Quote Originally Posted by KeithH View Post
I have placed LEDs on the Shift register's Parallel out pins along with a current limiting 680R resistor on each pin. I am intending to create a chain of 30 or more shift registers so don't want to loose too much power over the whole chain. I am not too hot on the electical side of this so for me this will be trial and error. I can't really say exactly what I am trying to make except to say it will have a lot of LEDs on a chain of shift registers, all spaced about an inch apart and wired together, i.e. not on the same PCB. So there is a lot of room for leakage and noise etc. Is it a good idea to use the Resistors or should I look for a register/LED combination that draws the least power per LED? Also it would make it easier to build if I didn't need the 210+ resistors. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Thanks.
Since your LEDs are individually controllable, you're probably going to need one resistor per LED, unless you find LEDs with resistors built in. If you don't, you might end up burning up '4094's over time. Maybe there's another version of the '4094' out there that can handle the current your LEDs require.