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[mcw]

Xenium LED "FUN" Guide Thread
-----------------------

.LED files are stored under:
E:\XeniumOS\Leds\

.LED files are TEXT files

.LED files consist of lines with the following format:
XX YY ZZ
Where
XX = Count, in ms? for the LED to stay that color
YY = Xenium LED color
ZZ = Front Panel (Xbox console) LED Color

Count values:
10000 = 1 Second
1000 = 1/10th of a second (100 milliseconds)
100 = 1/100th of a second (10 milliseconds)
10 = 1/1000th of a second (1 millisecond)
1 = 1/10000th of a second (1/10th of a millisecond)

Possible Xenium LED colors:
0 = OFF
1 = Red
2 = Green
3 = Amber
4 = Blue
5 = Purple
6 = Teal
7 = White

Possible Front Panel (Xbox Console) LED Colors:
0F = Green
FF = Orange
F0 = Red

SAMPLE Test file:

CODE

10000 0 0F
10000 1 FF
10000 2 F0
10000 3 FF
10000 4 0F
10000 5 FF
10000 6 F0
10000 7 FF

What this does is cycle through the full color set (including OFF). One color per second, and it will also change the front panel eject color every second as well.

Keep in mind that the file will LOOP!! So when it reaches the end, it jumps back to the beginning and starts again - it won't cycle back from the bottom of the file going to the top. So remember that when you create Xbox Disco.

Here's the same sample that will cycle through:
[/CODE]1000 0 0F
1000 1 FF
1000 2 F0
1000 3 FF
1000 4 0F
1000 5 FF
1000 6 F0
1000 7 FF
1000 6 F0
1000 5 FF
1000 4 0F
1000 3 FF
1000 2 F0
1000 1 FF[/CODE]

Tips and tricks:
How do I make Fades (from OFF to a color, or color to OFF), or Transitions (from one color to another)

Answer:
Very carefully!! Haha, no, seriously. Fades and transitions are accomplished by slowly bringing in your secondary color, err, well, it's actually creeeeping in at a very "fast" count rate, and you're slowing it down to show up...

Here's what I mean:
Let's say you want to transition from Red to Green, so, we need to know:
Xenium LED Color for RED = 1
Xenium LED Color for GREEN = 2

You want the color to be on for 1 second, and then you want to have the transition last about 1 second... So, that's a total of 10000 as far as your transition count.

The start would be:
10000 1 0F
The end would be:
10000 2 0F

What goes in between?
A very LONG and boring chain...
100 1 0F
1 2 0F
99 1 0F
2 2 0F
98 1 0F
3 2 0F
97 1 0F
4 2 0F
96 1 0F
5 2 0F

and so on... until you end up with

5 1 0F
96 2 0F
4 1 0F
97 2 0F
3 1 0F
98 2 0F
2 1 0F
99 2 0F
1 1 0F
100 2 0F

So, do you understand transitions now?

The above sample transition is a "Perfect" transition where it's even on both sides. You can vary the numbers so that colors might fade out faster, or fade out slower.... I'll try to add more examples as I can..

OH, YEAH... SPREADSHEET APPLICATIONS ARE YOUR FRIEND WHEN MAKING TRANSITIONS...

I ended up making the complete transition in Excel:
Cell A1 = 100
Cell A2 = 1
Cell A3 = =A1-1
Cell A4 = =A2+1
And then I selected cells A3 AND A4, and chose to COPY, and then selected all cells from A5 to A200, and hit PASTE. I ended up with the full transition.. You can also check the length of the transition by adding up the numbers using SUM.
For example, I selected cell B1 and typed =SUM(A1:A200) and it came up with 10100.... Whoops, that's just slightly over 1 second, now isn't it? So, I can shave off 100 from somewhere (delete the two middle values, which are 50 each), or leave it as is - who's going to notice that my fade is 10 milliseconds longer?

Here's the FULL file, if anyone wants to see it (the director's cut which is 10 milliseconds longer):
Download the Extended .LED File

This post has been edited by mcw: Jan 13 2005, 06:33 AM

[mcw]

Went back to look through it and realized I mistyped the sample cycling code...

CODE

10000 0 0F
10000 1 FF
10000 2 F0
10000 3 FF
10000 4 0F
10000 5 FF
10000 6 F0
10000 7 FF
10000 6 F0
10000 5 FF
10000 4 0F
10000 3 FF
10000 2 F0
10000 1 FF

[mcw]

Wow, this non-Edit thing gets pretty annoying after a while...

Poor man's method (non math person) to calculate symmetrical transitions
--------------------------

To find the closest symmetrical transition for a given time period, use this somewhat easy formula:

First, how long do you want the transition to be? Let's call this "Y"
"X" is going to be the number you'll use (more about this in a minute)

Solve this equation, X is your unknown:
X^2 = Y
(That's "X-Squared")

Whatever you get for "X" is going to be the value you start at

Example:
I want my transition from one color to another to be 1 second. 1 second in the .LED format is 10000
So, X^2 = 10000
X = 100

When I make my transition, I will start at 100
Refer to the example above to see how this would work...

And remember, it's NOT the RIGHT way to calculate these, hence, you'll be left over with a little extra when adding them up.... No worries, just subtract what you need to if you want to make it perfect, but, eh, who's gonna know you're 1/10th of a millisecond too slow?

[mcw]

Music Matching - Make Your Xenium LEDs DANCE!
AND MAKING YOUR OWN COLORS - WOW!
----------------------------------------------

For those that are musicians, here's an easy guide to get you started (although you should know all this!)

Example Time Signature: 4/4 (you have 4 beats per measure)
Example Beats Per Minute: 60 (in 60 seconds, you'll have 60 beats)

MATH:
60 Seconds in 1 Minute / Beats Per Minute = Seconds per beat
Beats per measure * Seconds per beat = Seconds per measure

For the above example:
60s / 60BPM = 1 Second per beat
4/4 Time Signature = 4 beats per measure, so 4 beats per measure * 1 Second = 4 Seconds per measure

Referring back to our chart, 4 seconds = 40000 count
Therefore, a Full Measure = 40000

Whole Note = Full Measure = 40000
Half Note = Full Measure / 2 = 20000
Quarter Note = Full Measure / 4 = 10000
Eigth Note = Full Measure / 8 = 5000
Sixteenth Note = Full Measure / 16 = 2500
Thirty-secondth Note = Full Measure / 32 = 1250

Now, let's see what happens in 4/4 time with 80 BPM?
60 / 80 = .75 (it takes 3/4 of a second to go through 1 measure)
4 beats in a measure * .75 = 3 seconds to play a measure, or 30000 count

Whole Note: 30000
Half Note: 15000
Quarter Note: 7500
Eigth Note: 3750
16th Note: 1875
32nd Note: 937.5 (oh oh... you can round up or down... Your call)

What about the NOTES THEMSELVES?!
Well, here's a tough one for you to go with... You have 7 notes, but only 6 available colors on the chip. So what do you do?
Three options:

Option A - Use OFF as a color, but it's pretty ugly
Option B - One color gets to be two notes.. Sometimes it might not be what you want...
Option C - CREATE YOUR OWN COLORS!!!!

Wait? SAY THAT AGAIN!
You can't create your own color! Ahhhh, but you can trick your eye into thinking that you're looking at a different color.. The highest possible speed (at this time) that you can display Xenium LEDs is approximately 1/10,000th of a second... THAT'S FAST!

How would I do this? THAT SOUNDS SO COOL!!!!!!

Well, simple, but we need to clear some things up:
The total count for your mix should never exceed 200 (each individual component should not be more than 100)

If I wanted to make a very dim RED, I would use this code:

CODE

1 1 0F
100 0 0F

Try it out! You'll see the RED appears to be very dim, but in truth, it's Red and Off alternating extremely quickly, with Red being on only 1/10000th of a second, and the LED being off for 10 milliseconds

Try out

CODE

25 1 0F
100 0 0F

Hmm, the Red is a bit brighter than the last one, but it's not blinding, wow! That's amazing!

BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE.....

You can use this same technique to CREATE YOUR OWN COLORS... THAT'S RIGHT... MAKE UP NEW COLORS AS YOU PLEASE!
Some ideas: Mix with WHITE to soften a color
Mix your own batch: Combine three or more colors (remember, keep the total count less than 200) to come up with some unique colors

Example color:

CODE

25 4 0F
100 7 0F

It's a light blueish purple... I mixed White and Blue

CODE

50 4 0F
150 3 0F

This gives you a Blue-Amber mix (off-white). But wait, is't that the same thing as:

CODE

25 4 0F
75 3 0F

or

CODE

1 4 0F
3 3 0F

Yeah - but would you want to repeat that a few thousand times to make 1 second or whatever you need? You can use small numbers if that's all you have, but if you're incorporating it into something long, then the bigger the count, the better (it just means LESS work for you and the chip).

And yes, you can even fade these out... Same principle applies, except that the TOTAL count of your mix is the value you will have to use...

From yesterday's example:
100 1 0F
1 2 0F
99 1 0F
2 2 0F
98 1 0F
3 2 0F
97 1 0F
4 2 0F
96 1 0F
5 2 0F

Notice that I had 100 as my initial color value to fade... Well, my mix color would need to add up to 100 on its own.

With a color transition, I would use:
20 1 0F
80 2 0F
1 2 0F
20 1 0F
79 2 0F
2 2 0F
19 1 0F
79 2 0F
3 2 0F
19 1 0F
78 2 0F
4 2 0F
18 1 0F
78 2 0F
5 2 0F

Keep in mind that between each OFF point I use, I can still only subtract 1 from the TOTAL. If I subtract 1 from each, my fade out will go much faster - which can be a different effect if you want.
I decided to alternate... The first time the color shows, it's full, the next time (after an OFF), I subtract 1 from a single color, then OFF, then I subtract 1 from the other color, and repeat.
Yes, eventually 1 color will have faded to 0 before the other.. That's okay!

If you want to be proper, you need to keep the same RATIO between the mixed colors... Instead of subtracting 1 from each color every other time, I would make sure my ratio was the same...

Example:
Initial color is 20:80 Red:Green, so it's a 1/4 mix.

20 1 0F
80 2 0F
1 2 0F
20 1 0F
79 2 0F
2 2 0F
20 1 0F
78 2 0F
3 2 0F
20 1 0F
77 2 0F
4 2 0F
20 1 0F
76 2 0F
5 2 0F
19 1 0F
76 2 0F
6 2 0F

Notice that I only subtracted from the Green for the first few times, why? Well:
20 * 4 = 80
19 * 4 = 76
So, I subtract from the 80 only until I am at 76, and then I subtract from my Red, and make it 19.
If my Red is at 18, that means my Green is at 72, so, I now subtract from my Green until I am at 72, then I subtract from Red.

Really, it's all up to you in the end - Your effect!

It can be a pretty awesome effect - fading out your own custom colors... It's a little more work, though.

Some things to remember:
RGB (Red, Green, Blue) - these colors are your primary colors.. Mixing them up can get you any color you want, so I would only deal with 1, 2, 4 (R, G, . You can mix with 7 (White) if you want to soften a color... But, nothing's stopping you from mixing the other colors - play around!

[Rabid1]

Awsome! Hey mcm, do you get out much?

[mcw]

Hehehe, thanks, I think  

Seriously, no, it was pretty easy to figure it out... Took me only a few minutes to come up with everything, just writing it down as I get time.

The ones that don't get out are the guys with 1500 posts in less than a month...

[Mikolan]

I got a liiittle problem with excel. It won't let me subtract. Whenever i type a - it justs ends up with todays date. Anyone know how to disable this indredibly annoying feature?

[mcw]

May be a macro, or text replacement thing....

Is it any time you type "-" anywhere? Click on any cell, and just hit "-" and you get today's date?

If it's an Auto Text thing:
Tools -> Options -> Spelling -> AutoCorrect Options (for Office 2003, don't remember if it's in the same spot for previous versions)

Look for any automatic replacement settings for a "-"

[Mikolan]

i looked a little further into it and it only happens when i write "something"-"something". And it makes a date out of it. For example, i write 4-5 it outputs 2005-04-05. I have no replacements or macros :/

EDIT: Found it, i forgot the "="

This post has been edited by Mikolan: Jan 14 2005, 10:59 AM

[omg]

how can you get the leds to work outside of the xenium os mine keeps shutting off the leds when going into a bios

[BigDaddyShoo]

QUOTE(omg @ Jan 14 2005, 01:16 PM)

how can you get the leds to work outside of the xenium os mine keeps shutting off the leds when going into a bios

sounds to me like you set your bios to use 'no color as default

try re-flashing your chip and re-choosing a color for the bios.

[photoman]

thanks for the test .LED file, I opened it in MSWord and just did a find and replace of the two values i wanted. the REAL lazy man's way of doing it  

Great work by you none-the-less  

[mcw]

QUOTE(photoman @ Jan 14 2005, 06:30 AM)

thanks for the test .LED file, I opened it in MSWord and just did a find and replace of the two values i wanted. the REAL lazy man's way of doing it 

Great work by you none-the-less 

Glad you had some fun! Eventually, when I do get time, I'll start making some longer ones... Might even have a few more tricks up my sleeve.

[logicbomb.de]

QUOTE(BigDaddyShoo @ Jan 14 2005, 09:29 AM)

sounds to me like you set your bios to use 'no color as default

try re-flashing your chip and re-choosing a color for the bios.

what I think omg was trying to say what that, when he fires up his BIOS from the launch menu, the LED sequencing shuts off; but his assigned BIOS color is solid when it boot to the dash board.

The same thing is happening to me. My default BIOS color is blue. when I launched my X2 bios from the menu, the sequencing stopped and when to a solid Blue.   I didn't try a re-flash, had to sleep.

has anyone been able to retain the LED sequencing outside of the Xenium OS?

is it posible even?

[mrjkwik]

the led flashing does not work once the bios is launched.

i think i saw on the xodus forums that they may try and change that.  cant remember if it was a team member that said it or someone speculating it was 3am when i was looking  



i know changing the .led file is easy enough.  but does any coder wanna throw together a simple little program to "build" an led file.  that would be cool.