40 Channel LED Controller?

Question

Hi, Ok here's my problem. I have 40 LEDs. I want to put them into a circuit with maybe a PIC microcontroller? Or something of similar nature.. Something that will allow me to create sequences with the lights.

Basically I just need a PIC or something similar that's fairly cheap and has 40 different ports/terminals that I can turn on and off similtaneously easily.

Answer 1

You can get pics with more than 40 i/o pins but these are only available in surface mount form and are very expensive and which are tricky to work with....if i were doing this i'd configure the leds into a 5x8 matrix array. therfore only requiring  13 i/o pins if your only using standard 4mA led then you can simply drive the array direct from the pic. and if you run the array at about 1Khz then you wont notice any flicker...

google led matrix if you need more help...you'll find this is the common way of doing it...

Answer 2

I made a LED light box that sequenced 100 RGB dyes and 50 Ultra-bright dyes. I used a PIXaxe microcontroller and some drivers. You probably don't need a 40 i/o microcontroller.

Can you be more specific. Do you want to control each LED independently?? or just string them to together for simple sequences.

If it's for simple sequences you can use a drivers or shift registers. I placed a link below if you use shift registers.

If you want to control 40 LED's individually it would take more then a paragraph to explain and about $200 in parts. If you send me a more in-depth description of your project I can give you more advice.