Peggy 2 LED Matrix

The Peggy 2 is a 25x25 LED matrix kit from Evil Mad Scientist Labs. Ever since I first saw the Peggy kit I thought it was one of the cooler kits available. I finally got around to getting one of these awesome kits and it is a sight to behold. By far the largest kit I have ever built, it is also the best quality kit I have come across. The Peggy 2's circuit board is probably twice the thickness of a normal printed circuit board, a welcome feature for such a large board since the added thickness makes the board very rigid. You can purchase the Peggy 2 in a variety of kit configurations; I got the so called awesomeness bundle which includes a power supply, extra pushbuttons, and 640 diffused 10mm LEDs in the color of your choosing (white in my case). 

The build itself took around 2 hours to assemble the control circuitry and another 4.5 hours to solder all of the LEDs. It's a bit of an undertaking, but when you're done it's a great feeling when all 625 LEDs light up. To program the Peggy you use the Arduino IDE and download the Peggy Library. I haven't experimented too much with it yet, but I did try out some of the demo programs from the library and you can see what the Peggy can do in the video below. I look forward to playing with this project a lot in the future.