Sorry if this is the wrong place,

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1

Sorry if this is the wrong place, but maybe someone else has had this problem. I recently purchased a couple of ESP8266 12-Es from amazon (http://a.co/cCmpG9O) to control some WS2812Bs. When I power the board with USB power, everything works as expected. When I attempt to power with a wall-wart, however, it appears as though PWM is no longer functional.

I know the microcontroller is working, because I loaded the blink routine and it works via external power. I tried connecting a couple of the other GND pins to the external GND, but it didn’t appear to help. Any ideas?

Also, if anyone has a guide for setting up wifi/android control with these I’d appreciate it.

Thanks,
Ryan

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The first diagram is correct , the second is not ,
You are trying to power " from the ESP ". , but vin is 5 volts input not an output ,
In addition , both alternatives will face problems with your data line , as the ESP is 3,3 volts logic , and even when you are not identifying the leds , for sure are not 3,3 volts logic .

3

Thanks, Gustavo. The weird thing is, the 2nd diagram (USB power) is the only way it will work.

4

You may have a noisy power supply, try a big capacitor or you may need a level shifter as @Gustavo_K ​ says. Use the 74HCT245 level shifter.

5

Thanks, Jeremy. That might be it, I’ll throw a smoothing cap on it and see if it helps.