Medium 16x32 RGB LED matrix panel

SKU: ADA420 Brand: Adafruit

Bring a little bit of Times Square into your home with this 16 x 32 RGB LED matrix panel. These panels are normally used to make video walls, here in New York Adafruit...

$64.40 AUD, inc GST

$58.55 AUD, exc GST

Available with a lead time
Expect dispatch between Dec 30 and Jan 03

Quantity Discounts:

6-12 $56.79 (exc GST)
12+ $55.62 (exc GST)

Bring a little bit of Times Square into your home with this 16 x 32 RGB LED matrix panel. These panels are normally used to make video walls, here in New York Adafruit see them on the sides of busses and bus stops, to display animations or short video clips. Adafruit thought they looked really cool so they picked up a few boxes of them from a factory. They have 512 bright RGB LEDs arranged in a 16x32 grid on the front. On the back there is a PCB with two IDC connectors (one input, one output: in theory you can chain these together) and 12 16-bit latches that allow you to drive the display with a 1:8 scan rate.

RAM & Processor Requirements

Keep in mind that these displays were designed to be driven by FPGAs or other high speed processors: they do not have built in PWM control of any kind. Instead, you're supposed to redraw the screen over and over to 'manually' PWM the whole thing.

You'll need about 1600 bytes of RAM to buffer the 12-bit color image. You cannot use this size panel with an Arduino UNO (ATmega328) or ATmega32u4 - you need a chip with more RAM! These displays are technically 'chainable' - connect one output to the next input - as long as you have the RAM and CPU to handle it

This display does best with a high speed, high RAM microcontroller like a SAMD21, SAMD51, ESP32, etc. 8-bit micros are going to struggle if they work at all. The good news is that the display is pre-white balanced with nice uniformity so if you turn on all the LEDs it's not a particularly tinted white.

Power Requirements

There's a lot of LEDs! You may need up to 4A per panel. We suggest Adafruit's 4A regulated 5V adapter and then connecting a 2.1mm jack. Please check out Adafruit's tutorials for more details!

Connection Requirements

These displays require 13 GPIO pins to control. You may have to use consecutive or special pins depending on the driver firmware. We'll be honest: folks who try to wire directly are usually not successful, its easy to get confused and misconnect. For that reason, Adafruit strongly recommend a ready-to-go board or adapter that makes wiring as easy as plugging in the cables and powering with 5V

Adafruit recommend the Matrix Portal ESP32-S3 for a WiFi-enabled powerful plug-and-play board
The original Matrix Portal with SAMD51 is also a great plug-and-play board if you happen to want a Cortex M4 as a main processor (we recommend the S3 version, above, as it is faster and has more memory)
For many Arduino-shaped boards, you may be able to use Adafruit's RGB Matrix Shield (check the product page and tutorial for which Arduino-like boards can be used)
They also have RGB Matrix FeatherWings for many Feather boards (check the product page and tutorial for which Feather boards can be used)
For Raspberry Pi computers, Adafruit's RGB Matrix Bonnet is fully plug-and-play for powerful Linux-controlled displays.

Adafruit have also got Adafruit's great Protomatter library that works in Arduino and CircuitPython for quick usage of many chained matrices.

Please note! These panels are remainder stock from factories that make huge light boards. For that reason, the look and size might vary from batch to batch, even though the basic operation, codebase, and tutorial is the same.

Technical Details

Datasheet

Dimensions: 192mm x 96mm x 12mm (7.6" x 3.8" x 0.5")
Panel weight with IDC cable and power cable: 170g
5V regulated power input, 2.5A max (all LEDs on)
5V data logic level input
~2000 mcd LEDs on 6mm pitch
Compatible with M3 mounting screws
1/8 scan rate
Indoor display, 140 degree visibility
Displays are 'chainable' - connect one output to the next input - but Adafruit's Arduino example code does not support this yet

As of August 11, 2020 - Adafruit no longer include Magnetic Feet with this product

Datasheet

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