I'm not sure where to post this, so please feel free to move this if necessary. I'm working on trying to get a PIC16F886 to control a basic 4X20 parallel LCD module and am having some issues when writing characters. It's sort of difficult to explain the issues, but basically the LCD is working because the cursor moves after each character write, but there is no character to be seen.
During the initialization, I can control all of the set-up instructions just fine, 5x8 font or 5x11, no cursor, blinking, shift pattern and everything, but like I said when I write a character, nothing gets printed to the screen, but the address counter is incremented correctly, because the cursor moves. And then I can even issue a return home command and the cursor returns home correctly.
I'm not really sure what's wrong. Anyone seen this oddity before? Also if I play with the contrast adjust via my 10K pot, if the contrast pin is essentially grounded, every character position has the "block" looking character. If I start to raise the voltage a little, they slowly dissapear until only the cursor is left, but again no character. And if I continue raising it, the cursor dissapears too. I think this is the correct operation. It wasn't until I did this did I realize the LCD was even initializing correctly.
Any help would be really appreciated. The LCD is brand new and is a Newhaven NHD-0420H1Z-FL-GBW-3V.
During the initialization, I can control all of the set-up instructions just fine, 5x8 font or 5x11, no cursor, blinking, shift pattern and everything, but like I said when I write a character, nothing gets printed to the screen, but the address counter is incremented correctly, because the cursor moves. And then I can even issue a return home command and the cursor returns home correctly.
I'm not really sure what's wrong. Anyone seen this oddity before? Also if I play with the contrast adjust via my 10K pot, if the contrast pin is essentially grounded, every character position has the "block" looking character. If I start to raise the voltage a little, they slowly dissapear until only the cursor is left, but again no character. And if I continue raising it, the cursor dissapears too. I think this is the correct operation. It wasn't until I did this did I realize the LCD was even initializing correctly.
Any help would be really appreciated. The LCD is brand new and is a Newhaven NHD-0420H1Z-FL-GBW-3V.