When you set a digital port to Off, it outputs gnd. If you set a digital port to On, it outputs +5

:)

Thanks for the help but please excuse my ignorance. I'm new and trying to figure this all out.

However I think I'm starting to understand. But.... So, I need to attach to one light pattern trigger pin to one of the digital ports. There are three pins on each of the digital ports. Which ones do I use?

Then once connected properly I expect I need to write a script in ARC that says something like this to ground the pin on the light board and start the light pattern?: Set (digitalPort, [on/off/true/false]) Set a digital port state to either on or off Example: Set(D2, OFF)

Then to stop it I would set the port to ON? Example: Set(D2, ON)

Am I close or completely wrong?

Thanks again for the help,

Dave Schulpius

If this helps here is a description I received from the guy that makes this light control board of how the effect section works:

"Heres how it works. A computer only monitors 1 and 0. +5 is considered 1 or true basically, So all the inputs to the computers are +5 thru pull up resistors (the small resistors on the board above the chip). So when you ground one of the lines, the value drops to 0 volts, and the computer knows the input has changed and to react. But, any voltage IN to those connections will blow the computer chip, it only knows +5 and anything above that will fry the CPU. The board black power wire is ground, as well as the GND pin where you put the connections for the effects. Stick with those for ground."

Perhaps I should ground this board through a relay using a transistor controlled by the EZ-B? If so any suggestions on how to build that circuit and what to use?

Thanks again for any thoughts on this.

Dave Schulpius

Black=Ground Red= +5Volts Yellow=Signal

If there is no Black wire, then Brown is Ground.

I would STRONGLY Recommend that you read all of the Tutorials ans watch all of the videos.

:D

Thanks, Excellent advice. I'm slowly going through the videos while working on each phase of my robot. I do get impatient sometimes and get ahead of myself. However I do like to know what to do when I get to each part so I can keep building. I'll be wanting to connect this board soon and thought it would be a nice added attraction if EZ-B could change the light patterns on my robot as it controlled other things like answering questions and movement through the Speech Recognition. EZ-B is a wonderful board. It's bringing my full size B9 (Lost in Space) Robot slowly alive!

Thanks again for the guidance and I'm sure I'll have lots other questions. I really don't want to blow something up. I've done that lots of other time and it can get expensive and frustrating.

Dave Schulpius

Movie maker is right about the wiring. Apply that to what I had said. You'll never get more than 5 volts from the ez-b pins. Either 5, gnd or signal. And signal can be either 0 or 5.

Then to get more advanced you can use pwm to generate voltage between 0 and 5. But u don't need that.

Hi all,

Sorry in advance for the long post.

I am having mixed success with EZ-B controlling the light patterns. After burning out one of my chips on the light controller board and now being very careful I found the right combination of connections to get the EZ-B to ground the light effect pins I want: I ran a ground wire from the effects connection grounding pad/pin on the light board to the "Ground" pin of one of the Digital Ports of the EZ-B. Then one wire from the effects pin on the light board I wanted to ground to the "Signal" pin of that same EZ-B Digital Port. All worked well while I had the EZ-B powered on, connected through the Bluetooth to ARC on the Laptop and that Digital Port configured. I could set the port to ON in ARC and it would send 5v through the signal wire to the effects enable pin on the light board and when I set the port to OFF the signal wire would switch to ground and start the light effect. Sadly when the ARC is not connected through Bluetooth to the EZ-B the Digital Ports "Signal" is OFF and the effect pin is grounded and causes the lighting effect to run. The Digital ports seem to have only two states, ON (sending 5v) and OFF (0v and grounded). I think I need a true Null when the EZ-B is disabled because I want the light control board to stay running it's regular routine all by it's self when the EZ-B is off or waiting to connect to the Laptop.

So, if I'm not mistaken I can not run the light board directly from the EZ-B Digital port. Please let me know if you see any other way to do this. If not my next step will be to try a relay that EZ-B will turn on and off and switch the effects pin of the light board directly to it's own ground. Any suggestions on a type of 5v relay that EZ-B may be able to handle. I've seen 4-Channel Relay Board built for Arduino. Do you think this will do the job? Can be seen here: http://www.amazon.com/SainSmart-4-Channel-Relay-Module-Arduino/dp/B0057OC5O8

Thanks for any help or wisdom you can offer,

David Schulpius