Help identify lcd display on Smoothwall SWG700 [Edit: Portwell EZIO]

stephenw10

My interest was toggled.

Still no way to make it work with lcdproc but I did find a couple of new pieces of information that at least allowed me to confirm the screen operating.

Firstly the rs232 module operates at a blistering 2400bps! So to talk to it we need to set the com port to that speed. Usually that would be handled by whatever application is talking to the module but to do it from the command line we need to setting to stick so:

[2.4.0-BETA][root@s4.stevew.lan]/root: stty -f /dev/cuau1.init speed 2400

It reports 9600 but it has set correctly as you can confirm by:

[2.4.0-BETA][root@s4.stevew.lan]/root: stty -f /dev/cuau1
speed 2400 baud;
lflags: echoe echoke echoctl
oflags: tab0
cflags: cs8 -parenb clocal

Obviously that's assuming the LCD is on com2 which most are because the console is on com1.

Then you need to initialise the module with some hex codes. It will accept ascii directly after that but you need hex to clear the screen, move the cursor etc.

[2.4.0-BETA][root@s4.stevew.lan]/root: cat pfsense.hex > /dev/cuau1

If you see anything on the display that confirms it's type.

Steve

pfsense.hex.txt

uknownme123

Will try this and report back.

a_null

It does look like one of the EZIO devices. Here's what I have for them:

EZIO 100 Info
http://www.graphicartsolutions.com/tech/EZIO-FINAL.PDF

EZIO 300 Info
http://www.graphicartsolutions.com/tech/EZIO-300.pdf

A hardware installation guide for one of the EZIO family devices
http://www.graphicartsolutions.com/tech/CAR_3000_EZIO_Installation.pdf

Hope it helps.

advnetops

Hi

This is exactly the same issue I am having.. I have a few Caswell CAR-3000 applicances running pfSense and I'm trying to get the EZIO 300 LCD working. I managed to tes the display out by sending hex to COM2 in DOS using:

serialsend.exe /baudrare 2400 /devnum 2 /hex "\xfe\x28\xfe\x28\xfe\x01TEXTLINE01\xfe\xaaTEXTLINE02"

Just trying to do that in FreeBSD. It looks to me like it's on /dev/cuau1 but no joy sending like this:

echo -e "\xfe\x28\xfe\x28\xfe\x01TEXTLINE01\xfe\xaaTEXTLINE02" > /dev/cuau1

Did the "pfsense.hex" posted previously work? (I can't check right now as I am not at the device but keen to do so). Hopefully someone can put me out of my misery as its driving me mad :D

advnetops

I was kindly sent this from Portwell support which I thought I'd share so hopefully it takes us closer to solving it.

I can't compile on pfSense as there's no cc or gcc and couldn't get it installed so I compiled on a virtual box and copied across but I got an strange error when running it (I am assuming some dependency not installed on pfSense).

I am not worried about updating the display in realtime, just once on boot so I figured I could call this vaia script on boot - anythign to get rid of "**" which the LCD shows at present

Hope it helps

ezio-freebsd.c.txt

advnetops

I can confirm Stephen's hex file works :)

pfsense.JPG_thumb

stephenw10

:)

The FreeBSD echo command doesn't parse those escape sequences so you can't send hex directly like that unfortunately. Took me a while to realise that.

I was looking at the various lcdprodc drivers to see what might be closest to use as a base. The thing that looks closest is the serialVFD driver but it has no button support which is unfortunate.

It's somewhat beyond my coding skills though.

Steve

stephenw10

Ha, just read your other thread. fmertz, who rewrote the sdec driver, is completely right. Just use the mtc_s16209x driver for maximum win!

I'm sure I tried that before but probably had the wrong baud rate.

Buttons don't work. Heartbeat appears incorrectly. Backlight control not functioning as expected. Scope for improvement… ;)

Steve

eziolcd1.jpg_thumb

a_null

I don't think the EZIO devices offer any backlight control.

stephenw10

Yes I believe you're right. Or at least it's not documented if the backlight/contrast are controllable.

The mtc_s16209xdriver is not perfect. In fact when you compare the command sequences it uses vs the documented EZIO comamnds it's hard to see how it works at all.

It does not initialise the display correctly. You need to send that string yourself other wise the display will not respond after a power cycle. Not a reboot where the display remains powered. I just kept the shellcmds detailed above to do that.

The 'beginning of line' values are wrong which means everything is offset to the right by one character which screws the heartbeat icon.

There is no function to read the keypad though it seems like it could be added relatively painlessly.

Steve

fmertz

@stephenw10:

The mtc_s16209xdriver is not perfect.

If there is a sense that there are at least a few of these devices out there, let me know if there is any interest in getting this driver updated (or a new one created) to work as per the spec.

stephenw10

Oh I'm sure there are more than a few and there would be a number of users for a real, more complete driver here.

The EZIO is the standard display used by Portwell (who are also Caswell?). They are the OEM supplier for a number of other manufacturers.

There seem to be several versions, 100, 300 etc but I believe they are backward compatible. The instruction set seems to be the same.

Thanks.

Steve

fmertz

Hmm, after taking a look at some of the upstream lcdproc driver code, how about the lb216 driver? The code seem to match with the published EZIO spec just about perfectly.

2 issues:

A backlight is supported by this lb216 driver. Best case, the command is ignored by the EZIO device, or we discover there is a controllable backlight!
There is no code for the keypad

Also, the defaults are "wrong" for the EZIO device, but are configurable:

"Speed=2400" and "Device=/dev/…" have to be added to the config file.

If anyone has a chance to test this out, let me know.

stephenw10

Ooo nice catch.

It works better. The text lines up correctly so I assume it's setting start position right.

The backlight, contrast and brightness settings do nothing.

However the screen is not initialised from power off. I still have to send the hexfile at it with the start sequence in it:

FE 28 FE 28

After that lcdproc kicks in

Steve

fmertz

So, if I was to make a code change to this existing lb216 driver, we would need a way to instruct the driver to behave either as it was coded before for the lb216, or as an EZIO device. The "obvious" way is to put a new line in the configuration file, like "Variant=EZIO". If we do this however, there would be no easy way for the existing pfSense lcdproc integration package to set it. So, question:

What would be a good parameter to use in the configuration file to nudge the driver to adopt the EZIO behavior, instead of the default lb216, with no code change to the pfSense lcdproc package?

"Speed" is not good because there are apparently some lb216 devices at 2400 bps already (as per the code), even if the default is 9600.
"Device" is not helping us because both would use the same "COM2" device.
What else can you think of (I have no pfSense instance running at the moment)?

Thanks.

stephenw10

Display size might be good to use. I trued some different values and they don't seem to actually affect the EZIO display at all. There are probably some options that don't actually exist as an lb216 device either.

However my preference would be for a separate driver. That would mean making changes to the lcdproc package to have it selectable but that's relatively easy.

Steve

fmertz

Finally got around to acquiring and setting up this EZIO device. Running off of my Debian Linux ARM NAS, with a Serial/USB adapter, a couple of yost adapters, and a rollover cable. Also has to borrow a motherboard-to-DB9 ribbon cable off of an old Nokia appliances. And to think this is not even that deep into the junk pile…

IMG_20170401_131126.jpg_thumb

stephenw10

Nice. ;D

Riftcore

@stephenw10:

Ha, just read your other thread. fmertz, who rewrote the sdec driver, is completely right. Just use the mtc_s16209x driver for maximum win!

I'm sure I tried that before but probably had the wrong baud rate.

Buttons don't work. Heartbeat appears incorrectly. Backlight control not functioning as expected. Scope for improvement… ;)

Steve

Hi Steven
Don't supose you could share a screen shot of your settings in lcdproc as I can't even get my one to start! lol

edit = got it to start but it still shows only two * on the screen.

fmertz

Problem is that none of the existing lcdproc drivers have the correct initialization sequence for this EZIO device, yet. So, FOR NOW the device has to be initialized "by hand". If you read this thread again, there is a short file that has to be sent to the display. The file has the right initialization string. After that, the lb216 driver can be used with some success.

Best of luck, keep us posted.

PS: I have offered to write a proper driver for these EZIO devices as the spec is available. Let us know if you can help with the effort, like testing prototypes along the way.