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Forum Index : Microcontroller and PC projects : MM runs 65k VGA 800x480 resolution
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boss Senior Member  Joined: 19/08/2011 Location: CanadaPosts: 268 |
Good day, and greetings from rainy Vancouver. A board made in Australia can do this. The tiny board costs $49US and is pretty slow, but for industrial control is good enough. It is connected to MM via COM2: and I wish I had higher baud rate then 19200. More info can be found on http://www.4dsystems.com.au/prod.php?id=131. It is able to play .wav files as well (not tested yet). I developed some demonstration SW, so if anyone would like to play with I can send it. Regards boss 
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donmck Guru  Joined: 09/06/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1313 |
Or for around $15USD, you can purchase the PICASO Embedded Graphics Controller from 4DSystems (which just happens to be a PIC chip), and build your own minimal system from the data sheets. Cheers Don... https://www.dontronics.com |
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| boss Senior Member Joined: 19/08/2011 Location: CanadaPosts: 268 |
You are absolutely right, I'm planing to use FPGA to get 1024x768 and higher resolution, but now I'm little bit rush with my project and this board is good value for that money. And I have to use sound too. Regards boss |
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Nick Guru Joined: 09/06/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 512 |
Interesting board. Unfortunately, won't directly accept any of the maximite graphics commands so it seems a bit "disconnected". Wonder how painful it would be trying to write a game with it if it only understands serial I/O commands. Don't know how it would be with anything too screen interactive. But I agree, would make a good display device. Personally, I'd prefer to see something more closely integrated that still uses the Maximites commands. Something more of an extension to the Maximite rather than a foreign add-on. Interesting to see what people can make of this on the Maximte. Cheap too. |
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| JohnS Guru Joined: 18/11/2011 Location: United KingdomPosts: 3813 |
Is it just a board for $49 and you still need the display itself? Is there not a cheaper way to do that? John |
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| donmck Guru Joined: 09/06/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1313 |
It is TTL serial in (232 software protocol), and VGA out. So you still need a display of some description. Cheers Don... https://www.dontronics.com |
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| Nick Guru Joined: 09/06/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 512 |
Here's an idea on how to integrate this board with the Maximite. A firmware update that translates the written graphics commands to the serial commands required by this board. A mode option to choose which display device the instruction is to be directed to... 1=Maximite 480x432 B/W display or 2=This VGA board. Example: MODE 1 LINE(0,0)-(10,10),1 This draws a normal line on the Maximite. MODE 2 LINE(0,0)-(10,10),1 This draws a line of color 1 to the serial board (the translation being done to the serial port instructions of the VGA card). The color number can be 0=Black and any other number being White for Maximite mode. In VGA board mode this would signify an actual colour number that the board is capable of displaying. This way it will be easy to make code that is cross compatible. It should also be able to drive the 2 displays simultaneously with each displaying different data. Dual screen Maximite!! And all this with a firmware update and an external board that doesn't require any mods to the Maximite itself. Well? Does this sound crazy or does it truly wreak of genius?! 
Nick |
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| JohnS Guru Joined: 18/11/2011 Location: United KingdomPosts: 3813 |
For such a slow board at $49 I would not bother. There must be a decent speed one, probably cheaper. John |
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| boss Senior Member Joined: 19/08/2011 Location: CanadaPosts: 268 |
Good morning, I read all comments carefully 1)JohnS: I would like to rectify some false assumptions: Sure that tiny card is not fast enough to play games. I wrote that the board is slow but good enough for some kind of industrial control, ie. ship navigation light panel. When you consider the price of such device ($5500+) and $49 for VGA, you have an answer. And the price for 7" TFT display that meets all criteria for navy application starts at $550. The concept of the device is little bit obsolete, but I didn't find anythig better on the market that is industrially manufactured. And you can connect it to all kinds of processors. 2)Nick: The command set is simple and well documented and I think that the implementation into MM Basic will not be a big deal. Your idea is great. Or we can add dedicated commands like VGA_line,VGA_circle...... Regards boss |
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| JohnS Guru Joined: 18/11/2011 Location: United KingdomPosts: 3813 |
Thanks - though I've no interest in that application area or $550+ TFT displays. I'd like a display controller that's cheaper than the DM itself. If the DM had a bit more RAM I'd use a second DM! An Olinuxino maybe. John |
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| donmck Guru Joined: 09/06/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1313 |
Olinuxino is an interesting idea. Or even an RPi if you could get them. 
Cheers Don... https://www.dontronics.com |
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| boss Senior Member Joined: 19/08/2011 Location: CanadaPosts: 268 |
Hi John, all clear, you probably don't need "salt spray resistant" display for your application. But some need that kind of equipments. And I'm trying to deploy MM in professional devices. Regards boss |
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Geoffg Guru Joined: 06/06/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 3196 |
I tried to build a colour Maximite using this board and exactly this technique but it didn't work out. The problem is not the speed of transferring the data over the serial interface but the speed at which the Picaso chip on the VGA controller processes the data. I cannot remember the exact numbers but the VGA controller was about ten times slower than the Maximite's normal display driver. That meant that redrawing a screen full of text took about 5 seconds - far too long for games and the full screen editor. As Boss said, when used for semi static text and graphics it is great. The company (4D Systems) also has a range of touch sensitive LCDs that use the same controller chip and I have written a library of MMBasic functions to display data and buttons and get touch events. For anyone who is interested, attached is a very preliminary version of the library. 2012-05-21_230833_4D_LCD_Demo_and_photo.zip Geoff Geoff Graham - http://geoffg.net |
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| Nick Guru Joined: 09/06/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 512 |
Oh well. Would have been a neat way to apply a plug-in colour upgrade to the maximite. |
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| TC 72 Newbie  Joined: 05/02/2014 Location: FrancePosts: 15 |
good evening I'm about 4DLCDLIB code posted by geoff, I'm stuck on a sub program that I do not understand: sub LCDBsetup can someone inform me thank you in advance thierry |
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MicroBlocks Guru Joined: 12/05/2012 Location: ThailandPosts: 2209 |
I have a gameduino2 that looks very promising. It is fast! For games it is probably a good choice. http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=2iy_y UQd4Mw Microblocks. Build with logic. |
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Grogster Admin Group  Joined: 31/12/2012 Location: New ZealandPosts: 9308 |
Misleading thread title?
It's not the MM doing the high res. 
Still, and interesting read. I have one of these 4D modules - I was playing with it using a PICAXE controller at the time, and this was my EXACT finding too - I ended up going with the FREE TellyMate from Batsocks.co.uk instead. Even though composite B/W video is much less sexy then colour, and considerably fuzzier then crisp VGA, it was still the better choice from the speed point of things. Running the TellyMate as fast as possible, it would redraw the screen very quickly, whereas, as you say, the 4D thing was slow, slow, slow.... Not that this is to say that the 4D might not suit someone else, but it did not work for me the way I wanted it to or hoped it would, but that is why you purchase a sample to play with. I doubt I will ever use the module again.
Smoke makes things work. When the smoke gets out, it stops! |
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Zonker Guru Joined: 18/08/2012 Location: United StatesPosts: 761 |
Good evening Gents.. The really cool thing you can do with these displays is setup a small GUI design inside them and then pass value data to the objects inside. I have been using them for an EIS (engine information system) I have been working on. 
It has a small screen select bar at the top to show the data readouts of all the information gathered by the Micromite sensor subsystem. Then the MM just transmits updated data values to the 4-D systems display. The display unit handles the user interface... (sweet)..! |
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| Grogster Admin Group Joined: 31/12/2012 Location: New ZealandPosts: 9308 |
@ Zonker - looks like you are into aviation. Seen all the Mayday Air Disaster episodes? Also well worth a look is Flight Radar 24 Smoke makes things work. When the smoke gets out, it stops! |
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BobD Guru Joined: 07/12/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 935 |
FR 24 is so good. I could waste hours on that (and have). |
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