kmr-1.8 tft display manufacturer

Recently, I had the idea to make a digital picture frame—one of these kinds which load images from SD cards and show each image for some time. I was remembering myself that I already own a small TFT display, the KMR-1.8 SPI, that works out of the box with an Arduino Uno. When I digged up my KMR-1.8 SPI, I realized that it has also an in-built SD card reader. Moreover, I looked up the Internet and found ready-to-use libraries for the in-built SD card reader as well as showing images on the TFT display. For these reasons, I thought making such an digital picture frame will turn out very easy.

When I started to implement my first lines of codes and started to connect my Arduino Uno to the KMR-1.8 SPI, I ran into two major problems. First, the colors of my image file did not match to the colors displayed by the KMR-1.8 (red and blue were interchanged). Second, my first prototypes stopped to work after about 5 minutes. The application started to freeze and showed the same image forever instead of displaying the next image after a chosen time.

There exists various versions of so-called “1.8 TFT displays” from different manufacturers. Not all of them are 100% compatible to each other. Therefore, if you own a TFT display and want to use my tutorial to make it work, please check if your TFT display really matches the version I used in this tutorial:

The source code relies on three header files (and libraries): SPI.h (Link), SD.h (Link) and TFT.h (Link). Please make sure that all of them are correctly installed before trying out my source code (In Arduino IDE: Tools -> Manage Libraries…).

I overcame the first problem by not using the default initialization method (“TFTscreen.begin();”) of the TFT library. Instead, I looked up whats inside the “begin”-method. I found a method called “initR” which has a parameter that allows to perform the initialization for a specific chip. Here, the parameter value “INITR_BLACKTAB” worked for me as the colors were then shown correctly. In addition, I call the method “setRotation” with parameter value “1” in order to be conform to the default initialization method. In the end, the code for the setting up the TFT library object looks like this:// ...

The code looks for image files (*.BMP) on the SD card and shows each image for 60 seconds. You can change the display time by setting “DELAY_IMAGE_SWAP” to a new value.

@david_prentice: I meant Himax, well spotted! I remember seeing a 1.8" display with a HX---- driver advertised, but I am not sure where I saw it. Yes you are right, ILI9163/S6D02A1/ST7735 are all options often advertised for 1.8" displays.

Interestingly it reports my display as having an ILI9163 but I am using initialisation code from this library for a S6D02A1 and it works OK but that may just be by luck and a degree of initialisation address compatibility.

An 1.8" 128 x 160 TFT LCD can be purchased for around $3. The one that I got has the marking of "KMR-1.8 SPI". It claims to be ST7735R based. ST7735R is a 262K 18-bit color TFT controller/driver by Sitronix. ST7735R is a chip with large aspect ratio (10 x 0.7 mm); it has 759 pads (including 396 source and 162 gate driver output pins) and supports a number of interfaces, parallel and serial.

LED+, SD_CS, MOSI and SCK have 4.7-Ohm series resistors. LED- is shorted to GND. The display is advertised to work with Arduino, but it appears to take only 3V input.

I used 1600-Ohm resistors in series for 5V to 3V conversion. I wonder if that might cause some problem. The display input pins do not cause the 5V signal level to drop as I expect with ESD protection diodes. Could the input be 5V tolerant? The I/O voltage is specified as 1.65 to 3.7V according to the data sheet and the operating voltage is 2.3 to 4.8V. 5V would be stressing it. I power the Arduino nano with the USB, so the actual voltage is 4.7V (after the diode). It is possible that the 3V from the regulator is not actually used by the display, but only for the SD card.

People have reported that the display can also run on Orange Pi. The device is supported by notro"s fbtft, with built-in support for Adafruit 1.8". The wiring is as follows,

The data sheet specifies the min serial clock cycle time is 66ns for write and 150ns for read. Even for just writing, the max clock frequency is 15MHz. Even though the driver seemed to load correctly, I was unable to display anything. Lowering the SPI clock rate did not help.

I powered both the arduino and the display with 3.3V. The hardware SPI worked. (I mistakenly used D12 as DC, which compounded the problem. D12 is MISO.) Even the software SPI behaved a little better (without the some flicking). So the hardware is fine running 3.3V (drawing about 55mA).

The next step is to run X windows on it. I created X11 config file and run startx as the second display. The X Window did run on the display; but the X Windows on the HDMI display disappears.

In this guide we’re going to show you how you can use the 1.8 TFT display with the Arduino. You’ll learn how to wire the display, write text, draw shapes and display images on the screen.

The 1.8 TFT is a colorful display with 128 x 160 color pixels. The display can load images from an SD card – it has an SD card slot at the back. The following figure shows the screen front and back view.

This module uses SPI communication – see the wiring below . To control the display we’ll use the TFT library, which is already included with Arduino IDE 1.0.5 and later.

The TFT display communicates with the Arduino via SPI communication, so you need to include the SPI library on your code. We also use the TFT library to write and draw on the display.

In which “Hello, World!” is the text you want to display and the (x, y) coordinate is the location where you want to start display text on the screen.

The 1.8 TFT display can load images from the SD card. To read from the SD card you use the SD library, already included in the Arduino IDE software. Follow the next steps to display an image on the display:

Note: some people find issues with this display when trying to read from the SD card. We don’t know why that happens. In fact, we tested a couple of times and it worked well, and then, when we were about to record to show you the final result, the display didn’t recognized the SD card anymore – we’re not sure if it’s a problem with the SD card holder that doesn’t establish a proper connection with the SD card. However, we are sure these instructions work, because we’ve tested them.

In this guide we’ve shown you how to use the 1.8 TFT display with the Arduino: display text, draw shapes and display images. You can easily add a nice visual interface to your projects using this display.

Specification:Driver IC: ST7735RResolution: 128 x 160 pixelsFeatures:- Can help you to get rid of the Arduino serial monitor.- Some tests and provide UTFT library, AdaFruit Library and instruction on DropBox.- Tested with Latest Arduino 1.6.5.IO interface:1. RESET --directly to the microcontroller IO2. CS --directly to the microcontroller IO3. A0 --IO control registers select4. SDA --IO control data transmission5. SCL --IO control SPI bus6. BL--High Level 3.3V backlight onNote:Please contact us for documents and driver if you need. Please noted this LCD is 3.3V, which can not receive 5V signals from the Arduino, so please use a 1k series resistors between GPIO lines on a 5V arduino and this LCD, power this LCD with 5V but drive it with "level shifted resistor" GPIO lines.Besides, you could use mcifriend 2.8 inch TFT LCD library to get it to work, it will work fine with the Mega or Uno.

Of course I’ve not just been working on the pretty colours – I’ve revamped the control codes for the ESP8266-driven controller twice, discovered and fixed an OTA flaw in the code, re-hashed the Node-Red driving code, found and fixed countless other bits and pieces… you know – in other words – pretty much revamped everything just to improve a simple display.

PLEASE NOTE: If you wish to use the display module depicted above – make sure it is based on the s6d02a1 chip (board says 1.8″ TFT) – try this link:  Cheap LCDs https://tech.scargill.net/yourls/cheaplcd. Boards have the marking “1.8 TFT MODULE” on the bottom. The ones with a single connector (as against one on each side) generally do NOT use this chip and hence are not compatible). Also, AliExpress do this board cheaply.

So the box is just an Ebay job, I think it was £3 – sadly I can’t find them right now, lovely job with rounded corners and top/bottom vents. We did find a sluightly larger one however. The display is one I call the QD-tech display, based on the 6sd02a1 controller and very cheap, see above. 120×160 pixel LCD and supported in ESP-NOW.

Glued to the back of this display is a Wemos D1 Mini from AliExpress, dirt cheap ESP-12 based board and they communicate via SPI – simplified to the minimum. I’ve connected resets together, CE to ground and so the only actual connections to the display are 5v and 3v3 (backlight) from the Wemos D1) and ground of course, for signals: clock, data, D/C. That’s it.

I use my well-developed ESP-NOW ESP8266 code for this and had to make some improvements on the way. As I was updating the board over and over and over, learning about the display chip, I noted memory issues occasionally when doing over the air updates – fixed that. I noted that I had no way to tell if the ESP8266 (and hence the display) had reset at any time (to know to do the init code) – fixed that (my ESP8266 code now sends a status message when rebooting). I got sick of the clumsy way I had to update the display, sending line, box, text commands so I amalgamated them all into string commands – and that was such a good idea I went back and made the code for other displays follow the same format.  You can see how all of this might’ve taken up a lot of time.

Above you see the Node-Red code, running on a Raspberry Pi using my usual setup – there are in fact 2 displays – one on my desk and one in the hallway. I check for the ESP12s coming out of reset and send start-up code via MQTT to the displays separately. Overkill, could have just done the one.  That includes setting up the display itself, clearing the screen and putting in that nice white framework of lines and rectangles.  Meanwhile I have timed functions updating the time (once a second) and everything else once a minute.  The weather forecast (see icons in a previous post) comes from Dark Sky and I was having difficulty getting what I wanted out of the Node for that service, when it occurred to me that was just as easy to do an HTTP request – as the HTTP node is able to capture information and convert it to a JSON object. How handy is that.

You may notice a reference to England – this display is running in Spain but I have a Node-Red setup with sensors back in the UK so the two Node-Red installations will soon exchange temperature/humidity and other info – so I figured I may as well show temperature and humidity from back in the UK.

I’ll not go into the entire code sent off to the display, as mentioned above I’ve very much simplified that now and it is all detailed in the manual I put together for home control.

I needed to install this library from Bodmer; then edit the User_Setup.h file ( in sketchbook/libraries/TFT_ESPI ) to match my display and the connections used.

This User_Setup.h works fine for the ESP32; except that in the UTFT_DEMO_FAST Example the final screen (orange rectangle on blue background) no text was displayed.

I bought this LCD Display for a university course that I"m taking. The screen itself works amazingly with the breadboard that I had on hand and the tm4c123 microcontroller that we all used in the class. On both sides of the screen are indicators of what each pin should be assigned/connected to on the microcontroller. A big plus with this screen in comparison to others on the market is that it comes with connector pins connected to it already. Many people in my class had to learn how to solder and sloppily connected external pins to their other screens. That"s most certainly not a problem here! Additionally, this screen had an SD card, if i remember correctly, that allows for more functionality. The screen has a full range of colors and allows both text and manually imported sprites to be displayed onto it. I"m not too sure if that all deals with the drivers I mention later or the screen itself, but its most certainly a plus in its own aspect. The LCD is built well and at no moment in time was I scared about it breaking - I even remember throwing it in my backpack connected to a bunch of wires while rushing to class on multiple occasions.

The only complaint that I have with this screen is the lack of "drivers" that it has to display more complicated graphics. One specific example that I remember dealing with was that there is no horizontal orientation change feature. To display graphics horizontally, I had to rotate them in photoshop manually and import them into my program like that. This made things like positioning the sprites and graphics and, more importantly, edge detection more complicated as I had to account for the changed position basis (originally being the bottom left corner but being changed to the top left for the sprites when the screen itself is rotated).