Question regarding LCD displays and custom characters

Projects General Guidance
1

Hello,
as an example:
"LCD2004 I2C" and "LCD2004" (without I2C)

Fact is that the LCD2004 I2C is a normal LCD2004 with a little board on its back which acts as a serial bus.
This serial bus is controlled by a HITACHI HD44780 chip.
The Hitachi controller has very limited space for custom characters.

The other version of this LCD does not have this little board on its back and can only be accessed via parallel.
Is it possible to program more custom characters than with the Hitachi chip?

Reason: I would like to be able to show sentences or words written in Thai "alphabet"...

ขอบคุณสำหรับการตอบกลับ
(means... Thank you for your response)

Eric

2

The RAM for storing user defined characters is part of the LCD chip, not the interface chip so you still only get 8 characters

3

Thanks for your response...

I see...

Except LCD 2004 style displays, what choice do I have to program 44 consonant and 32 vowel symbols?

Matrix displays?
OLED?

Is there a LCD 2004 style display which allows the creation of many custom characters?

By the way, I scrubbed the internet for the last few weeks and I did not find any "Thai alphabet library". So I my goal is try to create such a set to be used with the Arduino system.

4

You most likely will have to go with an OLED since you can control every pixel on the screen

5

Maybe a Graphic LCD (GLCD). The most common types have KS0108 (8-pin parallel interface only) or ST7920 (8-pin parallel or SPI interface).

@olikraus can you help @ericvill with a Thai font for your U8G2 library?

You can get i2c backpacks for the KS0108, but they are not the same as the backpacks for 1602/2004 displays, and I don't think they are compatible with U8G2.
td_libs_GLCD_1

6

Thanks @PaulRB.
Thanks also to @olikraus.
I will focus on graphicslcd's as I think it is the only possibility to create all these "custom" characters.

First I will see on the internet where I can get such a LCD.
And I'll be back.

7

OpenSmart do a low cost 1.8" 128x64 LCD, ST7565, SPI based and very fast.

Runs with the U8g2 and U8glib libraries, so there is a very large range of fonts and tutorials for generating custom ones.

That LCD is one of the few I have found that is readable in direct sunlight too.

There is a larger 2.4" version, also visible in direct sunlight, but no backlight.

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8

U8g2 has a Thai font, in three sizes, https://github.com/olikraus/u8g2/wiki/fntgrptlwg

The font names used for the setFont() function are:
u8g2_font_etl14thai_t
u8g2_font_etl16thai_t
u8g2_font_etl24thai_t

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9

Screenshot_20240521-133210-909
Screenshot_20240521-133210-9091080×1712 191 KB

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10

@srnet
Excellent.

I will definitely consider this display...

Thanks for the info...

Eric

11

@david_2018

That is exactly what I need....

In fact, it is not "exactly" for me, it's for my 12 years old daughter.
At school, they have to propose a science project...
And I want to show her what she could do with a little coding, a module (temperature, GPS, PM2.5,...) and an Arduino._
As we live in Thailand, she will obviously need to display whatever she wants to show in Thai language, hence my question about displays.

Cheers,
Eric

12

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