Marc's Blog: arduino - Comparing FastLED::NeoMatrix and SmartMatrix::GFX with PixelMatrix Aurora and Table ME Demos

Comparing is a misnomer, both libraries pretty much offer the same exact APi (which is the point).

https://github.com/marcmerlin/FastLED_NeoMatrix

https://github.com/marcmerlin/SmartMatrix_GFX

pretty much work exactly the same except for how you init them, but if you use https://github.com/marcmerlin/FastLED_NeoMatrix_SmartMatrix_LEDMatrix_GFX_Demos/blob/master/neomatrix_config.h , you can just include that and your same code will work on both FastLED backed matrices and SmartMatrix backed matrices, even though they are totally different technologies.

RGBPanels do use less power even when corrected for amount of brightness generated (my estimate is at least 3 times less), they can be a lot more dense, they're cheaper, but they're a pain in the ass to drive since they require constant refreshes at high speed. That being said, as long as you don't exceed 128x64, which is more or less the practical limit on teensy 3.6 and ESP32 due to memory limits due to how SmartMatrix works (a different implementation could push things to at least 128x128 by sacrificing quality for memory use).

The demos I used for the pictures below are

Aurora: https://github.com/marcmerlin/FastLED_NeoMatrix_SmartMatrix_LEDMatrix_GFX_Demos/tree/master/GFX/Aurora

Table from Mark Estes: https://github.com/marcmerlin/FastLED_NeoMatrix_SmartMatrix_LEDMatrix_GFX_Demos/tree/master/LEDMatrix/Table_Mark_Estes

Here are some shots of Aurora in 32x32 and 32x24 with FastLED::NeoMatrix vs 64x96 with SmartMatrix: