led How can I effectively reduce the voltage needed to activate a transistor


Posted on Feb 7, 2014

A circuit which basically connects the line out (audio output) of a music playing device to a set of LEDs (actually a huge strip of around 200 LEDs), so they flash in time with the music (from internet tutorials - I`m a bit of beginner). My circuit works very well using my laptop as the audio device (connecting my circuit to the headphone jack on it). But when I use something smaller such as an iPod, the lights barely


led How can I effectively reduce the voltage needed to activate a transistor
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turn on at all. I`ve tried using a Darlington Pair (below), but that makes the issue worse. This is why I think the issue is that the audio line out is not reaching the 0. 7 volts across the base and emitter that the TIP31C transistor needs to activate (the Darlington Pair means it now needs 1. 4 volts to activate). From my research, it looks like using an op amp might be the way forward, to amplify the audio line out signal before the TIP31C transistor. Would somebody be able to suggest one, and which inputs I should connect to




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