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5v 10amp power supply to drive an ESP32. Which converter?
- Thread starter KMatle
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How many amps does the Neopixels use/need?
If you are concerned that 10 amps sounds like it's too much for your ESP32 board, don't worry about that at all.
Those 10 amps are simply "available" if needed. Your ESP32 board will just draw the current it needs and no more - so be assured the 10 amps will absolutely NOT blow up your ESP32 board.
An analogy would be this: Let say you have a container that contains a gallon of water. You are thirsty, so you just take a few sips - It's not like the container is going to force you to drink the entire gallon at the same time. So the ESP32 board will just use the amount of current it needs and no more. But if something needs more current, like the neopixels, then the power supply can provide "up to" 10 amps of power just like the water container can provide you up to 1 gallon of water when needed.
The only concern would be if you have a ton of neopixels and they need all 10amps, then there might not be much current left over to power the ESP32.
If you are concerned that 10 amps sounds like it's too much for your ESP32 board, don't worry about that at all.
Those 10 amps are simply "available" if needed. Your ESP32 board will just draw the current it needs and no more - so be assured the 10 amps will absolutely NOT blow up your ESP32 board.
An analogy would be this: Let say you have a container that contains a gallon of water. You are thirsty, so you just take a few sips - It's not like the container is going to force you to drink the entire gallon at the same time. So the ESP32 board will just use the amount of current it needs and no more. But if something needs more current, like the neopixels, then the power supply can provide "up to" 10 amps of power just like the water container can provide you up to 1 gallon of water when needed.
The only concern would be if you have a ton of neopixels and they need all 10amps, then there might not be much current left over to power the ESP32.
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I think that I would put a quick blow 500mA fuse, or some other appropriate low value, in series with the 5v just to limit the current in case something tries to liberate the magic smoke from the ICs on the board!
en.wikipedia.org
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Magic smoke - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Just make sure that the fuse is only on the Positive (red) wire going to the ESP32 board. I say this because a string of neopixels will probably need more than 500ma and would blow that fuse pretty quickly if the fuse was used to also supply power to them.I think that I would put a quick blow 500mA fuse, or some other appropriate low value, in series with the 5v just to limit the current in case something tries to liberate the magic smoke from the ICs on the board!
.Magic smoke - Wikipedia
You can limit the current with a resistor of value: ( R = V / I )
Bad idea! It will drop the voltage to the board and cause voltage swings as the current demand of the board varies. The board will need a low impedance source of power which a series resistor does not provide.
Definitely no need for a current limiting resistor in this case.
I have a strip with 150 pixels. So it's 0,06a (3 x 0.02a) per pixel which need 9 amp@5v when all are used at full brightness. I bought a power supply which outputs 10amp max. So if all pixels are used we have 9amp minus the consumption of the pixels.
Possible issue: I assume that the supply isn't regulated perfectly. When all pixels are switched off, the ESP32 could get too much power and will be destroyed. There are tons of regulators to buy but only 5v to 3.3 or regulators which only can handle 5amp.
Maybe it's better to get an extra "mains to 5v 500ma" supply for the esp and connect both to mains.
Possible issue: I assume that the supply isn't regulated perfectly. When all pixels are switched off, the ESP32 could get too much power and will be destroyed. There are tons of regulators to buy but only 5v to 3.3 or regulators which only can handle 5amp.
Maybe it's better to get an extra "mains to 5v 500ma" supply for the esp and connect both to mains.
If the 5v to 3.3v regulator says it can only handle 5 amps, what that means is that it can "output" up to 5amps at 3.3v. It doesn't mean something bad will happen if you connect it to a 10amp 5v source.
But what is strange is that 5 amps seems like a lot of output current capability from what I imagine is a small "on-board" DC-to-DC converter (the 5v to 3.3v converter). The 5 amp rating could very well be accurate, but it just seems like such a heavy duty converter would be an overkill for the small ESP32 board.
Now, getting back to your 9amp requirement for the leds and that you think your power supply is not very regulated. Well the way to tell if the power supply is doing a good job of regulation is to measure the voltage at the 5v terminals with no load (none of the LEDs on) - it should be 5.00vdc +/- 5%. Then turn on all the LEDs, and measure it again. If it's stays near 5.00 +/- 5%, then its doing a very good job regulating the voltage and it's safe to use with the 5 to 3.3 converter. But if the voltage varies more then +/- 5%, then you should get a more regulated power supply.
The other issue is that if all the LED's are on and it does in fact draw 9amps, then you might want to consider getting a larger 12 or 15 amp power supply because if the LEDs draw 9amps and the ESP32 draws lets say only 250ma, that's 9.25amps total, and you typically want more then just .75amp (10 max amps rating of PS minus max load of 9.25amps) overhead room because the normal load of a project should not be very close to the max load of the power supply. Thus, if you instead use a 12amp power supply, then you would have 2.75 amps of headroom which will have a much lower chance of stressing out the power supply constantly.
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Hi KMate,
i have a strip with 150 pixels and 12A amp running now for 10 months without a Problem.
I have the strip running with the following boards:
wemos mini D1
nodemcu
Olimex esp8266
M5Stack
M5stickC
Wemos Lolin D32
Alle laufen ohne zusätzlichen 3,3 V reg.(all running without 3,3regulators)
Best regards
Michael
And yes, as an alternative solution, you could get a separate 5v at 1amp power supply to connect to just the ESP32 and use the 500ma fuse as suggested inline with the red/positive wire.
If you do this, then I would recommend connecting the two grounds of each power supply together (the black/negative wire from the 10AMP power supply to the black/negative wire of the 1amp supply) so you wont have any floating ground issues. (DO NOT connect the red/positive wires of each power supply together)
IMHO you will not have any problem with your 5V 10A powering both the ESP and the ledstrip.
I did powered an ESP32 with a 2s lipo bat able to drain 25 or 30A @ 7V without any issue.
Provided that your ESP32 board has a 3.3V reg onboard, it will work.
The worst case would be that your NeoPixels drains all the current from the power supply and forces a reset on the ESP32 (due to excessive voltage drop)... but even this is unlikely to occur and not dangerous for your ESP32.
I did powered an ESP32 with a 2s lipo bat able to drain 25 or 30A @ 7V without any issue.
Provided that your ESP32 board has a 3.3V reg onboard, it will work.
The worst case would be that your NeoPixels drains all the current from the power supply and forces a reset on the ESP32 (due to excessive voltage drop)... but even this is unlikely to occur and not dangerous for your ESP32.
Hi, let me put my "2 cents"!
Your power supply is a voltage source and not a current source. Hence it depends on the load as to how much current is drawn. Your scenario will not at all be hazardous to ESP32 board. In fact the higher the current rating of the the power supply the better is the regulation characteristics.
Your power supply is a voltage source and not a current source. Hence it depends on the load as to how much current is drawn. Your scenario will not at all be hazardous to ESP32 board. In fact the higher the current rating of the the power supply the better is the regulation characteristics.
So not knowing why you don't want a 2nd PS (other than cost of course) what about one of these options. I use some like the pink one that has two USB outputs (one 1 amp one 2amp).
YUP as far as I remember the ESP has "brown out" detection and will reboot at whatever the threshhold point is. (so correct volts not enough amps).
Output Parameters: 5V
Charging current: 1000mA