We get lots of great questions; here are the answers to the most frequent:
How many lights are in the display
The display used to be 25,000 incandescent lights. The new LED ‘Pixels’ are much brighter, and can be any color, so we need far fewer lights (and power) than when we used incandescent lights.
As of 2025, the light count is approximately 8,500 pixel bulbs.
What is an LED ‘Pixel’?
A ‘Pixel’ is an individual bulb that contains 3 LED lights
The LED lights inside the pixel are colored Red, Green, and Blue (RGB)
By controlling the brightness of the 3 colors, you can create any color
For instance, purple is a mix of blue and red
Fun fact: all of the lights in the show are either 5 volt (the snowflake above megatree) or 12 volt (everything else). There are no 120 volt (standard plugs) lights in the show.
How much does your power bill go up?
While the Pixel LEDs use very little power, the pixels themselves are more than 10 times the price of standard incandescent light.
Our older incandescent display of 25,000 lights had power bill go up $100-$200 a month.
The power bill for ‘Pixel’ lights cost about $50 a month.
How do you control the lights & music?
The controllers are Falcon controllers
The software to program the lights is called XLights
The ‘Computer’ to run the show is a $35 Rasberry Pi
The computer connects to the control boards over a 1 gigabit network using Cat5e network cable
The music comes out of the Raspberry Pi through a SoundBlaster adapter via USB. The SoundBlasters speaker jack then plugs into an FM transmitter.
The fixtures (arches, trees, roof lights, etc) are custom built
How long does it take to do something like this?
Approximately 100-200 hours a year!
Work on the show is being done all year long.
January – Test new configurations while the show is still out, mark broken items, put away the show and order new lights\fixtures for next year's show
January through May – Fix last years broken items, test new software updates, and verify configurations
June – Receive the lights ordered in January
June through August – Ponder new music choices, build new fixtures, controllers, cables.
September through October - Test new fixtures, verify and lock down software versions (XLights, Falcon Player, firmware, etc). Make programming changes and add new songs.
November – Setup!
December - Mostly off. fix and tweak here and there
Year round - Programming of the music to lights
How long does it take to setup or take down the display?
Most of the display is mounted on boards and pipes, making for a much easier setup.
The entire show can be setup in ~40 hours
I want to do this to my house next year. How much should I budget to get started?
The software (Xlights) is free
We budget ~$0.60 for each 'Pixel'. While the pixel itself costs ~$0.30, the $0.60 includes wires and controllers;
For instance, the big mega tree is 1600 lights (16 strands of 100 pixels).
The ‘pixels’ themselves would be ~$600
The controller for the tree is ~$150
Power supply (12 volt 40amp) ~$50
Control box, wires, cable ~$100
An FM transmitter is ~$100.
Do the lights bother you in the house?
Nope. The lights are mostly pointed at the street; Besides, we love it!