LCD cable won't work

dudah85 · 07-16-2001, 09:14 PM

Alright, I ran the LCD cable, soldered it, tested it TWICE!!!! And when I plugged it all in for a test, it doesn't work. For some reasong my HD didn't startup so I used a Win 98 boot disk and when DOS was loaded, I have a floppy w/ LCD print and and TXT file. It sends or whatever fine, but nothing on the LCD! It's all 22 gauge wire and was tested with a Fluke. The most resistance I had was like 8 ohms. The LCD doesn't even have power, no backlight, nothing. What's wrong?!?! Thanks!

-Kev

monger · 07-16-2001, 09:32 PM

8 ohms is ALOT. Plus you should have pretty even resistance with all the lines. I'm assuming that you used all seperate strand 22 gauge wire. Sounds like you may have a cold soldered joint. Find the high resistance lines and re-solder them and see if you can get a better connection.

Depending on the length of the run, why didn't you use ribbon cable or even a hacked and slashed printer cable? Sounds like you may have to re-wire the whole job...

either that or you cooked your LCD. Hey anything is possible.

dudah85 · 07-16-2001, 09:34 PM

The LCD is OK, I just hooked it up to the 1 foot parallel cable, I'm running 13 ft of cable and its shielded and grounded. Guess I'll check out pricewatch and spend some MORE money!

dudah85 · 07-16-2001, 09:44 PM

Would this work? web page

magnetik · 07-16-2001, 09:57 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Dudah:
<STRONG>The LCD is OK, I just hooked it up to the 1 foot parallel cable, I'm running 13 ft of cable and its shielded and grounded.</STRONG>

the cable length will make a difference at lengths of 13ft that you are quoting. With my mp3car software developement I was using one of my 40*2 lcd's with about 2 ft of cable fine..... once I built my 10ft cable to reach from the dash to the rear hatch/boot of my suzuki I nearly tore my hair out with the LCD not working... checked wiring about eight times.....

turned out that the timings I had set for my LCD display code on the parallel port was too quick for the cable length. slowing back the transmission to the LCD from the parallel port fixed the problem....

monger · 07-16-2001, 10:00 PM

I dont think that it is a problem with the length of the cable. Mine is a good 25' with no problems at all. Parallel transfers are good for atleast 30-50 feet. I think that you just have a bad cable job.

dudah85 · 07-16-2001, 10:10 PM

Where did you get your cable? I'm looking and can't find any! Thanks

magnetik · 07-16-2001, 11:30 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Monger:
<STRONG>I dont think that it is a problem with the length of the cable. Mine is a good 25' with no problems at all. Parallel transfers are good for atleast 30-50 feet. I think that you just have a bad cable job.</STRONG>

true.... but like in my situation if the LCD data is pumped out too quickly over a longer length it WILL cause trubbles.... now depending on the LCD software that
Dudah is tying to use, it may be transmitting that little bit too quick.... it would make sense if he is having success with a 1ft cable...

Tech^Cellfish · 07-17-2001, 06:40 AM

Magnetic is correct! Signal rate may be to fast. Most plug-ins and software has and option to control the rate or place a delay for the output to LCD.

PaulzY · 07-17-2001, 02:53 PM

the transfer rate on some parrallel ports are slower than others also, on some older motherboards it may be slower i think the standard is around 2meg but dont have anythign else to compare it too

07-17-2001, 05:19 PM

Quote:

The LCD doesn't even have power, no backlight, nothing. What's wrong?!?! Thanks!

This is obvious, but I'm gonna ask anyways. You need to run a seperate power line to the LCD from a power supply, it won't get power from the parallel port. Did you do this, if it isn't getting power it obviously isn't gonna work.

By the way I like your MAME cab, I'm building one myself.

dudah85 · 07-17-2001, 09:42 PM

Yup, I have a male connector in the box that connects to the mobo, then theres wires goin through to a female one on the outside, on the 13th pin, I connect it to the PSU from a old fan connector and ground is obviosly ground.

By the way, have you gone to arcadecontrols.com yet? I'm always there posting and sometimes in chat! Good luck with the MAME cab, theyre lots of fun, more fun building though!

pinballfreak · 07-18-2001, 02:22 AM

Quote:

Good luck with the MAME cab, theyre lots of fun, more fun building though!

lol, I just had to get my 2 cents in on this one. Why not get the real thing? Convert some cheap MK2 game back to Pac-Man. You'll have fun and a classic game all at the same time.

07-18-2001, 10:35 AM

Dudah, sounds like your power wiring should work will your backlight come on? If not try using your multimeter and find out how far back you have good power on your cables, maybe there's a bad solder joint or something there. I have been to arcadecontrols.com, I've posted there a few times great site.

pinballfreak, I'd have restored a classic, but why not have thousands of games on a cab instead of just one. I think it's great when people bring back the classic games, but I wanted more out of my cab since I'll only have room for one.

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