Interstate 75 chain multiple panels Possible?

Discussion Raspberry Pi
1

Hi Guys,

I’m thinking about createing a small LED Wall with 4 64x32 Matrix panels.

Is the interstate 75 able to chain 4 Panels?

Thanks in advance
Tim

2

I would love to try a project like that one day. I don’t have the device, I’m answering based on the product page for the Interstate 75 - RGB LED Matrix Driver (it uses an RP2040)

It has this part:

Interstate 2040 is powered and programmable by USB-C. USB-C is capable of providing up to 3A of power which should be enough to power a single 64x64 (or smaller) panel, assuming you’re not planning anything too eye-bleedingly bright. If you need more power than that (so you can chain multiple panels together, perhaps?) you can inject it into the screw terminals instead.

so the 64x64 panels have 4096 LEDs/dots while the 64x32 panels have 2048 LEDs/dots so in theory it could support 2 x 64x32 panels without needing extra power.

Pimoroni mention multiple panels on this tutorial:
Getting Started with Interstate 75
it doesn’t have much info but it has a photo of the back of a couple panels.

4 x 64x32 panels would be 8192 LEDs/dots so double what the product page suggests it can power. It sounds like extra care would need to be taken to be sure it was setup right. Hopefully someone else with experience with the panels answers.

EDIT: I looked at that getting started page a bit more, it had info about powering the board and panels, I didn’t read all of it but it looks good enough info for a getting started page.

And I had a quick look about software, it might be hard setting up how the panels are arranged, I’m guessing they might only work in a long row so making making 4x64=256 wide and 64 high rather than being able to do 128x128 with them in a 2 x 2 arrangement.

Then looking on GitHub issue search for hub75 I found Interstate 75 Pixel Mapping #249 that appears to be talking about this topic. I’ve only used LED matrixes on the sense hat and BBC Microbit i.e. all in one devices not separate panels, if (probably when :)) I get HUB75 panels, I’d have to learn about it then.

3

Yeah about the powering i will give every Panel an external powersupply.

I was able to Chain 2 Panels in a row. Both have shown the Same content. So basically i have driven 2 Panels.

Will try further…