Eric Hertz
See the description above, regarding the Binary Ice Clock and 7-seg Binary Clock, which largely inspired this venture!
For several years, I developed "avr-lvds-lcd" aka "LCDdirectLVDS", which enables an LVDS-interfaced LCD [such as from a laptop] to be driven by an AVR and a few support-components already available in many hobbiests' toolboxes. During those years, this had become my development-platform... doing the same proof-of-concept in a window on a desktop-computer would've been significantly more difficult for me. This had the nice side-effect of a one-off software experiment like this binary clock being a bit like a finished stand-alone device ready for a bookshelf.
It's been years since that "development environment" has been at my ready. Though, this experiment led to other ideas I may revisit in the future, such as this 7-segment clock idea, which hides the time in plain view, only to be seen when viewed through a removable mask.
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Hardware-wise, this project literally requires nothing more than:
- ATtiny85 (8-pin, 8-bit AVR microcontroller with 512bytes of RAM, and PWM with "dead-time" necessary for FPD-Link compatible signals)
- Two SN74LS86 quad-XOR's (used as buffers and inverters to drive LVDS)
- An old laptop-LCD
- LCD-backlight driver
- 3.6V power-supply
- Wire
- (perf/bread-board)
(NOTE: This is in the proof-of-concept phase. I haven't installed a real-time clock, so it just starts at 0hour 0min 0sec when it's powered-up... So, I guess, it's really a binary-timer?)
This old laptop-display is mounted inside, literally, an old picture-frame. The red-border was spray-painted onto the glass to cover up the LCD's metal frame and help center it.
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Ideas:
Amongst various ideas, one is to actually cover all but the necessary parts of this display... E.G.
- Punch three-rows of 8 holes into a piece of paper between the glass and the display, it might look as though it's 24 separate LEDs.
- Stencil/laser-cut letters/numbers/shapes, etc...
- Maybe even print images/masks onto a transparency?
(With this simple circuit, the screen-resolution is highly-limited... 16x16--stretched-across the original 1024x768--is definitely doable, which is *plenty* for this binary-clock. There are definitely methods to stretch the resolution, quite a bit. The avr-lvds-lcd code tries to provide a step-by-step procedure for getting a display running. Still, the process of fine-tuning these *way* out-of-spec timings, and determining various characteristics, for a particular display is not for the faint-hearted.)
matseng
Ryan Eanes
I like this, it would be a good use of one of the many laptop screens I have laying around. I feel like I'm in the same boat as you: I feel guilty doing something like this with a screen capable of so much more resolution, but in all reality I'm never gonna put it to work doing anything like that, so I might as well get some use out of it and learn a little bit at the same time. Plus I have at least five candidate screens, so not that big a deal anyway. I also like the idea of the paper overlays for the screen, you could customize this in all sorts of ways, kinda like an abstract art installation.
As to your question about kits, I could see that going well, but it would have to be a one-size-fits-all kind of solution, where someone could basically plug and play with any screen they might have on hand. That would be the hard part, because LVDS inverter boards aren't all standard, plus some screens would be capable of different resolutions and that might throw off the timing. But with alternate pinouts for different screen configurations, or maybe different code to be loaded on the ATTiny, it could be overcome, it would just take some doing. It is a good idea though, just find that sweet spot between price point and compatibility.
Sorry for my rambling thoughts, if I decide to follow through with this, I'll make a project page and let you know how it turns out.