I am building a project and I want 2 x 7 Segment displays.
To minimise pin usage, I thought I would use a BCD-7 Segment display driver.
I want to use 5 volts, so I looked in my TTL cookbook. 7447. Ok, but it is for common ANODE displays.
It puts the outputs LOW to activate the segment. Ok. It also boasts that it can drive nixi and other kinds of displays.
If I want to use LED it is said to use 330 ohm resistors.
But looking at the 7 Segment displays they are common CATHODE!
You can multiplex it with nine wires (including the decimal). Use two NPN transistors to drive the common cathodes, one is controlled from a port line via a 1k resistor, its collector is connected to the base of the second via two diodes in series with the midpoint of the two diodes, the anode of each, pulled up by another 1k resistor to 5V.
Paul__B:
Yes, if only.
(I was hoping someone with that skill and enthusiasm might do it with lightning speed, as I couldn't think of how to just before bedtime.)
Pencil, paper; take a picture; attach it.
Arduous.
MAX7219, drives up to 8 common cathode displays with SCK, MOSI, SS from Ardunino.
Or LED library and any pins for bit-banged interface.
Or 2 cd4AC164 shift registers. Do the value o- segment mapping in software, just an array lookup: