WS2811 Pixels Digital Addressable LED String Lights Waterproof RGB Full Color 12mm DC 12V 5V (DC 5V 500pcs)

I decided to get creative for Halloween and create a Tunnel to Hell. I'd never used an Arduino before nor done any electronics, but I was able to get this up and running as I wanted in a few days. I bought the 5V 500 pack which are actually 10 sets of 50 LEDs which you can daisy-chain together. There were three things for me to understand before I got them working: controlling them, powering them and ensuring I had enough RAM. CONTROLLING THEM The LEDs only require two connections to the Arduino board, which involved identifying the red, white and blue wires on the main LED cable, then connecting the white signal wire to one of the comms connectors and then connecting the blue ground wire to the GND connector. Controlling them is easy if you use a library called FastLED, which has a great help community on Reddit. The library can be added in the Arduino software via Manage Libraries and comes with some easy to understand examples. POWERING THEM The Arduino itself can't power enough of the LEDs so you'll need to connect a power supply. I bought a 5V 2amp power supply which I connected to the loose red and blue wires on the LEDs by screwing on a DC power connector. For my project, I hardly use any of the LEDs at the same time so 2amps seems to be enough, but if you use all the 500 LEDs at once at full brightness in white it can use 30amps! For this, I understand that you need to 'inject' 10amps of power along the strands at three points using three power supplies connected via a DC power connector, although the 12V version requires less injection points. I'd recommend buying a single power supply and then seeing if it's enough to power your project. RAM I started using the Arduno Uno r3 which worked for up to 450 LEDs. To get all 500 working within RAM I needed to upgrade to an Arduino Mega, which cost a little more money but worked the same as an Ardunio. I actually used an Elegoo Mega, which is a compatible copy. Overall the LEDs seem good quality and work as described. They're a bit smelly from the manufacturing process but perhaps that will dissipate over time.

These lights are really good. I won't comment on colour accuracy etc as that isn't my thing. I just like a chaos of colour at Christmas and these are easy to control using WLED and QuinLED Dig units. I find these days that I cut off the connectors and just wire them using wago connectors but the lights otherwise last well over several years out in the rain, snow, ice. I bought this same set two years ago and this year 2022 I bought more to add to them. Be careful though as different batches have noticeable colour differences. That's as far as I go with colour matching talk.

Used these for a year+ now in both 5v and 12v... they're good and nice and bright. Survived the winter outdoors for a couple of months with no issues at all. Some things to consider: 1) They smell! I'm not really sure what they smell of, but the entire strings have some kind of oily substance over them. After leaving them outside for a couple of days, they were fine. 2) Check the wattage... on *some* of my strings, on the label it said 0.6w/led whereas the Amazon description says 0.3w/led 3) Check the colours of the wires match to the text on the bullet (they can change from string to string!) and also make sure you are working in the correct direction (also varies from string to string) 4) The distance between each pixel isn't massive... I found myself cutting and splicing a fair bit to get what I wanted Other than that, Rextin seems to be a good source of pixels from Amazon that you can get next day with no need to worry about import duty and all that stuff...

Great quality for the price. Well made pixels. I’ve had another brand at a similar price that had lower quality on the casing and the pixels were often not pointing straight. Rextin brand are made as though there is care put into the making of them. I am very happy. I use them for my holiday (Halloween and Christmas) Light shows. So, in this case, a matrix display (signage) and the outlines to the windows at my house. Also, I drilled some holes in 2 x 4 to light up a cross I made to hang on my chimney. The lights in the matrix and window outlines have been actively working nightly for October and working great. The lights in the cross will be tested soon and will mostly be used for the Christmas light show. The included video is the lights operating during a programmed sequence. They are doing what they are supposed to do.

I love these lights. I ordered a second set. The delivery is prompt -exceeds expectations. The quality is superb

These have worked perfectly for me. I made a 130 LED animated pumpkin using an Arduino clone. They even survived accidental reverse polarity during testing. I am using the Neopixel library. Just use NEO_RGB + NEO_KHZ400 in your parameter string. I plan to use the rest of the 500 I purchased for Christmas animations. I have noticed a slight color difference with mixed colors like orange, yellow and magenta from string to string, but it is not noticeable enough to be a problem. In a long straight line it would never be noticeable. In my pumpkin with three different stings in close proximity it is just barely noticeable. It might be more of a problem in a matrix like a sign. They are very, very bright.

Ordered 1000 5 volt and tested all with HolidayCoro 16 channel controller. Work very well. Cut the connectors off and soldered pigtails for my Christmas show megatree. Recommend highly. Cost is about half of most all competitors. I have used my original order for Christmas 2017 and 2018. Very durable. VERY bright. If fact I lowered brightness via my controller to 50% and they were still very bright. I will be ordering more for 2019.

I have done many projects with WS2811 pixels (such as these) and with WS2812b strips. With this set of 500, I created 4 strings of 120 LEDs each. They work very well with one exception: If you drive them all white (0xffffff) the color becomes more reddish as you go further down the string. It's not the software, because the same software drives other projects. It's not the power, because I even used a 40amp power supply, running one string of 120 at a time, and tried bridging the +5V so that only short runs of LEDs were direct connected to +5V. This doesn't affect my project though because I only use primary and secondary colors. I did also notice that the plastic lens of many of the LEDs have small drops of glue on them. This also doesn't affect my project but it makes you wonder about the manufacturing.