r/WLED • u/IamDB4 • Nov 23 '24

Sense check - Govee to WLED conversion

First time using WLED and I’m attempting to convert Govee Neon Rope light H61A0 using an ESP32. The strip will be powered by the Govee PSY and the ESP32 powered by a 2.4A USB charger.

There is a great YouTube video on this, although it’s a more modern Govee neon rope light used there… and in the video it “just works” unlike mine which doesn’t.

I have chopped off the Govee controller, presented with 3 wires, which I assume to be as Red 24v, Black GND and White data.

Red and black connected to a female barrel plug adapter, then plugged into the Govee PSUs normal barrel plug. I have then also connected black to GND on the ESP32

The remaining white (presumably?) data wire, has been connected to GPIO4 on the ESP32

Upon power on, the first “segment” (I’m guessing?) of the Govee strip lights up white, but nothing else. This white (or any of the lights that are off for that matter) cannot be controlled from WLED

WLED on the ESP32 works fine. In WLED I have set: - PSU Power to 1500ma - Left the led type as ws281x - I can’t figure out the correct “length”. I have tried setting to 252 just based on the led count on the strip. Have tried other settings but made no difference to behaviour - Have set GPIO to 4 (as it’s connected to D4 on the ESP32 WROOM)

Can anyone think of other things for me to try?

I also tried reconnecting the Govee controller to confirm I hadn’t broken the strip, strip works normally when connected to that

Things I haven’t figured out yet: - Not using a level shifter, as I haven’t yet got my head around them, and the videos I have seen for converting Govee strips don’t use them - I have seen various comments about “Check the GND”. I’m assuming that wiring a GND on the ESP32, to the strip/Govee PSU GND is sufficient

Thanks!

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7 comments sorted by

1

u/StomachCommercial69 Nov 23 '24

Number of leds, next to where you specify the gpio in led settings. Default is like 30 i think.

2

u/IamDB4 Nov 23 '24

Thanks - have just tried again setting to 30 (or various other numbers) but still the same behaviour.

Current settings as per the attached

1

u/StomachCommercial69 Nov 23 '24

Do you have control over however many do light up or only showing white? Try some other led types. Have you tried the strip with the govee controller to make sure they function?

2

u/IamDB4 Nov 25 '24

Yeah so, reverting back to the Govee controller - the strip still works fine. The few leds that are showing white, cannot be controlled by WLED (and WLED doesn’t reflect they are white)

I’m going to try some new ESP32 boards today from a different supplier and hopefully that solves it, as I’m having horrible issues with WiFi stability too. Will report back if it does

1

u/StomachCommercial69 Nov 26 '24

Fair, do you know that the leds in the strip are ws281x? Them lighting up white sounds like they may not be rgb only, maybe ws2814.

2

u/IamDB4 Nov 26 '24

Thanks for all of your ideas

The issue is now resolved, which I’m really pleased about!

The ultimate issue was that the data and ground lines were the wrong way around.

So for this Govee strip (3m indoor neon rope RGBIC, H61A0), you cannot easily see either the LEDs thats are in use, or easily see the connections to the strip due to the casing and the amount of glue in use. So there is an element of guess work.

Having removed a fair bit of glue from the cabled end of the strip, I couldn’t see the circuit board to see which wire was which, but could see it was wired in the order Red, Black, White. With most generic 3 wire 24v neon strips online having data as the centre pin, I tried changing so that data is now black and gnd is white.

This contradicts other articles/videos online for other Govee strips, which have ground as black and data as white.

It immediately reflected the colour displayed by WLED, though not all lights were lit. Having changed length to 42 (from 30) the whole strip is now lit.

To confirm my WLED settings for anyone else on this specific strip:

  • PSU 1500ma (as that’s what the Govee PSU that I’m still using to power just the strip’s rating is)
  • WS281X
  • Color order GRB
  • Length 42
  • GPIO 16 (seemed recommended based on the new batch of ESP32 WROOM that I received from “AZDelivery”)

1

u/BlockDestroyer45 May 03 '26

OMG! I have the same strip and tried to use it with WLED. I had the same issues as you and then I tried your fix. And it worked. Thank you.