OK... I have some questions for those who want to assist a very confused individual starting down this path...
which connector is recommended? I have purchased a few sets with the 3-pin JST SM connectors. Now that I am looking at the falcon controller I see it is not one of the pigtail types so is the xconnect or ray wu a better choice or does it matter?
is Pixel Controller the best place to purchase a falcon controller? I've seen a few sites offering falcon controllers at various price ranges. Or is there others options I should consider? I basically want to start this year with the eves on both levels of the front of my house using Permatracks, line the garage door and a christmas tree but who knows I might do a few more items like a wreath.
I want to get one of the trees as mentioned above, is Holiday Coro or Light-O_Rama the best choices or other?
I have been researching and feel like I am drowning so I would appreciate any advice and helpful advice on the best path.
I've been playing with WLED and nodemcu for a few hours but realize I will probably switch to xlights.
Connectors:
I was just trying to decide on XConnect or Ray Wu connectors myself and ended up choosing XConnect. They are mostly the same though, I just decided on those because that is what I could get strings of pixels for readily at the moment as well as spare connectors to wire to my custom controllers (which are working great so far... have to refresh my writeup).
Other questions:
Maybe check doityourselfchristmas.com for more recommendations on the controller and such.
Hey, Sorry for the late replay. I haven't logged in for a few days.
I find that these connectors won't hold up outdoors.
I use the 18 AWG Screw Together Extension cables.
Ray Wu or xconnect is just a personal choice. My first purchase was from Holiday Coro and so I started with xconnect. I do have some Ray Wu and they are the same item, just different pin positions. You're going to need to do a fair amount of soldering when you take on the lights project, so at the end of the day, it doesn't really matter too much because you can easily swap them out by soldering to a new wire. The extension cables come in 5ft and 20ft lengths, so measure the distances of your displays and buy accordingly. On other thing I use is this flat connector cable and then solder pigtails to the ends. Sometime the black cable is too heavy and doesn't do things like wrap around trees very easily.
It is the "home of falcon controllers" so you can't go wrong there. You just need to decide if you want to go with 5v of 12v. I recommend 12v; you can string more lights together with longer lead wire and voltage drop isn't a bad. Speaking of which, voltage drop is a huge issue and so plan your power accordingly. Even though you can buy a controller with more outputs, doesn't mean it will work for you. The further your lights get from the controller, the more trouble you have keeping them functioning properly and the more power injections you will need.
I prefer to have multiple controllers throughout the display, allowing me to keep the controllers as close to the lights as possible. Some people don't consider power injection a problem, but it's been the monkey on my back some years. In my opinion, the less power injection you need, the better your display. For example, in the display I posted above, I had 3 controllers, each with 16 outputs:
The mega tree only. The controller was placed at the base of the tree and the tree needed all 16 outputs. It still needed extra power, but because there was relatively no lead wire to the lights, the extra power wasn't too bad.
The lights on the left side of the yard
The lights on the right side of the yard.
I could have placed one controller in the middle of the yard for all the lights as 16 outputs would be enough, but the amount of wire needed to do this would mean a lot of injections, and running the lights a high brightness would have been a challenge for the controller.
I'm not a fan of Light-o-Rama or the pre-packaged trees in general. Both are much more expensive, and setting up a light display requires a lot of DIY skills, and creating the display yourself gives you the knowledge required to troubleshoot.
The best approach depends on the size tree that you want, but I buy a lot from Boscoyo. One year my display had multiple 6-8 ft trees and they were easy to set up with the Boscoyo Mega Tree Kit, 3/4 in EMT Conduit , and Mounting Strips. This year I built the mega mega tree, and for that I used these really great instructions from Walter Monkhouse. If you ever decide on the big daddy tree, they require the big mounting strips.
A few final notes. . .
I found this guys site to have a lot of good information when I was starting out.
My first year I did the house outline with the rgb pixel strips. Most sites will tell you to do this and there are lots of mounting accessories available. Personally, I'm don't like them so much. They tend to lose connection easily as the strips are very thin and they didn't hold up well over time. After a few years, I moved to use the 12mm Pixel nodes (or bullets). They are durable and make a much better display. To me, they are the perfect christmas light. I buy them from Ray Wu and have had excellent experiences with him. Last year I did a custom run because I wanted 12 in wire between the lights and 4 in is the max available. I emailed him directly and had my product in hand 2 weeks later. And the cost of a custom run was cheaper than the regular lights available on US sites.
I hope this helps. Feel free to send me a DM and we can exchange emails if you want to chat more about it.
Good luck. It can be frustrating at first, but big payoffs once you get your feet wet.
WOW.. thanks for that write up. a lot of good info. it is definitely a huge learning curve. i have received 500 pixel nodes this week with xconnect so i am starting the journey.
you'll be fine. don't bite off more than you can chew your first year, and don't underestimate the amount of wiring troubleshooting that will be involved. the tech isn't plug and play yet, but more than worth it in the end.
I noticed someone posting about Halloween on the forum today so decided I to follow up on my own Christmas display journey. It did not begin until I saw this thread. This journey is definitely not for the faint of heart but thanks to @McSketchy for answering some of my questions along the way. I also viewed many tutorial guides on YouTube - lots of them and I definitely needed them. I guess I under estimated what was required in the beginning. I started simple with a 100 string light. LOL it took 2 days to get it to light up. I was following the guide on YouTube exactly then on day two, I googled it and determined one of the wires was not set correctly. I changed it and it worked. I thought about what I wanted and decided to start very small this year with just 2-2.5 thousand lights. Then the more I thought about it and thought about it, I was determined to go bigger and make a statement in my neighborhood. LOL my neighbor convinced me to do it. So 2000 suddenly jumped to 10,000. Then reality sunk in… that I actually needed more than I had anticipated…. Power supplies, a larger controller, props, how to hang them on my house, outlets on exterior of the house. It definitely costs a lot so beware. It took me a couple of months to figure out all the details on how to program the lights using xLights and it is still only a tiny fraction of what I need to learn. Luckily I figured out how to import and map others free work and adjust it to my display. One done for a 10 minute show took about a week of fine tuning. Oh, to order this stuff… there can be a long wait time for delivery. I ordered the first 2000 lights in April, the rest in June and none have arrived yet. I ordered 1000 from china in June at a higher cost but they arrived within weeks. Still waiting on other items but hopefully most should arrive later this month.
But I think I am ready. Many hours building props, many hours reading up stuff or viewing YouTube videos on other folks displays or what to do or not to do. Many changes to my display over the summer. I think I am ready for Christmas 2021.
Oh, did I fail to mention an 8x4 foot video board with 5000 lights. It was fun building the display stand. I am still trying to decide if I want to put up a radio channel for people to tune to while driving by. Either that or speakers but that is probably overboard. I expect to hear from my homeowners association. Yes… only running the lights at 30%.
That is what I have been working on for the past 5 months.
Lighting sequences are so much better with sound so I think you'll eventually want to do one or the other. I have mine setup up so I can do either, but I'm sure my neighbors prefer I use the FM transmitter. With the transmitter option you'll probably want a "Tune To" sign as well. I'm using an old 24" monitor that I've setup as a digital matrix in xLights.
Hey jkp. Glad to hear you are still working on it and things are progressing. You will def need a tune to sign if you have a radio broadcast. I had lawn sign made on VistaPrint; cheap and easy.
For the speaker option, I have outdoor speakers set up bc I am in Florida and many people walk to view the lights. But I didn't want the sequences to be playing music the entire night, so I built a sequence controller that allows people to start/stop/forward the sequences.
When no one has started the routines, the lights display effects that are not created for a musical sequence. It works perfectly. You need to run the routines through Falcon Player with a RaspPi device, but I recommend that setup regardless. Feel free to reach out to me if you want to know about the wiring.
