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HD44780-compatible 16-pin LCD Display - best way of connecting it...

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Hippogriff

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Hi,

I have bought a standard 16-pin HD44780-compatible LCD display that I plan on setting up so that I can do easy(ier) debugging of my JAL code by having something other than a LED to indicate what's going on in code.

I understand that I won't need all 16 pins to use this LCD display. However, I'm genuinely stumped as to what connection I would be best using to connect this thing to a breadboard.

At the moment, I'm planning on soldering on a 16-way male PCB header pin, but what do I then require to connect to those header pins? Is there a specialised 16-way (16 x 1) connector and cable that I could use? Male on one end, female on the other?

At first I thought it would be ribbon cable - the type used for floppy drives and such (like this **broken link removed** ) - but I can't seem to find a 16 x 1 header for that... 16 x 2 isn't a problem (I think) but I'm wondering why 16 x 1 doesn't exist.

Then I definitely thought it would be these DuPont connectors (like what you see here on eBay **broken link removed** ) am I going down the right path by looking at those? There's no UK sellers, weirdly, so I'd have to wait a couple of weeks for it to arrive from the Far East.

Searching Rapid brought me nothing, really... I found the PCB male header pins, of course, but something that would connect nicely to them didn't then jump out at me.

Again, this might simply be a question of "I can't search properly for something before I know the terminology for it"... so any guidance appreciated.

P.S. - obviously I'd like it to be nicely detachable, so I'm not planning on just soldering a load of wires to it, although... thinking again... that might not be a bad idea... ;)
 
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OK, scratch this request... I've gone and soldered right-angled PCB headers directly to it, now it has ultimate pluggability as it just slots into the breadboard.
 
Well, got there in the end, but the darn thing is upside down now. Maybe I should've waited and got myself some sort of cable. :mad:

**broken link removed**

Not going to be that much use for debugging.
 
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It looks fine to me down here in Australia. :)

But seriously now, it's still a success so congrats. Maybe you can solder another row of right-angle pins to that row, so the pins point down when the LCD is mounted flat, then plug it in flat to the breadboard with the pins at the top.
 
I like your Shift1-LCD thing. That's a useful debugging asset... as opposed to what I've got above, which is not that useful, using 6 PIC pins and all that.
 
I normally use the Molex SL series, they come in a large variety of styles. I think the Tycho/AMP equivalent is their MTA series. There is also KK and C-Grid from Molex. You would have to be able to crimp the wires yourself. Here is a photo of a male to female connector I made with the SL series.
 

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