Diy Lcd

[Oreo_The_Cookie]

Looking at MEAT BAG's LCD screen, I want one myself, crystalfonts seems expensive to me, and I don't think I could get it up ere in Canada, could I get the parts in Radio Shack and make one myself, any guides?

Thanks :)

[Docta_Z]

you want to make a liquid crystal display? Bro.. good luck. :beer:

[Oreo_The_Cookie]

Well I buy the little display, then wire everything myself, I know I've seen a few before, just can't find them right now

[Oreo_The_Cookie]

Found one here (http://www.gideontech.com/guides/lcd/)

[kaiser__sose]

OREO..
u live in canada?? where??
i'm in toronto..
just today was down on queen street and walked into supremetronic (www.supremetronic.com) on queen and beverly.. i picked up a 16x2 LCD wit a backlight for $15 CAD...
they also have 16x1 for 14 and 24x4 and others at diff prices..
they have a grafical lcd for $38 that i might pick up next and try to work ...


look at this link tto show you how to wire it up. http://www.overclockers.com.au/techstuff/a_diy_lcd/

then i just downloaded port95nt and lcdSmartie and i was up and running in less than an hour..

the only diff was in the wiring i had to add a +5 and ground connection to the 15th and 16th pins respectively for the backlight to light up.. but it was a snap
i suck at soldering and stuff and i was able to accomplish this task in no time on my first try..

[Element-Xero]

I bought the crystalfontz 16x2 lcd kit from caseetc.

Its a DIY 16x2 kit, but they include all the parts, so you just gotta solder it all together. For 20 bucks its not a bad deal.

[Oreo_The_Cookie]

Originally posted by kaiser__sose
OREO..
u live in canada?? where??
i'm in toronto..
just today was down on queen street and walked into supremetronic (www.supremetronic.com) on queen and beverly.. i picked up a 16x2 LCD wit a backlight for $15 CAD...
they also have 16x1 for 14 and 24x4 and others at diff prices..
they have a grafical lcd for $38 that i might pick up next and try to work ...


look at this link tto show you how to wire it up. http://www.overclockers.com.au/techstuff/a_diy_lcd/

then i just downloaded port95nt and lcdSmartie and i was up and running in less than an hour..

the only diff was in the wiring i had to add a +5 and ground connection to the 15th and 16th pins respectively for the backlight to light up.. but it was a snap
i suck at soldering and stuff and i was able to accomplish this task in no time on my first try..

Thank you, after looking around I thought that dream was dead, but looks like next patcheque I'm getting a lcd, Thanks again :)

EDIT: Yup I'm in Toronto, well Mississauga now but I still consider downtown my home ;)

[kaiser__sose]

they also have different lcd's at active surplus on queen but i don't know if the controler chip on those is compatible with the software that 's out there now.. also supremetronic is cheaper..
the lcd, some 16 pin wire and a parallel port connector all together for less than $20 CAD.

[Seal]

i made one! it was my first mod! theyre reallly really cool. i bought the smallest one because i wasnt sure whether it would work or not but now i know it does, i might go and buy the biggest one they got. (mines a 16x2 i wanna buy the 4x20 i think it is)

theyre not too hard, you just gotta get a very good soldering iron and have a steady hand. you can buy a printer cable and cut it but i bought the 25pin connector and make the wire myself! hehe.

[Element-Xero]

i think thats the same display I have, I mounted it in my case just last night, it looks really cool, I'll have to post a pic when I get home (at work now). A tip for mounting and general cable management is to tightly wrap all the cables for that thing in electrical tape, so much easier to manage when there is one fat bundle than 20 individual wires

[Seal]

yeah, i've got heat shring tubing around all of the cables so theyre pretty tidy. how did you mount it onto your computer? i'm kinda thinking of the wiring and how you would plug it into your parallel port because the plug is on the outside of the case where as the lcd is on the inside...

i'm thinking of building a little box for it so i can have it on my desktop just below my monitor because i wont look at it if its on my case cos its on the floor.

have you put pots on yours to adjust backlight and contrast? i've just put a switch on the backlight (on and off) and one for the main power.

[nixie]

I'm still trying to decided what screen to buy, there is one which uses a chip that i know is compatable with the current software via the parrallel port and one which has the option of running a 8bit or 4 bit data bus. This seems to me to indicate it will run from either parralell or serial ports, but is it worth the risk. (btw the 2nd one is more expensive.

[kaiser__sose]

as long as it uses the standard HD controller then it will work with the software out there.. otherwise u will have to write your own software.

[nixie]

Sounds good, guess I need to find out whta control chip it is then

[Seal]

my one you see up there has the HD44780 processing chip.

[nixie]

Ah ha I found the controllor chip, it has a ks0070b which I belive is a HD44780 compatable chip, now I wonder how easy it is to use the serial instead of parrallel port???

[Sn0rKy]

how do these measure temps?
thru bios.. or can you plug in thermal probes?

[Seal]

No, you have software that prints out whatever you want on your lcd. i use lcd smartie. It reads temps from mbm5.

[Black_Ops]

let me help you guys out.

most character lcd's can be assumed to have a HD44780 compliant processor. when it says 8 or 4 bit data bus it is considering 1 wire per bit. in 8 bit data is fed in from the D0 - D7 pins in 4 bit it is fed in through D4-D7. that inst counting the 3-4 other controll lines required for communication.

to make it serial you would need to program a MCU to conroll the lcd and output the data it recives from the 3 wire serial interface to the computer (gnd, tx, rx) you might want to put a max232 level converter to make rs232 compliant signal levels for reliable communication. another option is to get a serial lcd premade from some company like crystalfontz. that is my little blurb about lcds and how they work

[TyRex]

anyone know where you can find and LCD for less thatn 50 that's 4x20??? I don't need a kit, just the LCD with the chip on it

[Liss]

have you guys had lcds with 14pins? and the pins are different from the scamatic?

http://www.gideontech.com/guides/lcd/lcd06_s.gif

[Serraph]

If you know how to solder, doing it yourself is 2/3 to 1/2 times cheaper than buying a serial LCD. I bought my 4 x 20 LCD a week ago for $25 from crystalfontz and am in the process of wiring it up.

If you do it yourself get one of these (cheapest 4x20 is ~$18): http://www.crystalfontz.com/products/index-std.html

If you want a serial one (cheapest 4x20 is $45):
http://www.crystalfontz.com/products/index-ser.html

Here's how I'm wiring mine up so I can use 2 potentiometers to control the backlight and contrast. The resistor value will vary depending on the voltage and current your backlight uses.

http://www.theforumisdown.com/uploadfiles/0103/lcd08.gif

[Annoyingrob]

Just a note, I picked up a few of those 24x2 LCDs from active surplus a few months back. They are the standard controller chip, but I could never get them to work properly.

[TyRex]

Originally posted by Serraph
If you know how to solder, doing it yourself is 2/3 to 1/2 times cheaper than buying a serial LCD. I bought my 4 x 20 LCD a week ago for $25 from crystalfontz and am in the process of wiring it up.

If you do it yourself get one of these (cheapest 4x20 is ~$18): http://www.crystalfontz.com/products/index-std.html

If you want a serial one (cheapest 4x20 is $45):
http://www.crystalfontz.com/products/index-ser.html

Here's how I'm wiring mine up so I can use 2 potentiometers to control the backlight and contrast. The resistor value will vary depending on the voltage and current your backlight uses.

http://www.theforumisdown.com/uploadfiles/0103/lcd08.gif

does that 18 dollar one have the ability to be converted to a blue backlit.

[Black_Ops]

Originally posted by Annoyingrob
Just a note, I picked up a few of those 24x2 LCDs from active surplus a few months back. They are the standard controller chip, but I could never get them to work properly.

well a 24x2 is not a standard size so the chances of it using a standard controller is slim to nill.

its kind of like this futaba VFD i got a 20x4 that dosent use a standard chip but was marketed as using a hd44780.

if you can get the data sheet for your 24x2 you could write your own software to controll it :)

[LuckyBob]

The other option is to get a parallel LCD and get something like the SLI-OEM to convert it to serial. Pretty easy solder job, and realitively cheap. I've a 20x4 green on black LCD screen, to which I added in a brightness pot, but other than that it's just the stock SLI-OEM board.

[Serraph]

Originally posted by TyRex


does that 18 dollar one have the ability to be converted to a blue backlit.

Don't think the 18 dollar one has a backlight at all. There's one for a few more dollars that's the same with a backlight though. It would probably be easier to just get the $31 blue one instead of risking failure of converting a cheaper one and having to get a new one IMO.

[TyRex]

true, I'll just do that