PCA2117: Automotive LCD driver for character displays

Overview

The PCA2117 is a low-power Liquid Crystal Display (LCD) controller and driver. It is specifically designed to drive LCD dot-matrix displays of 2‑lines by 20 characters or 1‑line by 40 characters with 5 x 8 dot format. In addition 200 icons can be displayed. The chip contains a character generator and displays alphanumeric characters. The PCA2117 features an internal charge pump with internal capacitors for on-chip generation of the LCD driving voltage. To ensure an optimal and stable contrast over the full temperature range, the PCA2117 offers a programmable temperature compensation of the LCD supply voltage. The PCA2117 can be easily connected to a microcontroller by either the two-line I²C-bus or a four-line bidirectional SPI-bus.

Various character sets can be manufactured on request. In addition up to 48 user-defined symbols (5 x 8 dot format) can be stored in three selectable RAM columns with 16 characters each.

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Features

AEC Q100 grade 2 compliant for automotive applications
Single-chip LCD controller and driver
Extended operating temperature range from -40 °C to +105 °C
2-line display of up to 20 characters plus 200 icons or 1-line display of up to 40 characters plus 200 icons
5 x 7 character format plus cursor and user-defined symbols
Icon blink function
On-chip:
- Programmable 4, 3, or 2 times voltage multiplier generating LCD supply voltage (external supply also possible)
- Integrated temperature sensor with temperature readout
- Selectable linear temperature compensation of on-chip generated V_LCD
- Generation of intermediate LCD bias voltages
- Oscillator requires no external components (external clock also possible)
Readout of RAM and all registers possible
Diagnostic features:
- Checksum on I²C and SPI bus
Frame frequency: programmable from 45 Hz to 360 Hz
Display Data RAM (DDRAM): 80 characters
Character Generator ROM (CGROM): 240, 224, or 208 characters (5 x 8) depending on the selected RAM size
Character Generator RAM (CGRAM): 16, 32, or 48 characters (5 x 8); ICON-RAM: 400 bit
Two-line I²C-bus interface or four-line SPI bus selectable through input pin
Inversion modes
- n-line (n = 1 to 7) inversion
- Frame inversion
Large supply voltage range: V_DD1: 2.5 V to 5.5 V (chip can be driven with battery cells)
Analog supply voltage V_DD2: 2.5 V to 5.5 V
LCD supply voltage V_LCD: 4 V to 16 V
Direct mode to save current consumption for icon mode and multiplex drive mode 1:9 (depending on V_DD2 value and LCD properties)
Power-down mode pin
Very low current consumption (20 μA to 200 μA):
- Power-down mode: < 2 μA
- Icon mode: < 25 μA
Icon mode is used to save current. When only icons are displayed, a much lower LCD operating voltage can be used and the switching frequency of the LCD driver outputs is reduced. In this case, for most applications it is possible to use V_DD as LCD supply voltage

Target Applications

Automotive
- Instrument clusters
- Climate control display
- Car entertainment
- Car radio
Industrial
- Medical and health care
- Measuring equipment
- Machine control systems
- Information boards
- General-purpose display modules
Consumer
- White goods
- Home entertainment

MoreLess

Features

AEC Q100 grade 2 compliant for automotive applications
Single-chip LCD controller and driver
Extended operating temperature range from -40 °C to +105 °C
2-line display of up to 20 characters plus 200 icons or 1-line display of up to 40 characters plus 200 icons
5 x 7 character format plus cursor and user-defined symbols
Icon blink function
On-chip:
- Programmable 4, 3, or 2 times voltage multiplier generating LCD supply voltage (external supply also possible)
- Integrated temperature sensor with temperature readout
- Selectable linear temperature compensation of on-chip generated V_LCD
- Generation of intermediate LCD bias voltages
- Oscillator requires no external components (external clock also possible)
Readout of RAM and all registers possible
Diagnostic features:
- Checksum on I²C and SPI bus
Frame frequency: programmable from 45 Hz to 360 Hz
Display Data RAM (DDRAM): 80 characters
Character Generator ROM (CGROM): 240, 224, or 208 characters (5 x 8) depending on the selected RAM size
Character Generator RAM (CGRAM): 16, 32, or 48 characters (5 x 8); ICON-RAM: 400 bit
Two-line I²C-bus interface or four-line SPI bus selectable through input pin
Inversion modes
- n-line (n = 1 to 7) inversion
- Frame inversion
Large supply voltage range: V_DD1: 2.5 V to 5.5 V (chip can be driven with battery cells)
Analog supply voltage V_DD2: 2.5 V to 5.5 V
LCD supply voltage V_LCD: 4 V to 16 V
Direct mode to save current consumption for icon mode and multiplex drive mode 1:9 (depending on V_DD2 value and LCD properties)
Power-down mode pin
Very low current consumption (20 μA to 200 μA):
- Power-down mode: < 2 μA
- Icon mode: < 25 μA
Icon mode is used to save current. When only icons are displayed, a much lower LCD operating voltage can be used and the switching frequency of the LCD driver outputs is reduced. In this case, for most applications it is possible to use V_DD as LCD supply voltage

Target Applications

Automotive
- Instrument clusters
- Climate control display
- Car entertainment
- Car radio
Industrial
- Medical and health care
- Measuring equipment
- Machine control systems
- Information boards
- General-purpose display modules
Consumer
- White goods
- Home entertainment

Data Sheets

Application Notes