The customer came to us with a multi-color LED device controlled by an IR remote. The system worked well for the proof-of-concept but they wanted to optimize the performance and add certain functionality for their specific application. We decided to integrate one of our other PCBs with an on-board microcontroller in order to add additional control for their unique feature requirements.
To maintain the current IR remote capabilities for controlling the device, we hijacked the wireless control lines from the existing circuitry and used them as inputs into our microcontroller. This provided the customer with control of the system using the current IR remote hardware; instead of controlling intensity of the light as was intended with this off-the-shelf hardware, these wireless control lines now provided general purpose inputs into the new system logic control.
We then hijacked the control lines for the LEDs to add 5X the resolution of the existing LED PWM control system and an application-specific color transition scheme. With our custom PCB, we now had full control of the LEDs so we could program the desired color effects. With some custom firmware development, we were able to add LED transitional effects that met the customers vision.
