> From: "Snail Instruments" > Hi all, > > I have recently received following request - make information displays for > a courthouse, which would display 3(4) lines of 20 characters, would be > visible from 5 meters and would be based on LCD technology. I have tried, > that the characters should be about 1" (25mm) high, but the largest LCD > modules I have found are 14mm (0.57"), made by Batron. Is there any chance > to get such a large displays? Are there any manufacturers of LCD > information panels? Any other helpful information appreciated. TIA. You might want to think about using something a bit larger than 1 inch characters. While they may be visible at 5 metres to people with 20/20 vision, you should consider that in a public place like a courthouse there may be people with a wide range of visual ability or impairment and from some seats lighting may not be optimum. Anyway a quick web search for "large LCD" turned up http://www.rohm.com/news/lineup.html which looks like the kind of thing you mean, thay do accented European characters too. Also Densitron's LM 2131 claims 152mm high characters, bigger than you need but they may have other large stuff. You need to register to get the data sheet so I didn't bother. www.densitron.com Speaking of which, a general question. Is it just me or is it stupid to require people to register to get details of products? I've recently designed three mid-volume products which use LCDs - none of which used Densitron displays for exactly this reason. Looks like a website run by no-clue marketing people to me. Another possibility is to use the type of displays used for LCD monitors, which are available with VGA or TV-type input. Two or three of the TV types boxed together to make a long display would do the trick quite neatly. If your project is a one-off then these displays are readily available on the surplus market - but buy twice as many as you need, they may not be there when you need a maintenance spare. You might want to consider if LCD is really the best solution for the job. They do suffer from lower contrast than most other displays and are restricted in viewing angle. Many public information displays seem to use electro-mechanical displays which contain an array of rotatable flags, one per pixel, which are brightly painted on one side and dark on the other. There was some discussion of these displays here a few weeks back and some suppliers were mentioned. Just recently displays using electro-luminescent plastics which can be formed into any shape or size have become available. There may be something there that would help. . -- http://www.piclist.com hint: To leave the PICList mailto:piclist-unsubscribe-request@mitvma.mit.edu