He asked me to help him. But I can't understand where I should start? which micro should use?
please help me.
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How to make a moving nameboard using microcontrollers
How to make a moving nameboard using microcontrollers
One of friends (who has an electronic repairing shop) has wanted to build a moving nameboard for his shop.
He asked me to help him. But I can't understand where I should start? which micro should use?
please help me.
[ Post made via Mobile Device ]
He asked me to help him. But I can't understand where I should start? which micro should use?
please help me.
[ Post made via Mobile Device ]
Re: How to make a moving nameboard using microcontrollers
A partner company of ours make LED/LCD displays in Sri Lanka. However the policy of ROBOT.LK is to teach everything without any limit 
I'll give you some instructions.
* To drive 5X7 dot matrix display, you will need 35 output pins. Say you have 10 characters, then you will need 35 X 10 = 350 output pins on your micro. So asking about a suitable micro is not a good questions.
* So what is the technique here? The best I know is to use LED dot-matrix display driver ICs that can be operated through I2C. A single IC can operate a 5 x 7 dot-matrix display without any problem. So for 10 such displays, you will need 10 ICs.
* Once you have a proper configuration, you will only need to find a basic microcontroller with I2C or SPI bus based on your LED driver IC.
MAX6953 can drive up to 4, 5x7 displays (140 LEDs) through I2C. For above example, you will only need 3 such ICs which can drive up to 12, 5x7 displays. MAX6952 has similar functionality but communicates over SPI bus.
If you chose I2C, you can wire microcontroller's I2C pins to all ICs and make the CS (Chip Select) pin high on the IC you need to address. So even if you reserve a single output pin per each chip, you will only need 3 output pins on the micro to drive such 3 ICs which can drive up to 12, 5x7 LED dot-matrix displays (420 LEDs).
Have a look at following articles as well. Once you get familiar with these ICs, I'm sure making name boards will become a piece of cake
Building Dot Matrix Graphic Panels with the MAX6952 and MAX6953 5x7 LED Drivers
Software Control of the MAX6952 and MAX6953 LED Drivers in Graphic Applications
HT1632 is another popular matrix display driver IC.
I'll give you some instructions.* To drive 5X7 dot matrix display, you will need 35 output pins. Say you have 10 characters, then you will need 35 X 10 = 350 output pins on your micro. So asking about a suitable micro is not a good questions.
* So what is the technique here? The best I know is to use LED dot-matrix display driver ICs that can be operated through I2C. A single IC can operate a 5 x 7 dot-matrix display without any problem. So for 10 such displays, you will need 10 ICs.
* Once you have a proper configuration, you will only need to find a basic microcontroller with I2C or SPI bus based on your LED driver IC.
MAX6953 can drive up to 4, 5x7 displays (140 LEDs) through I2C. For above example, you will only need 3 such ICs which can drive up to 12, 5x7 displays. MAX6952 has similar functionality but communicates over SPI bus.
If you chose I2C, you can wire microcontroller's I2C pins to all ICs and make the CS (Chip Select) pin high on the IC you need to address. So even if you reserve a single output pin per each chip, you will only need 3 output pins on the micro to drive such 3 ICs which can drive up to 12, 5x7 LED dot-matrix displays (420 LEDs).
Have a look at following articles as well. Once you get familiar with these ICs, I'm sure making name boards will become a piece of cake
Building Dot Matrix Graphic Panels with the MAX6952 and MAX6953 5x7 LED Drivers
Software Control of the MAX6952 and MAX6953 LED Drivers in Graphic Applications
HT1632 is another popular matrix display driver IC.
Re: How to make a moving nameboard using microcontrollers
How about Extending a microcontroller's I/O ?
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Re: How to make a moving nameboard using microcontrollers
Possible but it all depends on your requirement and cost. It is possible to design it with digital electronics such as shift registers, etc... but make sure you do a cost evaluation on that. I have only described the commercial way of making them. You are open to do experiments.