Simple LED Button Question from a NOOB

[redcup]

Hello. I have transparent buttons installed, but not yet lit. If I just want the lights to turn on when the system is on, but nothing else fancy, what would I need and how would I go about it? Computer is up and running and working.

Thanks!!!

[monkeychunkuk]

all depends on the volatge of the Leds you have installed,if they are 12v you can pick up 12v from your power supply for your pc if you find a spare plug with a yellow and black

mke sure you have the polarity correct on each led and just daisy chain from each button to the next

[Polemicist]

Or if you have the money you can go a PacLED64 and drive the lights that way and grab a copy of LEDBlinky and animate the buggers. Looks awesome and is run off USB. You can even get RGB lights and go any colour you like. http://ultimarc.com/ enjoy

[blacketj]

First you have to figure out what lights you are going to use and what voltage they run at.

You should be able to grab 12v (yellow wire), 5v (red) or 3.3v (orange) off of your computer's power supply. So if you get LED packages designed for any of those voltages, you just need to wire them directly to the correct voltage wire and ground (black) and it should work. And the lights will only be on when the system is on.

This is what the wiring should look like:

So all the positive leads from the LEDs are connected to the power rail, and all negative leads to the ground rail. This is called wiring in parallel. Wired this way you should be able to have as many LEDs as you'll ever want running off one power connection with no problems. And if any of the LEDs burn out or get a loose connection, it won't affect the operation of the the others.

To keep it clean I would wire it all to a molex connector that I pulled off an old case fan or bought online somewhere. That way it would be easy to just unplug all the lights if you wanted to change to power supply.

[emb]

Are they LEDs for your pushbuttons? If so, just grab yourself a LED wiring harness from paradisearcadeshop:

http://www.paradisearcadeshop.com/en/jamma-harnesses/677-ez-led-wiring-harness-085574200677.html

Hook them up into a molex connector so you can just use your computer's power supply. You can find those 4 pin molex connectors for dirt cheap (or cut an existing one).

Keep in mind that you might also need resistors for your LEDs. You might want to ask the vendor where you bought your LEDs from to ensure they already have resistors.

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