SainSmart 2.8" TFT LCD display setup

[yojimbo187]

I have the afore mentioned display and i've been looking for help getting it up and running for some time. I found another person in the same situation as me, please help us:

Hi there,

I have been scouring the web to find all different bits of information for the Sainsmart 2.8 inch touch display with no avail on instructions on how to actually make it work.

I assumed that being it has a compatible 40 pin header that all I needed to do was put a 40 pin cable on it and install software and the os would pick up the display by default.

Apparently this is not the case. The display is a Sainsmart 2.8 inch touch display purchased from MicroCenter.

http://www.sainsmart.com/sainsmart-2-8- ... ry-pi.html

Description:
SainSmart 2.8" TFT LCD Display is a LCD touch screen module. It has 40pins interface and SD card and Flash reader design. It is a powerful and mutilfunctional module for your project.The Screen include a controller ILI9325, it's a support 8/16bit data interface , easy to drive by many MCU like arduino families，STM32 ,AVR and 8051. It is designed with a touch controller in it . The touch IC is XPT2046 , and touch interface is included in the 40 pins breakout. It is the version of product only with touch screen and touch controller.

Features:
240374PQ
262K color
240*320
2.8 inch
Wide viewing angle
ILI9325:240 RGB x 320 TFT Driver
Integrated Power, Gate and Source Driver With RAM
XPT2046-WIRE TOUCH,WIRE TOUCH, UP TO 125kHz CONVERSION RATE, SERIAL INTERFACE
Voltage type: 5v or 3v voltage input voltage，input is selectable. Because TFT can only work under 3.3 V voltage, so when the input voltage VIN is 5V, need through the 3.3 V voltage regulator IC step down to 3.3V , when the input voltage of 3.3 V, you need to use the zero resistance make J2 short , is equivalent to not through the voltage regulator IC for module and power supply directly.(Click here)

Note: the factory TFT module, are the 5 v power supply. By default.
Carrying on board SD holder, its work to SPI mode.

Documents:
Please contact us via support@sainsmart.com after your purchase.

Note: We have confirmed that the LCD is 100% compatible with Raspberry Pi but we do not have the programmed project yet.

So I contacted them and they sent me out the documentation etc. As I read all the documentation there was not one mention of how to get the PI to recognize the display. So I contacted them again and the response was to try element14.com. I went there and again no avail.

I am hoping that this is the last stop and that someone might have instructions on how to get the pi to recognize the display. Currently when hooked up the screen lights up, but that is about it, no output what so ever. The only output is what is going through the hdmi port to the tv.

Thanks for any and all help,
Shawn Mulligan

ready, set, educate us!

[DirkS]

The display is a Sainsmart 2.8 inch touch display purchased from MicroCenter.

http://www.sainsmart.com/sainsmart-2-8- ... ry-pi.html

Can you give the correct link, this one has been truncated;

[yojimbo187]

That it did... my apologies.

http://www.sainsmart.com/sainsmart-2-8- ... ry-pi.html

[alexiswk]

Have you had any luck getting the information? I was able to find the data sheet for the Sainsmart LCD but I have no idea how to connect the pins (other than the obvious power/ground, etc)

Here's a link to the datasheet: http://www.datasheet-pdf.com/datasheetd ... ?id=775377

[peek]

I just found this YouTube video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uBdsSWScao and associated article http://www.raspberrypirobot.com/tft-2-8 ... ay-monitor which looks promising. I don't know if it is still useful (it is over a year old), but I hope to try it out in the next few days.

[KilroyRock]

I know it's been 2 days, but any luck yet? I was planning a microcenter run today, they have 2 in stock at my local one, for 16 bucks it'd be worth a try to get up and running. I don't think i could figure it out, but I can follow directions of what someone else has knowledge of and figured out... (i'm lame, i know)

[peek]

Funny thing: my plan was to pick up one of these from my local MicroCenter, which claimed to have two of these in stock. They actually had none, so I had to find one on the internet. Therefore, I haven't yet been able to try anything.

[KilroyRock]

I had to ask them to have them find it for me. Microcenter is quite the snafu in the raspberry pi organizational department.


so i went ahead and got it, 16 bucks - worth playing with, if you ask me. I went through that tutorial you posted, but when it came to the pinouts, i'm certainly lost. the pinout on that is for a different 2.8", so i'm guessing in what to connect to what, and am afraid to find out what i'll hit wrong... i'll try some stuff and hope it works, please let me know if you do get somewhere, I'm flying blind over on my side!

[M15H]

I have purchased this same device and have been trying to get it to work. I feel like I'm close but haven't made it over the hump yet.

I contacted sainsmart and they sent me a link to a zip file containing the LCD driver and touchscreen driver data sheets. They also included sample code for an arduino setup. You may download it here: http://www.selloutsoon.com/albums/docum ... .8+TFT.zip

The TFT LCD driver wiki page is here: https://github.com/notro/fbtft/wiki This driver is part of the raspian kernel now so as long as you update your kernel the drivers will already be installed.

According to sainsmart tech support this device uses 16 bit parallel communication. The raspberry pi does not have enough GPIOs for this so we will need a interface circuit to connect it to our Pi so we can communicate to the display using the Pi's SPI. There are a couple of options for the interface either build one using ICs or get a guzunty pi. Details are here: https://github.com/notro/fbtft/wiki/SPI ... ce-circuit

So now you should have all the information needed to pull this all together. Unfortunately its not as simple as I thought it would be but I didn't do my homework and purchased the screen because I saw it at microcenter and it was cheap and figured I should be able to get it to work. If I were to do it over I would have purchased a device that had an SPI interface.

When I make some more progress I will reply with the details.

[kibako]

You'll probably need to research this a bit but I think you can just get a
RPI TFT LCD Adapter like this one

http://www.elecfreaks.com/store/rpi-tft ... p-709.html
viewtopic.php?f=41&t=43702
http://imall.iteadstudio.com/im130425001.html

The one from Mircocenter says it uses the ILI9325 controller so it should work with the PI

[aaron00792]

Hey was wondering if anyone had any luck with this