Controlling your World the Easy Way

Friends, Here is the ControlBASIC code to generate "pixel data" for a really HUGE, 2 x 20 module LED matrix using the ubiquitous MAX7219 modules. It contains data for both the standard, small font (usually called "5x7", even though some of my letters have a differing width), as w...

Here's a first iteration of the code for the LED Matrix "Weather Clock" described in the previous topic - I made a few changes after experimenting with the graphic display; it really made no sense without a scale, so instead, I added a second DHT22-type sensor (acually an AM2302) in order ...

Here are a couple of photos of the hardware: The EzSBC1 is mounted in a socket on a small perforated prototyping board, together with two 74ACT08 ICs, each containing four 2-input AND gates. They function as level converters from the processor's 3.3 volt logic levels to the 5 volt levels required by...

Friends - Having ironed out the bugs in my previous project (a huge 16x120 pixel LED matrix display for my model railroad), I'm now working on a smaller, 16x40 pixel Weather Station & Clock using the same MAX7219 LED modules. This was, of course, inspired by the DHTHUM and DHTTEMP commands in th...

Friends, Now, the LED matrix has grown to 30 modules, i.e. a display of 16 x 120 pixels. I've installed it above the background panorama on my model railroad, where it shows departures & arrivals, as well as running a Quiz game for the exhibit visitors - see photo. The large font is readable fro...

Commercial LED displays shift in the data by row (contrary to by column in my test above) in order to ensure smooth scrolling. You can tell from the slightly slanted characters, which straighten up as the scrolling stops. However, this complicates the data handling quite a bit; you either need to sh...

Friends - Now it works! The package of ten 8x8 LED matrices arrived yesterday! ( At the exorbitant price of $1.30 each... including postage! :D ) If you want to build something similar to this, there are a few pitfalls: First of all, the EzSBC1 has 3.3 volt logic levels, while the ubiquitous MAX7219...

Just an update FYI: The software is progressing nicely, I have the bitmap font ready, in Hex notation (not binary which takes twice the space - there's not enough RAM for everything else I'll be needing...) For a simple text display there's ample RAM, and if you want to design your own font, it's ea...

Hi again - I found out that Mac OS X's own Terminal program works well, once you get the settings right: screen /dev/tty.usbserial-A601TIHF 57600,cs8 (Note: The exact command contains the boards serial info, so you need do a ls /dev/tty.usb* command first, to get it...) Editing also works correctly,...

Yes, thanks for the hint - CoolTerm looks pretty cool! And loading a file is indeed a LOT faster this way! However, editing messes up the display, instead of a normal listing, all lines are concatenated to a single block of text, impossible to edit. I'm sure some setting is wrong, but despite trying...

Got the EzSBC1 today, just one week after ordering it - great! After some problems getting suitable communication software installed in OS X, I'm now using the MacWise VT100 emulator, which appears to interface well - the LEDs are blinking colorfully, and I can edit the program! One question: this e...

That's an impressive minature! How long did it take to build? And how do you move the trucks and cars? Thanks for the thumbs up! I've spent about 500 hours on the layout so far, including programming the PicoBASIC (only 12 commands) PIC controller which runs the trains (I've already maxed out the p...

Thanks, Daniel, for your encouraging reply. In fact, I ordered an EzSBC1 (and also twenty 8x8 LED matrices with 7219 drivers, for only $1.30 each!) on eBay even before your reply (I assume it's you selling the EzSBC on eBay...) However, the bottleneck is probably not in the shifting out of the data,...

Hello, new forum member here, in Helsinki, Finland! :D I'm about to order a EzSBC1 board for building a long dot-matrix display using multiple MAX7219 Dot matrix modules. Do you think the speed will suffice for scrolling ten or more 8x8 dot displays (address+data totals 1280 bits) in real time? I as...