connector built right into it so it could easily Supply a strip without any soldering which is really nice for those of you who like plug-and-play beginner controllers it has a barrel Jack also for 5 volts DC input and that's all it takes there's no 24v or 12 Vol it has a set of output terminals if you want to power something else and it also has an rj12 Jack the idea with this Jack is that you can use it to expand the functionality of this device let me show you what I mean you can use this Jack with an rj2 cable to connect a push button or an IR sensor and use those sensors with the wed firmware to kind of automate your controller you could even add an illuminant sensor which is really cool it runs an esp8266 which isn't high-powered but that's not necessary especially for a controller like this you'll also see these two LEDs that are lit up on the board here and those LEDs can actually be used as sacrificial pixels in the wed software to boost your data signal those aren't really necessary in most controllers because they'll have a logic level shifter and actually the newer version of this controller that I didn't buy has one instead of those LEDs it has ail built Infuse and a relay though which are really good things to have if you want to see a full guide on how this thing works how to add motion sensors push buttons aluminum sensors go ahead and check out Chris Maher's video which I'm going to leave Linked In the description by the way if you haven't seen Chris Maher's videos you have to check them out he does tons of wld and LED lighting videos and they are some excellent guides especially his Basics video on soldering Chris also covers a sound reactive version of the same controller while I do like the fact that you can add these externals I don't like that it doesn't have a case because your project really isn't polished off until you've added a case this means that you're going to have to 3D print one and it kind of takes away from the plug-and-play feel of this device Quinn LED makes a ton of different controllers but we're going to look at two of them in this video and some more in the next video the first one is the most basic the dig to go which is powered by a USBC Port so you can connect it up pretty easily even though it can only handle a maximum of 3 amps limited by built-in fuses on the other side it has a jack for three wire connector which is also provided allowing you to easily connect an LED strip with no soldering or screw terminals nice and clean it has two exposed four pin headers for additional things like sensors but it has a built-in IR receiver and a microphone as you can see on the top all these features make it a really versatile little controller now it has the basic version of wed installed on it but you can install the sound reactor version if you want because it's running an esp32 too because it's running the standard version of WD it can be updated via home assistant without any issues pretty sweet the next one is an oldie but a goodie and it was my first ever wed controller in my first ever project using wed this one is called the Quinn LED dig Uno and while this video is covering basic wed controllers this one is probably the furthest from basic and the closest to DIY just because of the different things you can do with it it has a single Channel LED output and two screw terminals to take 5 to 24 Vols DC actually there's a second data output so you technically could control two LED strips sharing the same power terminals from what I read on the website it should be able to handle 15 amps but it only has a 10 amp fuse on it so I'd probably limit it there if you do want a case for this one you can 3D print one yourself or you can buy one from the Quinn LED shop this one can also be updated easily via home assistant which is really nice simple and easy to do so for testing these devices I actually used a variable power supply and I tested them using 5 volts 12 volts and 24 volts depending on what they say they're capable of running I tested them at 5 volts using this neon rope light that I've showed in a previous wed video and I didn't have problems with any of them they all worked fine next I use this ws2811 cob LED strip as well as these ws2811 pixel bullets to test each of these at 12 volts this worked fine for all of them except for the wires on these pixel bullets are kind of thick and they couldn't fit into into the tiny terminals of the SM light controller they literally have made these terminals so small that you can't fit standard wires into them this actually makes me really dislike this controller despite the features because they've tried to make it so small that it's actually a pain to use anyway once I did get those 12volt cob lights hooked up to it it actually worked fine with no issues controlling the 12vt LED strip lastly I tried them all at 24 volts using this 24volt cob LED strip and this is where I had some issues both the SM light controller and the GED opto controller had issues at 12 volts and the LED strip would flash erratically and I couldn't control brightness or anything like that thinking I damaged the strip I then went back and tried the Dig Uno as well as some other ones and they had no issues so there's something really wrong with the SM light and the GED opto at 24 Vols if you're still watching thanks for sticking around to the end now it's time to go over my favorites and my least favorites for my favorites I'll tell you what I liked about them and why I chose those controllers over the others and for my least favorites I'll tell you why I wouldn't really recommend them for most situations since these controllers are all pretty basic and they all just control an LED strip pretty much I'm going to start with the two best budget options these are the atham ls 2812b for small projects and the atham ls 4p for mediumsized projects I love the plug-and playay nature of the ls 282b and for short runs it's definitely worth the price I can even see this used for some batterypowered options like something in your car the ls 4p is great for mediumsized projects where you aren't powering a ton of LED matrices or anything like that because it is limited by the esp8266 but it can handle 160 amps which is quite a bit my favorite sound reactive controller is probably the aam ls8 because it not only has a microphone but it also has dual Channel output and actual relay for cutting power to the LEDs it's rocket and ESP 32 and it's packaged really nice you don't have to add anything to it you you can just start using it if we're talking about the best dual Channel controller I think you can't go wrong with the GED opto because although it has n esp8266 it can handle a decent number of LEDs and it's really easy to use because it has spring terminals instead of screw terminals that being said it did have issues running 24volt LED strips so it might be something to consider if you're trying to run those now what's really cool about dual Channel outputs is the fact that they can actually treat both outputs as if they're connected together you can you can see with these two triangular panels how they act as if they're all one panel connected together even though it's two different outputs this applies to all dual Channel outputs and it's really a function of the wed software but it's pretty cool the best DIY style controller in my opinion is of course the Quin LED did Juno this is because you can get an optional temperature sensor to add to it and there are six GPO pins available for additional sensors and whatever you want to do with it if you're running a mediumsized pixel Matrix maybe like a 64x 64 this may be the way to go because it does have an esp32 so you could run sound reactive with a 64x 64 without any issues however I'm going to cover better options than this for some of these pixel matrices in the next video all right so my least favorite has to be the SM light controller and I hate to say that because I actually really like it at the same time however the tiny features but then excluding a relay and a fuse really take it down a notch in my book and the fact that I had to fight with those terminals is just going to be a pain for what we' call a basic controller I think there are some really great features about it like the USBC power and just everything they've packed into it but in my opinion make it a little bit bigger and have a little better features the next one I don't really like is the domestic automation controller mostly because of the price now that's because I run home assistant so I do all my automations there because wld integrates great with home assistant but if you don't have an automation platform of your own this could be a good option for getting some motion sensory and push button controls now the last one I'm going to say I don't recommend you might get a little mad because I've already recommended it and it's the djuno and my problem with it is when you look at the price the fact that it has no case and that it's meant for medium-sized projects if we're talking about basic LED controllers that's not the one I'd go with now again as you get more advanced this is the one for you another thing I don't like and it's something I guess I didn't show earlier but if you want to access access the terminals for connecting an LED strip you actually have to pull off the fuse then you have to pull off the esp32 and now you have access to those screw terminals that makes it a pain especially for someone who's a beginner and maybe they're a little afraid to take something apart it's just not something you want to have to do so that's the reason why I'm saying I wouldn't recommend it as a basic W controller anyway I know I'm going to hear it in the comments from you guys about this one but I got to say thanks for sticking around and that's pretty much it for this comparison do do me a favor and hit the like button if you like this video and if you didn't still hit the like button don't forget that I have part two of this comparison where I feature a bunch of advanced controllers and you do not want to miss it so hit subscribe and get the Bell on so you'll be notified when that one comes out let me know in the comments what you guys think of these controllers and if there's any that I missed anyway thanks for watching see you [Music] he [Music]

Channel: Make It Work

Views: 10,882

Keywords: smart home, tech, home assistant, automation, diy, review, control, device, sensor, wled, light strip, led strip, ws2812b, ws2811, 5v, 12v, 24v, vdc, power supply, athom, quinled, domestic automation, smlight, gledopto

Id: l0WAzAyRi8c

Length: 19min 8sec (1148 seconds)

Published: Sat Jun 15 2024