Which display to use

Chip Cox

I just recently switched from cable to Directv. Great, except the boxes don't have clocks on them. We got so used to the clocks on the cable boxes we don't have any wall/desk clocks any more. So I thought "what fun, I can work with my son to build a couple of clocks". Everything has gone fine so far. I'm using the spinneret to query a time server, and using the onboard clock chip to keep track of the time between SNTP refreshes. The problem is, I need a display I can see from across the room and I wasn't really going for the retro LED segment look. I have a 4x20 LCD display and it's working fine as a proof of concept, but I can't read it from more than about 5 feet away. Any suggestions as to a display large enough to hold 2 lines of text containing the date on the first line and the time on the second line in a font that can be read from say 20 feet away???

max72

possible solutions:
use your 4X20, and create custom chars to have "big fonts". Not a great solution by the way but doesn't require other hardware.

Brilldea display uses 4 pins, but it is still small, 20 feet may be too much. You use graphics.spin so quality is very good.
http://www.brilldea.com/product_LM9033A.html

Ray's 4.3" color display is great, still can use graphics.spin. Requires a lot of memory and many pins, but it is very good.
check http://www.rayslogic.com/ or propeller forum

Sparkfun's "HUGE" display is huge, and Ray made a sample code for it. I posted a modified version on the obex using propeller ROM fonts. Still need a lot of free pins and a little less free memory.

You can also use a "TV" display. You could have memory issues depending on the driver, but there is a lot of stuff around.

In all the cases you need free ram for the display buffer, so be careful...

Massimo

Unknown

P4 32X8 3208 Red LED Dot Matrix Unit Board SPI Like
http://www.sureelectronics.net/goods.php?id=1119

If you are only going to do a clock display, then you might want to find a clock LCD instead of a 4x20 or 2 x 16 display.

1.8 inch 4 digit 7-segment Red Display Board (DE-DP002)MTO (Retro Look?)
http://www.sureelectronics.net/goods.php?id=134

Chip Cox

Thanks, the brilldea one looks promising. The other constraint I forgot to mention is that I only have 4 pins left to use. So I'm pretty much tied to a 3 wire serial setup I think.

max72

I checked the objects for the brilldea display. There are 6 pins used. the 4 wire spi serial and two more. One is back light, so it could be independent. If you are so tight with free pins better to verify...