Using WS2812B for simple case light mod possible?

Thread Starter

Zenoslaf

Joined May 18, 2020
2
Hi all,

I'm relatively new to the world of electronics. I recently started modding my old Game Boys with backlit screens and some other stuff, and I would like to put some LED's in case to light up the buttons.

There are already similar LEDs on the market, but they are pretty expensive and I'm not sure if they are worth that much (7,50$ for 10 LEDs). So my question is: Can I use cheap chinese WS2812B LEDs instead of much more expensive set.

Can these WS2812B LEDs be even used like that? I would solder them in series, 4 of them go in one case. Do I also need a resistor? People that do this kind of projects, usually connect them to a capacitor on GameBoy. You can see it on this YouTube video.

I see most people are using them with Arduino for cool projects, but I only need cheap lights for my GameBoy case.

Thank you in advance.
 

R!f@@

Joined Apr 2, 2009
9,918
You cannot use WS2812B on it's own, resistor or not.
They are addressable LED's. To address them ( to light them ) you need a micro-controller such as an Arduino.

for u, tht video is best. Unless you want to cramp an arduino in to the gameboy. Which might be possible if you have space. And it will be much cooler
 

dendad

Joined Feb 20, 2016
4,452
It just may be a good project to start playing with Arduinos.
An Arduino Nano can be found on Ebay for under $5US, and adding that to your gameboy to drive some addressable LEDs is not to hard. There are many posts about it. Once you have the Arduino there, other things and be added, like accelerometer , light sensors, OLED displays, sound....
Have a play and see what you can make it do.
 
Top