Processors & outputs overview

Every panel in your project is driven by a processor and lit by a video source. This section covers how LED.FYI models processing hardware, from picking a Brompton or Novastar out of the library, through fitting cards into a modular chassis, to splitting a giant wall across several processors.

The signal chain

LED.FYI models the same chain you rig in the real world:

1. Content (an image, video, or test pattern) lives on a surface; see Surfaces, placements & video sources.
2. Surfaces are placed on a video source: a named raster of a fixed resolution (1920×1080 by default). This is the picture a processor would receive at its input. V1 called this an Output; you'll still see that word on older projects.
3. Each processor consumes one or more video sources and composes them into its canvas: the pixel space its output ports read from. A simple processor has a 1x1 canvas (one source, full frame); layouts like 2x2 tile several sources into one larger composite; see Outputs, canvases & multi-output.
4. Panels are mapped into the canvas (the 2D Mapping workbench is where you see and arrange this), and the processor's ports drive them over data strings. Which port drives which string is remembered by the string's first panel, so edits to other screens (adding a row, disabling a panel, resetting their manual wiring, reordering them) never shuffle a processor's port assignments.

The tree groups

The left sidebar lists every processor and video source in the project.

• Each processor row shows the amber chip icon, a small monospace tag badge before the name (9, or 9B for a designated mirror of processor 9; hover it to see which processor it backs up), the processor's editable name, and a trailing canvas layout (2x2, …) shown only when it isn't the default 1x1. The tag is the processor's position among primaries in this list, so it's the same number that prefixes every port label the processor produces; see the processor tag. The same tag heads the processor's Inspector (1 · Processor canvas). Clicking a row selects the processor and opens its Inspector.
• The + button on the group header (Add Processor) creates a new processor with a 1x1 layout. Its first slot is left empty (None); pick its source in the Inspector. (A new project's own Processor 1 comes already wired to Video Source 1, since that is the only possible answer.)

• Each video source row shows its name and resolution. Selecting one opens its Inspector (resolution, presets, lock, background, documented with the Video workbench), and switches the Video workbench to the tab that shows it: its processor's tab, or Unassigned if it feeds no processor yet, framed on that source.
• The group's + button (Add Video Source) creates a new 1920×1080 source.

Plan limits

The number of video sources you can add is limited by plan: Free allows 1, Pro 4, Studio unlimited; adding past your cap opens an upgrade prompt. Processors are never capped on any plan. See Plans & billing.

Adding, duplicating and deleting

All of these are also available from the command palette (⌘K), where processor commands are named Add / Duplicate / Delete Processor Canvas. "Processor canvas" is the internal name for a processor and its pixel space, and the delete confirmation calls it a canvas too.

Action	Where	What happens
Add processor	Tree + or ⌘K Add Processor Canvas	New 1x1 processor with an empty slot 1; the app does not choose which feed goes to which box. No processor model is assigned yet, so pick one in the Inspector (Choosing a processor).
Duplicate processor	Duplicate at the bottom of the processor's Inspector, or ⌘K	Copies the name (<name> copy), processor model, layout, signal settings and source bindings, but deliberately clears all wiring (switches, string assignments) and any backup-mirror role. A second processor starts unwired.
Delete processor	Delete at the bottom of the Inspector, or ⌘K	Confirms first (Delete canvas?), then removes it. Its screens, panels and any manual panel pins are re-homed onto a surviving processor. A screen split across it moves onto the processors it still uses without stacking any panels; see Deleting a processor a split screen uses. Unavailable for the last remaining processor.
Add video source	Tree + or ⌘K Add Video Source	New 1920×1080 source (plan-gated; see above).
Delete video source	Delete in the source's Inspector, or ⌘K	Confirms, then re-points every panel and surface placement that used it to a surviving source and clears it out of processor slots. Unavailable for the last remaining source.

You always keep at least one of each

Every panel must point at a processor and a video source, so the document always keeps at least one of each; the Delete action simply disables on the last one.

Where processors show up

• 2D Mapping and the Video workbench show one processor's canvas at a time. With two or more processors a switcher appears top-left: a row of pills, or a compact drop-down past six processors (Multi-processor screens).
• 3D renders every panel with the pixels of its own processor's composite, so a wall split across processors still reads as one continuous picture.
• The processor's Inspector carries its wiring sections (Switches, String assignment and Redundancy), documented under Wiring & power.
• Processors, ports and strings flow through to your paperwork: Sheets and the bill of materials.

What's in this section

Page	Covers
Choosing a processor & signal settings	The model picker, bit depth × frame rate, and the port-capacity model.
Modular processors	Chassis slots, input/output cards, and what fitting them unlocks.
Inputs & input modes	Binding video sources to inputs; Switched vs. Stitched.
Outputs, canvases & multi-output	Canvas layouts, tiling sources into one composite, spanning panels across tiles.
Multi-processor screens	Splitting one screen across processors: cut, assign, manual pins, backup mirrors.