I needed a library for a 7 segment display, but was not satisfied with the Arduino libraries, as a result I have made a new “library” that can handle nearly every cheap display on Ebay (See above picture, they are all supported) and has functions to display int/long/float/double/hex/binary/text. The library is fast and fairly compact.
The library have been update regularly with new display types and now also handles 14 segment displays, at the current time only a 8 digit version, but the common 4 digit version from ebay will be added when I receive it.
I am still working on this project, here is a table with all the displays used for testing, inclusive some measurements:
It is possible to sort and filter the table.
Wow Henrik, you’re truly a polymath!
I tried to come up with a proper translation for “van alle markten thuis” and I didn’t like “Jack of all trades” suggested by *oogle.
This really brings back some nostalgia for when I was making LCD drivers. I’ve been tempted to get a new display of some sort so I can increase the level of detail on my dashboard thingy, but for now I’m just using an old text-based 20x4 serial LCD I got a long time ago.
The displays used here are a lot nicer-looking, but it’d be difficult to go from 80 pixel-based characters down to just 8 segment-based characters. Kinda hoping to go the other way and find something with full pixel control, so I can display detailed graphs.
These things are so cool though… it makes me want to find uses for them, just so I can have an excuse to do fun projects. The 8-digit one with all the buttons is particularly interesting, since it could be used for really complex tasks.
ahhh… thank you… this, I can use… yes!…
In my opinion 7 segment (and 14 segment) display is much more useful with the small Arduino processor (Like mega) than graphical displays. The problem with graphical displays is they require a fairly large framebuffer in ram and flash for fonts and graphical code, this can be difficult to spare when you only have a 2 to 2.5kB ram and 32kB flash. The 2 or 4 line LCD displays works fine for these processors, but they are not nearly as easy to read as LED displays and with 14 segment it is possible to show show text.
I will implement the cheap 4 digit ebay 14 segment displays when I receive some (I have multiple orders for them), I expect the library will be able to handle 8 4 digit displays.
The 14-segment ones are really cool too. I’ve seen some nixie tube styled VFDs with 14-segment digits (or 16/17/18 segment, perhaps), and have been very tempted to do some projects with those. They’re beautiful, and I’d love to have a few. I haven’t been able to find any which connect via USB and display whatever the USB host sends though. A simple plain-text protocol over USB-serial would be more than sufficient for all sorts of purposes.
That is 16 segment displays, the difference between 14 & 16 segment is that top/bottom bar is slit on 16 segment.
On 16 segment some small letters looks better, upper case and numbers are the same as 14 segment. There is one disadvantage with 16 segment and that is driver chip, a 16 bit wide chip will not be able show any decimal point.
That would be easy to make with an Arduino.
I have started making my own display modules as open hardware:
First one is a alphanumeric display with RGB indicators above the displays and support for 8 buttons.
The library supports 8 of these displays mounted edge to edge or as separate displays.