Datasheet

8
Microchip Human Interface Solutions
FREE Microchip Graphics Display Designer
The Microchip Graphics Display
Designer (GDD) is a visual
design tool that provides
customers with a quick and
easy way of creating Graphical
User Interface (GUI) screens for
graphical interface applications
on Microchip MCUs.
It provides the following advantages to the developers:
■ Simplifi es coding for the GUI screens with an ability to
draw, resize and delete screen objects
■ Eliminates the need to manually calculate the x- and y-
coordinates for on-screen object placements
■ Generates output source fi les
■ Ability to import various graphical resources, including
custom fonts and bitmap images
Supported Screen Sizes and Colors
Microchip graphics solutions support various screen sizes
and colors ranging from small monochrome OLED displays
up to WVGA displays with vivid color. The table below
shows the bits per pixel required to represent color.
Display
Representation
Color Examples
Color Depth
(bits per pixel)
Mono Black and White 1
Grayscale
4 shades
16 shades
2
4
Color
256 colors
65K colors
16 million colors
8
16
24
As the color depth and display resolution increase, the
frame buffer grows. Depending on the size, the frame
buffer can be stored in the microcontroller RAM, in external
SRAM or integrated into an external graphics controller.
The table below shows examples of the frame buffer sizes
required for some popular resolution and color depths.
■ PIC24 “DA” family supports up to 96 KB on chip
■ PIC32 MCUs support up to 128 KB on chip
■ External SRAM can be used for larger frame buffers
■ For advanced graphics, external graphics controllers
have additional frame buffer storage
Microchip offers varying levels of solutions to drive
everything from simple monochrome LCDs to full color
WVGA user interfaces.
Graphics support includes the following approaches:
■ PIC24F “DA” integrated graphics controller
■ PIC32 controllerless graphics
■ Support for PIC MCU with external graphics controllers
The silicon offering is complemented with powerful, free
and easy to use graphics library, display designer GUI
and hardware development kits with flexible interface to
various glass sizes.
FREE Microchip Graphics Library
The Microchip Graphics
Library is highly modular
and is optimized for
Microchip’s 16- and 32-bit
microcontrollers. It is easy
to use and has an open
documented interface for driver or controller support. The
library supports the following features:
■ Pre-made graphics objects
■ Multiple fonts and languages
■ User interface for mTouch™ sensing
■ Includes buttons, charts, check boxes, scroll bars, list
boxes, images and basic animation
Display Controller Solutions: Graphical Displays
www.microchip.com/graphics
Display Resolution
Typical Sizes
Color Depth/
Memory Requirement in (bytes)
1 bpp
(Mono)
2 bpp
(4 shades)
4 bpp
(16 shades)
8 bpp
(256 colors)
16 bpp
(65K colors)
WVGA 800×480 7" 48,000 96,000 192,000 384,000 768,000
VGA 640×480 5.7" 38,400 76,800 153,600 307,200 614,400
WQVGA 480×272 4.3" 16,320 32,640 65,280 130,560 261,120
QVGA 320×240 3.2" 9,600 19,200 38,400 76,800 153,600
Common for OLED 128×64 1" –2.7" 1,024 2,048 4,096 8,192 16,384
Internal PIC® MCU SRAM External SRAM