First of all, sorry for asking this as it has most likely been asked a bunch of times.
I bought a bunch of white LEDs on ebay, and they came with resistors.
Now im running them from 12v with the 500 ohm resistors that they came with (one resistor per LED) and they run at about 16-18 mA. Is it normal for the resistors to get quite warm?
I measured the voltage across them at about 8.3 to 8.8 volts (it varies) and i calculated the power at about .168 watts, is it normal for a 1/4w resistor to get warm running at a little more then half its capacity?
I know this is a noob question, but i just wanna know if im doing this right.
Thanks
I bought a bunch of white LEDs on ebay, and they came with resistors.
Now im running them from 12v with the 500 ohm resistors that they came with (one resistor per LED) and they run at about 16-18 mA. Is it normal for the resistors to get quite warm?
I measured the voltage across them at about 8.3 to 8.8 volts (it varies) and i calculated the power at about .168 watts, is it normal for a 1/4w resistor to get warm running at a little more then half its capacity?
I know this is a noob question, but i just wanna know if im doing this right.
Thanks