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Tests and comparisons of WS2813, WS2812B, WS2815 and similar digital LED strips

Digital LED strip with individual RGB (W) control has long been included in our lives as a decorative decoration. The popularity of such products is growing every day, and even large Chinese online stores sometimes can not cope with the volume of orders in the pre-holiday season and not only. For this reason, a lot of low-quality goods and fakes appeared on the market. In this publication I want to share my experience in using and testing the digital tape WS2813 (WORLDSEMI CO., LIMITED), purchased from various sellers on the aliexpress trading platform, as well as the original factory one.

To get started, I want to compare the look and layout of smart LEDs.

1. Digital (smart) LED chips.

A comparative photograph of smart chips made with a macro lens clearly
shows significant differences:

  1. on the original chip from the factory (photo on the left), all three crystals are located on one electrode, on an analog with aliexpress, all three crystals are located on different electrodes (crystals should be placed on one electrode for better color mixing).
  2. on the original chip there is a capacitor, which gives additional stability in power, on the analogue of the capacitor there is no, it must be additionally installed on the tape.



2. The thickness of the copper conductive busbars.

VIDEO HERE

The test has undergone the lower copper layer of the LED strip, which is powered by pixels. When I reached the bottom layer, I measured its thickness in part of the contact pad using a high-precision instrument, which measures linear values โ€‹โ€‹using the absolute method. The thickness of the contact pad was:

  1. Original 55 ฮผm
  2. 35 ฮผm analog

The difference is 57%.



The thickness of the copper layer of the original is 57% more than the analogue. What does it mean?

This layer is responsible for powering the LEDs. The smaller the thickness of the layer, the greater the lack of power on the LEDs will experience and the more often it will be necessary to supply additional power to the tape in order to avoid reddening of the LEDs when the voltage drops. The red tint of the smart LED is due to the fact that the RED crystal requires a lower supply voltage than for GREEN and BLUE.

Findings:

  • LED products market is littered with counterfeit products;
  • the use of a cheap fake misleads an inexperienced user, because after only one meter such a tape gives out red light instead of white;
  • saving on tape quality makes no sense if you take into account the costs of connecting additional power and installing additional capacitors, not to mention the quality of LED chips.

Are you satisfied with the quality of the LED strip of your suppliers? Share your experiences.

We are setting up our production of digital LED strips, taking into account the results of our research and experiments to obtain a high-quality product, and we will be grateful for the constructive advice on the weak points of smart tapes and their solutions. At the same time, we test products and identify the best suppliers.

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