Another supplier has them (tft + esp32 + lot of peripherals and connectors) in yellow and we are busy developping software and hardware for them. Really nice boards for everyone to enjoy themselves.
Ralph, Many thanks for the video and github content. I really appreciate the lengths you go to in order to give us clarity e.g. the redacted TFT user setup header. As to the Elecrow product it's a real bonus to have ESP32, touch aware TFT display and micro CF holder in an all-in-one package; a tremendous starting block without the need for breadboards + tens of flying wires to modules. I've just spent a very happy afternoon planning a project and then learning various different bits.
For the last few weeks, I have been toying with the idea of getting one of these (ever since it came up in the UA-cam ads) to see whether it would be suitable for a project I am working on. So, thank you for your honest review Ralph. 👍Phil.
Glad I could help! You can download all the docs from them (and my GitHub) for each screen size first to help you decide too (see the comment above about the 5" version using I2S).
I should have waited until th end of the video because I searched for something like this in the past and wanted a 7 inches screen, so I went to the elecrow site and puchase the 7"... but I think it will be a challenge to make it to work now that I know it was not easy for you. Thank you for this one!
It will be easy enough if you use the TFT_eSPI library - works like a dream once you have the correct driver and pins specified (as per the video description, but your model might be different - check the schematic).
Greetings from the high plains of South Dakota! Got up this glorious morning, ate my bowl of shredded wheat, then put the coffee on to brew. Sat down in my old recliner that is surrounded by my sort of shop with tiny to large transistor radios all around, my soldering station on the computer desk that holds an old computer that i have not turned on now for years due to my love of laptops. The coffee maker did it's thing and gurgled to an end (now audible because of the great new hearing aides given me by the VA!) and I got out of my old chair, made my way to the kitchen avoiding stepping on my daughters 3 cats that live in our house with us and poured up my coffee in a stainless steel thermal coffee dispenser, a gift from my son last Christmas an returned to the recliner, but while I was up, my ring doorbell (an earlier gift from my kids!) told me, via Alexa View (Birthday gift from daughter) that someone was at my front door. So I sat down my coffee by my chair and got the mail. It was from Elecrow, it was this very device. I guess I had forgotten I ordered it, because when I got it open I began to search for where the hell I ordered it! Not Ebay, Not Amazon, well that is my regular supply source, but then I figured I must have seen someone do something with one some time ago and thought I needed one for some reason. A search brought me back to your video. Mystery SOLVED! Now to watch and see why I thought I had to have one because for the life of me I don't remember why. Must be old age or something, last May I hit 72, perhaps that's it. Thanks for the great videos, it is almost like having coffee with a buddy something I miss from my days in the coffee shops when I was a cop on the day watch.
I hope you enjoyed that coffee (with a virtual me) in your highly technological kitchen, Jerry. I, too, forget I have ordered stuff from Amazon or AliExpress for "research and development" purposes. Makes for an interesting life, right?
As you were talking about the placement of the sockets I was checking the board for my pet peeve on these screens. That little ribbon film cable for the touchscreen. This board seems to have done a decent job of tucking it tightly. Many others have it loose and if you tried to place the glass flush in a case you either have to leave a hole for it or risk ripping it off. These look great. When I use up my current supply, I will definitely be switching to this manufacturer. (And drooling over the larger displays)
Thanks. I was thinking about a low-power Raspi audioplayer with Toslink audio to my amplifier which get's it source from a DNLA capable NAS. This is the right tutorial to improve the usability of the stuff. 👍
Got charged 5% sales tax for South Dakota. I got the case, only problem the screws are a bit to long, need to trim or use washers to get a tight fit without cracking the case. I never cracked mine but from past experience I understand the need for torque control when using plastic cases. The case is made of very good plastic though, at least it appears to be, I like the smoked look, I used to replace all the domes on my RV'S with that type after surviving hail storms; we get a LOT of hail up in this country, this year though, no large hail; one year I had to replace the roof on my camper 2 times in the same season. The next hail the following year and my insurance company canceled me as a bad risk. Perhaps we have no hail this year as I sold my RV and no longer need to worry? Camping is just not the same without my loving wife of 51 years and 4 days, may she rest in peace.
Interesting that sales tax is more universally applied than I perhaps thought. Oh well, we can't escape them, that's for sure. My car got damaged once with a hailstorm whilst I was in Germany many years ago. Luckily I sold it "as is" so no downside for me!
The JST connectors are not just JST. The small ones are JST SH. Most common for hobbyists are the JST XH. Two more would be JST SM and JST VH. The VH ones are often used as heatbed connectors on 3D printers. But this listing is not complete. There is also a red type of JST connector used in small RC controlled cars and such and there are also very tiny, as well as even extremely tiny connectors used in laptops and phones to connect lipo batteries and such (I don't remember how they're called, but it's hard, or next to impossible to crimp at home).
And there I was, thinking that just having more than one connector type was overly complicated. The great thing about standards is that there are so many to choose from 😁 But thanks for this info. The JST connectors I have are of the XH type but I don't really like them because they are difficult to remove from the board. That's why I switched to KF2510 (friction fit) connectors instead.
@@RalphBacon thanks for the tip. I'll look into that. I guess the jst connectors are all made with them not needed to remove very often and to simplify connecting different electronics within an enclosure
That seems a neat product. If it had more IO broken out, it could be quite usefull. A screen with ESP32 is always a good starting point for many nice projects.
It looks like they're using SPI for that display, hence the speed. If you use 8bit or 16bit parallel you can hit over 30fps with very little CPU overhead on one core.
Yes, SPI is being used. But we can increase the frequency of the SPI bus to 1MHz I believe so speed should not really be an issue... but obviously is, so they might be running at 100 KHz.
@@RalphBacon The ESP32 can run the SPI bus at 80Mhz, but those displays start glitching just over 20Mhz (I've used them a lot in projects), so that limits the performance using SPI. With parallel the issue disappears, but obviously costs GPIO pins. Depending on the resolution of the display even 20Mhz is not going to result in a high framerate. Obviously you can just use the hardware window mode to update only blocks of the display that change, and it's possible to do smooth vertical scrolling using the hardware registers, but when the libraries do full screen updates, like LVGL, it really starts to "ripple" 😁
Correct. The CYD is effectively a (touch) screen attached to an ESP32 with all the connections made for you. Doesn't give you (m)any GPIO pins to play with, so treat as a self contained display module!
Hi Ralph, Good to hear that the infrequency (is that a word?) of your videos is due to work load and not health related issues, but I do personally miss your more regular postings. Like you, I have your Web Radio as a pretty constant companion while I potter away here in the shed. It would be good if an updated version could be got to work on the Electro ESP32/TFT board. Time to study your github #269 I think.
I'd like to get this working for my Web Radio; I just need some time to investigate which pins are available so I can route the [mp3] output to the VS1053 decoder that I use in that project (as well as sharing the SPI pins).
As far as the edge, the plug they furnished is nearly flush however the wires do stick out. I think you have a point as to how the plug should fit. I do love the little guy but it is a bit spendy for me as well.
Nice looking screen Ralph, personally I would be grateful for some vids on the I2S and other Audio possibilities despite the 8 bit limitation...cheers !
My current project is going to use a separate (very tiny) I2S board that works with the ESP32 for better quality... we shall see in due course. But I will also see what the two I2S channels on here can do maybe, too.
What sort of "setup" were you hoping for? Devil's in the detail, right? I've listed the TFT pins that I found critical but I have the others too. It's a standard ESP32 using both HSPI and VSPI for the TFT screen and SD card respectively plus breakout out a few others. Let me know what you need!
@@RalphBacon As someone who'd never used ESP32s before, I needed to know how to incorporate it into the IDE. However, I managed to find the info elsewhere.
I'm glad you found the information, as this video was not an introduction to the ESP32 (as you found out). I hope you are blown away by the sheer speed of the ESP32, not to mention the in-built Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. So very different from the old Arduino UNO.
Hi. Very impressed with your channel. Re TFT physical limitations. Perhaps the manufacturer could stand the headers up on the back so case size would not be an issue. Yes it would increase the depth but better than increasing the x,y size. Just a thought. Keep up the good work. Regards.
Don't we have mp3 decode to I2S in a library for the ESP32 instead of using a hardware decoder? I knew your old project uses a hardware decoder. In the US we don't have VAT.
You don't have VAT but many states have Sales Tax, right? I'm not sure an MP3 decoder in software is going to work that well, hence the hardware solution, but if you find a library you can give it a try. Hardware always works more quickly, more reliably and sometimes more cheaply than software!
yer cool video. i like that very compact, as you say i think the sockets should be moved but yes i will get one in time i could find some uses for that :)
@@RalphBacon yes. I have a few different displays and TFT_eSPI has no trouble with any of them. Looking forward to your i2s vid. I've used it as a plain ADC but not for sound. Worked great on its own but didn't seem to play well with my code when I put it all together. I'm sure it was my code that was the issue. It's constantly running timer0 and timer1 with external interrupts and several pin state changes. Never did figure out why. Oh well
That board is just a panelised board of mine, I can't remember how many fit into 100x100mm but it should not be _that_ much more, surely? Either you can panelise it, or PCBWay can do it for you. Try both ways, see which one works out least expensive?
OH just for shits and giggles, I went to Elecrow and I see they have the 7 inch on sale for around 24 bucks US, so I ordered one, got he case as well ended up about 42 bucks with their shipping and my 5% sales tax. Still not a bad price for a framed 7 inch programable screen!
Hi Ralph. I'm quite fancying one of these - but perhaps a 5” screen as I have a project for it. However I would need to add 2x rotary encoders and am not sure if there would enough pins available. The I /o sockets seem to only have for. Have you found out if it’s possible to access any more Gpio pins?
Unfortunately I could not get access to any further pins than what you see on the sockets. However, I understand the 5" version has more pins broken out, worth looking at on their website. Or use the screen without all the other stuff and just add your own ESP32 (as I did for my Web Radio). For a rotary encoder you would normally need 2 pins assuming you are only detecting one rising/falling edge via an interrupt and then reading the state of the other pin using a standard GPIO digitalRead to determine rotation direction?
Hi Ralph. I was wondering if you had the link to download the LVGL files for Arduino to test the screen. Finding it hard to download the correct files to be able to upload my own code to construct my own graphics. In addition, if I have a stepper motor (+ driver) acting as an output from this screen, which ports on the touch screen would need to be used to plug into the driver/ or arduino? Would appreciate any help!! (student struggling!)
I didn't use the LVGL library to test this screen; if you really want to go down that route (not for the fainthearted) you can download the library from their website, I believe. Personally, I would use the better known TFT_eSPI-x.x.xx library (where xxxxxx is the version number, I used an old version 2.2.23); I think these days the version is no longer included in the name, just as well! I also noticed that RandomNerd did a tutorial on a very similar (possibly exact) screen: bit.ly/4cxb1lK but you might have to check that the same SPI pins are being used by both Elecrow and Random Nerd (aka Rui).
And there's some info on my GitHub for this video, you did check that out already, right? github.com/RalphBacon/269-Elecrow-3.5-TFT-with-ESP32-built-in
Watching this with the 7 inch in hand, in the case and I note that the crow plug inserted, the plug itself is below the case, only the wires protrude so I guess if a fellow could find a 90 degree plug the wires could point down instead of out but would still be a problem, sort of.
Not easily, as I discovered. The problem is that the HSPI lines are not brought out anywhere. You could solder very small wires directly to the relevant pads on the ESP32 (bottom left corner area) and secure them to a pin header or some sort of socket, but it's not ideal. Do-able for the more experienced solderer but not beginners!
Just rip the connectors off the board(desolder em, not grab and jank) and make your own adapter board... if the kables are in the way... This should be possible by anyone getting this kind of thing.... :)
You sure the bad scrolling isn't a software problem? Ignoring all the incompatible parts and just going by the min requirements for chip speed, what version of Windows should an ESP32 be able to run? :D What is the max mem on an ESP32? 16Mb flash, 8mb psRAM, plus SD cards are faster than hdd. Windows 98 needed 16/24MB. Wouldn't the same be true for smartphones from a few years ago?(ESP32 being faster than them) Seems like simple web pages without video should be able to be quite snappy. You sure the drivers aren't doing something like redrawing the whole screen instead of using vertical scroll and just adding the new lines and other similar things?
I can't answer any of those sensible queries, but you could be right on all counts. 😏 To scroll up, it should move everything up by a pixel in the buffer and add in the bottom most pixel row then redisplay the buffer. But who knows what that library does without wading in. If Elecrow wrote the demo code (I can't find the source) using the LGVL library I can only assume they knew what they were doing. Perhaps they (or LVGL) should release it?
I too feel that it is a shame that the connectors are around the edge of the board and face outwards. As for needing to press the buttons after uploading code, that makes using the board in a real project impossible
Your last point is very relevant; I hope Elecrow respond because attempting to upload code via the USB but having to press buttons now buried inside an enclosure would be awkward, to say the least. Uploading code Over The Air (as I do with many of my projects) is also problematic, inasmuch that I would have to then switch the device off and back on to get it to reset (unless the reset after an OTA update works, I haven't tried it). It's a workaround but very unnecessary.
Hey Ralph, I think lvgl should work. I got a little bit of a different setup, but Arduino reguires me to change the root folder in the "preferences" of arduino to the one where the examples are stored. Then it will find the libraries that are delivered with the product. Because lvgl and TFT espi are so configurable, you really need to change the settings per project. So I guess these libraries are stored with the specific project.
In the Arduino IDE environment the library is (usually) global, a "feature" I hate. Visual Studio Code / PlatformIO allows you to take a copy of the library per project if you want and make whatever changes you want which will never be overwritten or updated. In the latter case you don't get bug fixes or new features but the project which used that version of the library is now finished, right? Enhancements to the (new) project could use the new library.
@@RalphBacon I just learned about Arduino and the global setting. I agree on the hate. Problem with tftespi and lvgl library is that you have to edit some settings in the configuration file for the specific hardware and connections that you are using. I think that if you were to update a shared library, that the settings will be lost. Similar that if you start a new project with a slightly different hardware setup, you might also need to edit this. All in all, lvgl is not a smooth ride for me. But I made it work at least once.
The "trick" is to keep the UserSettings.ini file safe so that if it is overwritten by an upgrade, you can just reinstall that single file and it should "just work" again. Or, do what I do in VSC / PlatformIO and keep the library in the lib folder where it is frozen in time, never to be upgraded again (for that project).
Ralph just happened across your video on this board, great review, was wondering do you thank this would work to view a remote esp32 cam and control a set of smart relays, I was thanking of a set up to control my on demand water heater from different locations in my house, esp32 camera to see the screen and then relays to change the temperature. Thanks
You are talking about HDMI signal processing - not something an ESP32 is going to be very good at I shouldn't think otherwise we would be seeing lots of tiny TVs and PC Monitors springing up. Now I know you can get the ESP32-CAM module that _sends out_ a camera signal (not sure of the protocol used) but I've not seen one that can process one (they are called monitors). Perhaps others have more info on this?
@@RalphBacon I have an esp32 with cam module. It can display resolutions from QQVGA (160 by 120) up to UXGA (1600 by 1200). I can get decent still pix on all resolutions but video only on the lowest. CIF (400 by 296) and down does allow video. He may be able to get low res pix on that display. I get my pix over wifi, never tried connecting a display or laptop directly.
The 5" version actually has better I2S functionality and has a bunch more onboard components. I wonder what PCB way thinks about you playing on Easyeda lol
Drat, I should have gone for the 5" version! Regarding the CAD package I use, well it's a fact of life (something I tried to explain to them) but I don't exactly throw it in anyone's face which package I use.
I often need to manually put ESP boards into boot mode before flashing. I've also noticed that I have some ESP32 dev boards that stay in boot mode after being reset by platformIO after flashing. I don't recall if this is something that changed with a recent PlatformIO update or not.
Thanks for the info! Since I started fitting that cap on the RST pin I've not had an issue with getting into boot mode automatically nor resetting afterward. But this board has that cap so I'm not sure what would cause this issue here.
@@RalphBacon I've had success with a capacitor between EN and GND as well and now that I've looked at the schematic, they have the equivalent of a 10.2uF capacitor to GND installed in addition to a 10K ohm pullup resistor tied to 3.3V. They seemed to be careful to "tune" the capacitor value (using 3 capacitors), so I assume they are trying to achieve very specific timing here.
Indeed, but 10μF seems a lot, I've always used 1-2μF with complete success. Perhaps I'll desolder their caps and just leave the low value one in place, see what happens!
Regarding Aliexpress and VAT yes they do charge the seller the Vat , but it is funny on the declaration on the package that is sent the item has got much cheaper so less tax, I could be wrong of course 🙂
If the HMRC every knocked at my door (figuratively speaking) saying I owe tax on anything shipped from China I would be very firmly pointing them in the direction of the invoice that includes it!
I'm sure the majority of sellers are passing it on (I think AliExpress controls all the finances and just passes the cost of the product to the seller, and gives the VAT to the UK/EU). But there are alleged known VAT scams operating from the Far East where UK addresses are being used to "register" a business so they can claim back the VAT (or something along those lines). But thankfully few and far between.
Ralph: My home made home automation system is web based. Have an arduino mega serving up the web site via ethernet card and cable to router. To control the system (turn lights on/off, set timers, monitor furnace, etc) I must log on using a laptop or pc or ipad. I was thinking that having some of these in major rooms(living room, bedroom) that were always on and logged to the website would be more convenient than using a computer. My html code is very simple, no graphics just text and click boxes. Do you think something like this could fit that role? Have you tried going to a website other than the samples provided by the manufacturer?
If you need a browser to control your home automation then this is not the solution. You say you use a laptop or PC so I'm guessing that's the case (your phone would work too). But you could use a RasPi (one of the older ones would work too as you're only using a browser). That all said, if all you want to do is format some simple HTML strings you could do that (with a bit of work) - after all, my ESP32 units all send out and reply using HTML, but it's simple stuff using GET commands, mostly. I have to parse some of the HTML's JSON in more sophisticated scenarios but there is a library for that. You could _emulate_ a simple web page, it just seems quite a lot of work to me (but look at my Pond Controller video, I show the HTML etc that I send out to the phone - you probably want to do it the other way round).
@@RalphBacon Thanks Ralph. Yes the phone works for accessing my system, but it is usually in another room on a charger. But that gives me another idea....my old phones that no longer have cell service can still access my wifi and therefore my automation system.
The handy thing about lvgl is the GUI builder for prototyping a gui on the lappy. I just switched to using it for my last project and my GUI is next level. It is very low level so no overhead. The code generated is much the same as I would write myself. If I run lvgl on top of the high performance espi library it scrolls very fast. I am not sure why this screen is so crappy. Maybe it is i2c and not spi?
The screen is deffo connected to the SPI lines (I got it working doing just that). But why it is so (relatively) slow is a mystery to me. When I say slow, I mean in that demo. It seemed just fine in all other sketches I threw at it (using the TFT_eSPI library).
ps, I am using Arduino_ESP32SPI with Arduino_GFX and doing an lvl_disp_flush with those and the screen scrolls amazingly well, but the ttgo is only 135x240 so maybe it is faster due to the much smaller display.
Hello Ralph, I have the same board with the ESP32-Wrover-B micro, which I choose becouse my current project is based on the TTGO T7 V1.3 ESP32-Wrover Mini micro. I intend to replace the 16x2 LCD display wtih this TFT 3.5" Touch Screen & ESP32-Wrover-B micro to display an off-line png tile map and two pairs of GPS coordinates to track our travels on the many off road trails (attacned - Tupperware 2.0.MOV). So far, I have been successful in passing two pairs of GPS coordingates from the T7 to the Display as verified by the Serial Monitor; now working on how to open the SD card's map to display both positions. Any assistance, suggestions or knowledgeble sources/references would be much appreciated.
I just found an excellent resource down below, Rui & Sara with Random Nerd Tutorials! I have been working with them for a while, this was a Gold Mine of a find, thank you for the reference!!!!
Wow! Why is the screen update rate so awful slow?! 😮 I consider this as unusable for programs which needs a quick update (e.g. Games). Ralph, do you know how the Display is connected to the ESP? SPI or via 8 bit parallel Interface. The latter would be much better for performance sakes but occupies more IO pins from the ESP… I suppose that they decided for SPI due to save IO pins though…
I think it's just the software they used; I've seen other demos where the fresh rate was very good. I can't tell how the screen is connected but there are more than 4 SPI wires going into that screen for sure, so maybe they do connect it 8-bit parallel?
AliExpress only adds VAT on order up to £130, any order over that they charge no VAT at all. You are meant to pay it locally to the courier but the last few times I've never had a request. Prices for small Chinese goods have gone up for a few reasons: -I believe the Chinese government used to subsidise the shipments years ago. -China Post used to pay much lower rates to overseas post offices, Donald Trump intervened due to loses at USPS -VAT has put the prices up
The third point you list has put up prices by 20%. And, unlike UK web sites, all the AliExpress prices are shown _pre-VAT_ so you get a nice "surprise" at the checkout. Joy.
They could have a button (like the UK websites selling to both trade and individuals) whether to show VAT-inclusive prices or not. After all, they know exactly the rate of VAT for each of their targets, otherwise they wouldn't charge the right amount at the checkout. Am I right?
@@RalphBacon not really: I might use the same account to buy goods and use different destination addresses: one in EU/UK and one in UA - you can know the final VAT/no-VAT when you are about to pay and you already told them where to send it
The point is that (a) we are now forced to pay VAT on low-value Chinese goods that we never paid before and (b) the website advertises an artificially low price (ex-VAT) that lures customers in. It's the reason why UK websites MUST include VAT prices for non-business users. After all, £10 is a good price, £12 (incl VAT) might be the same as Amazon! £100 must be a bargain, £120 not so much. And the Chinese government doesn't seem to be subsidising the shipping any more (not to the same extent anyway) so that's another kick up the proverbial for use hobbyists!
Ralph, I am very interested in working with ESP32/TFT ILI9488 combo board from Elecrow. Have you or aware of others who have configured the onboard ESP32 micro to display real-time live GPS coordinate positions to an off-line map downloaded on board?
You mean like a James Bond-style car-tracking device? If so, this may be more complex than you think as I was once involved with maps and routing in my day job and it was quite complex to do. For starters, the map you speak of has to be supplied by someone (at cost) and you have to know how to get the longitude and latitude displayed correctly. Even Google Maps is not free for this sort of project, but can be done without too much trouble. The ESP32 (or whatever device) can use a GPS (Ublox) device that sends very accurate GPS coordinates and I did a video on that a long time ago, video #70, I believe?
@@RalphBacon would an off-line map rendered as jpeg, png, etc. be applicible; as I am attempting do such with my ESP32-Wrover-B display as noted in my comment above?
I've not published that design yet (because we haven't looked at it properly and I'm designing my first project with it). But if you can use an EasyEDA project I can send you the files?
its a shame the SPI pins are not exposed on a connector as that would make connecing SPI peripherals easier i am looking to make a dab and internet radio and would look to use the VS1053 mp3 decoder and the Si4688 dab ic bith of these require SPI communication
I just posted something regarding SUNTON displays as rather nice alternative - not only do those expose more GPIOs but also the SPI bus... maybe you wanna look into those 🙂
No, no, quite a sensible observation. I too looked for other GPIO pins (so I could connect my MP3 decoder up for the Web Radio project) but could not find many that were not exposed via those sockets. I wonder if they are just "not connected". As you say, we should both look at the schematic!
I have designed very similar board to be used with SPI display and display took only 8 GPIOs (touch of course, and that includes backlight GPIO). All remaining are free to use
Indeed, the same as my ESP32 Web Radio and I controlled the backlight with a PWM. But I need 4 lines (I think) for the mp3 decoder (although some might be SPI lines).
Looks like most of the GPIO pins are allocated to the display and the connectors, but GPIO 17 to 22 are not used, the pads are on the PCB but do not go anywhere. With careful soldering you could connect these to your hardware.
Regarding the board-reset-after-code-upload problem (ua-cam.com/video/EMpF5-0YeSM/v-deo.html). From the schematic, the design omitted the "auto-restart" circuitry so, yes, unfortunately the manual reset-boot sequence is required. For the sake of a couple of cheap transistors and resistors, they could have greatly improved the user experience-especially for beginners who would find the two button finger dance confusing. Thanks for another superb video!
That's a shame, and I hope Elecrow take note of this annoying deficiency in their design. A case of spoiling the ship for a halfpenth of tar! (Old UK proverb)
@@RalphBaconand @xylopyrographer9664, for those you do not like that "two button finger dance": Do you have any recommendation for an alternative display with similar size and with touch functionality that can be used together with an ESP32? I know there are quite some other displays available, but I am just a beginner and thus would appreciare your advice.
Is there a way to connect to a 3.5" AMOLED screen? Like done in the following video with a smaller AMOLED screen: ua-cam.com/video/FuD-QmKn1uo/v-deo.html
Well, the library used in that video is the one I eventually used in the demo (and is what I use for my ESP32 Web Radio project). So you could connect any ESP32 device (including one from Elecrow) to an AMOLED screen like he shows. Whether Elecrow sell such a screen I don't know but I'm sure their website will have details if they do.
I recall when they started the tax crap, it was at the demand of our governments since they thought they were loosing to much tax revenue to the Chinese. They demanded the Chinese set this up and take our hard earned cash. I would guess the businesses were complaining as well that much of the money we spend in China is not going their way. @@RalphBacon
Nice review. Interesting board. It would have been nice with stronger ESP32 and more GPIO pin´s but I think it would be great for most constructions. Changed your name you said,seems you spend some long hours with photoshop too. No App is that good. 😂😂 You can easily dampening you printer, but a box over it foam or fabric inside or just put it on another table. Now just a thought, nothing political - Of course you have to pay taxes and VAT like everyone else. You can buy it all in UK (probably import from china) and thereby support your country but if you insist (or just don´t care) you can keep on buying your stuff in china and help developing the country and support their government. Do not complain about VAT and taxes, we both live in one of the better places in the world, that cost.
Putting a soundproof (or, at least, sound dampening box over my printer isn't going to work for me, as there just isn't enough space on the bench top. But it's a valid idea, and if I were to get a "proper" enclosure, it would mean I could print some of the more "difficult" (aka warping) filaments too. Yes, I'm playing devil's advocate regarding the VAT we now have to pay for purchases outside of the EU. I fully understand the reasons, it's just that this was (very) small and overlooked concession (loophole?) that we hobbyists took advantage of in the past; no more, however.
I used the TFT_eSPI-2.2.23 for my Web Radio and this worked fine here, although it is a full blown library. It does have some easy examples, but in this case you do need to do some prep work to get it all set up correctly (resolution, chip type) which means reading and editing the included config files.
It's the UK government that force the seller to collect the VAT at source. It was hit and miss before, whether customs intercepted your package to collect the VAT. At least you now know what you're paying. I once bought a £20 camera, customs intercepted it charged the VAT about £4 then royal mail wanted a handling charge of about £15 marking it nearly twice as much.
it is NOT Aliexpress who is "guilty" that we need to pay the tax while buying - this law has been enforced by both: EU and UK. If the business exports goods to EU/UK this business has to pay VAT in the rate as if the goods were produced in the destination country. Above 150 Euro however, the payment obligation goes to the buyer.
Hmm. Funny how we (the UK) decided to keep _that_ particular EU law/directive alive since Brexit. And I wonder whether the UK Treasury is aware of how it affects small businesses and hobbyists (like you and me) - to the extent I rarely order from China these days as the prices are now comparable (and we get quicker delivery locally!) It just annoys me that this was quietly imposed.
@@RalphBacon actually it is not a problem for me as I always deduct this VAT from my VAT. And if I buy something > 150 Euro (GBP), there is no VAT invoice and I don't deduct. If Royal Mail is too good and pays VAT on behalf of me, then I get an invoice and I deduct from my VAT. If not then there is no issue. But for the people who have no business or no VAT registered, it is extra 20% to the price - in such case sometimes it is cheaper (and in 99% faster) to buy on Amazon
Ralph - Indeed, we are now taxed on every purchase on the internet as well. While ours is not that high in my home state, it still is a pain in the rear, like all taxes. Seems to me we had a little fight with the UK over that some 245 years back indeed, if I remember my school learning properly, that fight was said to be about taxation without representation. Ah well, governments are now so big, and we have let them have so much power that it is easier to just pay the taxes and bitch to each other. Thank God we have a Supreme Court that told our would-be dictator with dementia where to go when he started the ministry of truth last year.
Hello Jerry, nice to see you here again! Hang on, you say we (the UK) had a fight with the USA? Probably you upstarts trying to be independent or something I should think 😁. But I agree that we just don't seem to be able to dodge taxes anywhere now. Drat and double drat.
Another supplier has them (tft + esp32 + lot of peripherals and connectors) in yellow and we are busy developping software and hardware for them. Really nice boards for everyone to enjoy themselves.
Thanks for the info!
Ralph, Many thanks for the video and github content. I really appreciate the lengths you go to in order to give us clarity e.g. the redacted TFT user setup header. As to the Elecrow product it's a real bonus to have ESP32, touch aware TFT display and micro CF holder in an all-in-one package; a tremendous starting block without the need for breadboards + tens of flying wires to modules. I've just spent a very happy afternoon planning a project and then learning various different bits.
Excellent! Sounds like you will have a busy time ahead of you.
For the last few weeks, I have been toying with the idea of getting one of these (ever since it came up in the UA-cam ads) to see whether it would be suitable for a project I am working on. So, thank you for your honest review Ralph. 👍Phil.
Glad I could help! You can download all the docs from them (and my GitHub) for each screen size first to help you decide too (see the comment above about the 5" version using I2S).
I should have waited until th end of the video because I searched for something like this in the past and wanted a 7 inches screen, so I went to the elecrow site and puchase the 7"... but I think it will be a challenge to make it to work now that I know it was not easy for you. Thank you for this one!
It will be easy enough if you use the TFT_eSPI library - works like a dream once you have the correct driver and pins specified (as per the video description, but your model might be different - check the schematic).
Greetings from the high plains of South Dakota! Got up this glorious morning, ate my bowl of shredded wheat, then put the coffee on to brew. Sat down in my old recliner that is surrounded by my sort of shop with tiny to large transistor radios all around, my soldering station on the computer desk that holds an old computer that i have not turned on now for years due to my love of laptops. The coffee maker did it's thing and gurgled to an end (now audible because of the great new hearing aides given me by the VA!) and I got out of my old chair, made my way to the kitchen avoiding stepping on my daughters 3 cats that live in our house with us and poured up my coffee in a stainless steel thermal coffee dispenser, a gift from my son last Christmas an returned to the recliner, but while I was up, my ring doorbell (an earlier gift from my kids!) told me, via Alexa View (Birthday gift from daughter) that someone was at my front door. So I sat down my coffee by my chair and got the mail. It was from Elecrow, it was this very device. I guess I had forgotten I ordered it, because when I got it open I began to search for where the hell I ordered it! Not Ebay, Not Amazon, well that is my regular supply source, but then I figured I must have seen someone do something with one some time ago and thought I needed one for some reason. A search brought me back to your video. Mystery SOLVED! Now to watch and see why I thought I had to have one because for the life of me I don't remember why. Must be old age or something, last May I hit 72, perhaps that's it.
Thanks for the great videos, it is almost like having coffee with a buddy something I miss from my days in the coffee shops when I was a cop on the day watch.
I hope you enjoyed that coffee (with a virtual me) in your highly technological kitchen, Jerry. I, too, forget I have ordered stuff from Amazon or AliExpress for "research and development" purposes. Makes for an interesting life, right?
As you were talking about the placement of the sockets I was checking the board for my pet peeve on these screens. That little ribbon film cable for the touchscreen. This board seems to have done a decent job of tucking it tightly. Many others have it loose and if you tried to place the glass flush in a case you either have to leave a hole for it or risk ripping it off. These look great. When I use up my current supply, I will definitely be switching to this manufacturer. (And drooling over the larger displays)
Drool away, I knew I should have requested the 5" display. 😁
A nice display/board and a very informative video. Thank you. (a new subscriber)
Great! thanks for watching.
Looks a good device, Thanks Ralph
It's certainly an interesting and neat device, I'm still deciphering the schematic.
@@RalphBacon Can you use the onther pins or do you have to use the plugs and sockets
You "have" to use the sockets for the I2C pins (21/22) and the PortD socket also exposes GPIO pins 25 & 32. It's all the others I'm searching for!
and welcome back, Ralph
And Thank You Trevor, hope things are going well for you.
Thanks. I was thinking about a low-power Raspi audioplayer with Toslink audio to my amplifier which get's it source from a DNLA capable NAS. This is the right tutorial to improve the usability of the stuff. 👍
Glad I could help!
Glad you are doing well, and a good video 🙂
Thank you! 😊
Great review... and of course I enjoyed it!
Thanks! I'm glad you enjoyed it 👍
I got the 7 inch this morning, very nice indeed, and of course got the frame. Now for some thing to build it into.....
I'm sure you will find something, Jerry!
Got charged 5% sales tax for South Dakota. I got the case, only problem the screws are a bit to long, need to trim or use washers to get a tight fit without cracking the case. I never cracked mine but from past experience I understand the need for torque control when using plastic cases. The case is made of very good plastic though, at least it appears to be, I like the smoked look, I used to replace all the domes on my RV'S with that type after surviving hail storms; we get a LOT of hail up in this country, this year though, no large hail; one year I had to replace the roof on my camper 2 times in the same season. The next hail the following year and my insurance company canceled me as a bad risk. Perhaps we have no hail this year as I sold my RV and no longer need to worry? Camping is just not the same without my loving wife of 51 years and 4 days, may she rest in peace.
Interesting that sales tax is more universally applied than I perhaps thought. Oh well, we can't escape them, that's for sure. My car got damaged once with a hailstorm whilst I was in Germany many years ago. Luckily I sold it "as is" so no downside for me!
The JST connectors are not just JST. The small ones are JST SH. Most common for hobbyists are the JST XH. Two more would be JST SM and JST VH. The VH ones are often used as heatbed connectors on 3D printers. But this listing is not complete. There is also a red type of JST connector used in small RC controlled cars and such and there are also very tiny, as well as even extremely tiny connectors used in laptops and phones to connect lipo batteries and such (I don't remember how they're called, but it's hard, or next to impossible to crimp at home).
And there I was, thinking that just having more than one connector type was overly complicated. The great thing about standards is that there are so many to choose from 😁
But thanks for this info. The JST connectors I have are of the XH type but I don't really like them because they are difficult to remove from the board. That's why I switched to KF2510 (friction fit) connectors instead.
@@RalphBacon thanks for the tip. I'll look into that. I guess the jst connectors are all made with them not needed to remove very often and to simplify connecting different electronics within an enclosure
That seems a neat product. If it had more IO broken out, it could be quite usefull. A screen with ESP32 is always a good starting point for many nice projects.
Yeah I agree! I will investigate where all the "other" pins have disappeared to. Or you can look at the schematic to find out before I get to it!
It looks like they're using SPI for that display, hence the speed. If you use 8bit or 16bit parallel you can hit over 30fps with very little CPU overhead on one core.
Yes, SPI is being used. But we can increase the frequency of the SPI bus to 1MHz I believe so speed should not really be an issue... but obviously is, so they might be running at 100 KHz.
@@RalphBacon The ESP32 can run the SPI bus at 80Mhz, but those displays start glitching just over 20Mhz (I've used them a lot in projects), so that limits the performance using SPI. With parallel the issue disappears, but obviously costs GPIO pins. Depending on the resolution of the display even 20Mhz is not going to result in a high framerate. Obviously you can just use the hardware window mode to update only blocks of the display that change, and it's possible to do smooth vertical scrolling using the hardware registers, but when the libraries do full screen updates, like LVGL, it really starts to "ripple" 😁
Thanks Ralph 😊
My pleasure!
Interesting board. I am dabbling in the somewhat popular "cheap yellow display', but i presume in essence there isnt much difference
Correct. The CYD is effectively a (touch) screen attached to an ESP32 with all the connections made for you. Doesn't give you (m)any GPIO pins to play with, so treat as a self contained display module!
Hi Ralph,
Good to hear that the infrequency (is that a word?) of your videos is due to work load and not health related issues, but I do personally miss your more regular postings.
Like you, I have your Web Radio as a pretty constant companion while I potter away here in the shed. It would be good if an updated version could be got to work on the Electro ESP32/TFT board. Time to study your github #269 I think.
I'd like to get this working for my Web Radio; I just need some time to investigate which pins are available so I can route the [mp3] output to the VS1053 decoder that I use in that project (as well as sharing the SPI pins).
As far as the edge, the plug they furnished is nearly flush however the wires do stick out. I think you have a point as to how the plug should fit. I do love the little guy but it is a bit spendy for me as well.
Thanks for sharing!
it works .. but you have to put the VCC on 5v , not 3.3v as shown on your diagram ;)
Hmm... good to know!
Nice looking screen Ralph, personally I would be grateful for some vids on the I2S and other Audio possibilities despite the 8 bit limitation...cheers !
My current project is going to use a separate (very tiny) I2S board that works with the ESP32 for better quality... we shall see in due course. But I will also see what the two I2S channels on here can do maybe, too.
@@RalphBacon Nice :)
Was really hoping for a setup tutorial for the Elecrow board...
What sort of "setup" were you hoping for? Devil's in the detail, right?
I've listed the TFT pins that I found critical but I have the others too. It's a standard ESP32 using both HSPI and VSPI for the TFT screen and SD card respectively plus breakout out a few others.
Let me know what you need!
@@RalphBacon As someone who'd never used ESP32s before, I needed to know how to incorporate it into the IDE.
However, I managed to find the info elsewhere.
I'm glad you found the information, as this video was not an introduction to the ESP32 (as you found out).
I hope you are blown away by the sheer speed of the ESP32, not to mention the in-built Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. So very different from the old Arduino UNO.
Hi. Very impressed with your channel. Re TFT physical limitations. Perhaps the manufacturer could stand the headers up on the back so case size would not be an issue. Yes it would increase the depth but better than increasing the x,y size. Just a thought. Keep up the good work. Regards.
Great point!
Don't we have mp3 decode to I2S in a library for the ESP32 instead of using a hardware decoder? I knew your old project uses a hardware decoder. In the US we don't have VAT.
You don't have VAT but many states have Sales Tax, right? I'm not sure an MP3 decoder in software is going to work that well, hence the hardware solution, but if you find a library you can give it a try. Hardware always works more quickly, more reliably and sometimes more cheaply than software!
yer cool video. i like that very compact, as you say i think the sockets should be moved but yes i will get one in time i could find some uses for that :)
Thanks for watching! I want to use it too for an upcoming project.
I always use the TFT_eSPI library. It's great!
Me too. Once you have understood it's trying to be all things to all screens, you just have to uncomment and/or add in the relevant pin names etc.
@@RalphBacon yes. I have a few different displays and TFT_eSPI has no trouble with any of them.
Looking forward to your i2s vid. I've used it as a plain ADC but not for sound. Worked great on its own but didn't seem to play well with my code when I put it all together. I'm sure it was my code that was the issue. It's constantly running timer0 and timer1 with external interrupts and several pin state changes.
Never did figure out why. Oh well
board at 1:10 is tons more than $5, I was gonna order one.
That board is just a panelised board of mine, I can't remember how many fit into 100x100mm but it should not be _that_ much more, surely? Either you can panelise it, or PCBWay can do it for you. Try both ways, see which one works out least expensive?
OH just for shits and giggles, I went to Elecrow and I see they have the 7 inch on sale for around 24 bucks US, so I ordered one, got he case as well ended up about 42 bucks with their shipping and my 5% sales tax. Still not a bad price for a framed 7 inch programable screen!
Yes, I will be using mine in a future project, ear-marked already!
Looks like a nice display board - I understand your comment about the connectors, but I think you can get right angle Grove and JSTs - can't you?
Pretty sure you must be able to, but these "Crow" connectors are new to me; no idea where to get the connectors ATM.
Hi Ralph. I'm quite fancying one of these - but perhaps a 5” screen as I have a project for it. However I would need to add 2x rotary encoders and am not sure if there would enough pins available. The I /o sockets seem to only have for. Have you found out if it’s possible to access any more Gpio pins?
Unfortunately I could not get access to any further pins than what you see on the sockets.
However, I understand the 5" version has more pins broken out, worth looking at on their website. Or use the screen without all the other stuff and just add your own ESP32 (as I did for my Web Radio).
For a rotary encoder you would normally need 2 pins assuming you are only detecting one rising/falling edge via an interrupt and then reading the state of the other pin using a standard GPIO digitalRead to determine rotation direction?
Hi Ralph. I was wondering if you had the link to download the LVGL files for Arduino to test the screen. Finding it hard to download the correct files to be able to upload my own code to construct my own graphics. In addition, if I have a stepper motor (+ driver) acting as an output from this screen, which ports on the touch screen would need to be used to plug into the driver/ or arduino? Would appreciate any help!! (student struggling!)
Sorry and if you could post the link to the 16 Learning lessons if you still have access to it as it is not on their website
I didn't use the LVGL library to test this screen; if you really want to go down that route (not for the fainthearted) you can download the library from their website, I believe.
Personally, I would use the better known TFT_eSPI-x.x.xx library (where xxxxxx is the version number, I used an old version 2.2.23); I think these days the version is no longer included in the name, just as well!
I also noticed that RandomNerd did a tutorial on a very similar (possibly exact) screen: bit.ly/4cxb1lK but you might have to check that the same SPI pins are being used by both Elecrow and Random Nerd (aka Rui).
And there's some info on my GitHub for this video, you did check that out already, right?
github.com/RalphBacon/269-Elecrow-3.5-TFT-with-ESP32-built-in
Watching this with the 7 inch in hand, in the case and I note that the crow plug inserted, the plug itself is below the case, only the wires protrude so I guess if a fellow could find a 90 degree plug the wires could point down instead of out but would still be a problem, sort of.
Or, as someone suggested, replace the sockets with others (if the pin spacing is compatible). 😮
That could work.@@RalphBacon
Interesting dev board and the price is not that bad.
The price was very reasonable IMHO, I was expecting a higher price (in which case I would not have decided to review it). And it's on offer right now.
Would you be able to connect a vs1053 for better audio ? As have a few sat in my parts kit
Not easily, as I discovered.
The problem is that the HSPI lines are not brought out anywhere. You could solder very small wires directly to the relevant pads on the ESP32 (bottom left corner area) and secure them to a pin header or some sort of socket, but it's not ideal. Do-able for the more experienced solderer but not beginners!
Just rip the connectors off the board(desolder em, not grab and jank) and make your own adapter board... if the kables are in the way... This should be possible by anyone getting this kind of thing.... :)
Yes, that is certainly a possibility, done carefully!
You sure the bad scrolling isn't a software problem?
Ignoring all the incompatible parts and just going by the min requirements for chip speed, what version of Windows should an ESP32 be able to run? :D
What is the max mem on an ESP32? 16Mb flash, 8mb psRAM, plus SD cards are faster than hdd. Windows 98 needed 16/24MB.
Wouldn't the same be true for smartphones from a few years ago?(ESP32 being faster than them)
Seems like simple web pages without video should be able to be quite snappy. You sure the drivers aren't doing something like redrawing the whole screen instead of using vertical scroll and just adding the new lines and other similar things?
I can't answer any of those sensible queries, but you could be right on all counts. 😏
To scroll up, it should move everything up by a pixel in the buffer and add in the bottom most pixel row then redisplay the buffer. But who knows what that library does without wading in.
If Elecrow wrote the demo code (I can't find the source) using the LGVL library I can only assume they knew what they were doing. Perhaps they (or LVGL) should release it?
I too feel that it is a shame that the connectors are around the edge of the board and face outwards.
As for needing to press the buttons after uploading code, that makes using the board in a real project impossible
Your last point is very relevant; I hope Elecrow respond because attempting to upload code via the USB but having to press buttons now buried inside an enclosure would be awkward, to say the least.
Uploading code Over The Air (as I do with many of my projects) is also problematic, inasmuch that I would have to then switch the device off and back on to get it to reset (unless the reset after an OTA update works, I haven't tried it). It's a workaround but very unnecessary.
Hey Ralph, I think lvgl should work.
I got a little bit of a different setup, but Arduino reguires me to change the root folder in the "preferences" of arduino to the one where the examples are stored. Then it will find the libraries that are delivered with the product.
Because lvgl and TFT espi are so configurable, you really need to change the settings per project. So I guess these libraries are stored with the specific project.
In the Arduino IDE environment the library is (usually) global, a "feature" I hate.
Visual Studio Code / PlatformIO allows you to take a copy of the library per project if you want and make whatever changes you want which will never be overwritten or updated.
In the latter case you don't get bug fixes or new features but the project which used that version of the library is now finished, right? Enhancements to the (new) project could use the new library.
@@RalphBacon I just learned about Arduino and the global setting. I agree on the hate.
Problem with tftespi and lvgl library is that you have to edit some settings in the configuration file for the specific hardware and connections that you are using.
I think that if you were to update a shared library, that the settings will be lost. Similar that if you start a new project with a slightly different hardware setup, you might also need to edit this.
All in all, lvgl is not a smooth ride for me. But I made it work at least once.
The "trick" is to keep the UserSettings.ini file safe so that if it is overwritten by an upgrade, you can just reinstall that single file and it should "just work" again.
Or, do what I do in VSC / PlatformIO and keep the library in the lib folder where it is frozen in time, never to be upgraded again (for that project).
Ralph just happened across your video on this board, great review, was wondering do you thank this would work to view a remote esp32 cam and control a set of smart relays, I was thanking of a set up to control my on demand water heater from different locations in my house, esp32 camera to see the screen and then relays to change the temperature. Thanks
You are talking about HDMI signal processing - not something an ESP32 is going to be very good at I shouldn't think otherwise we would be seeing lots of tiny TVs and PC Monitors springing up.
Now I know you can get the ESP32-CAM module that _sends out_ a camera signal (not sure of the protocol used) but I've not seen one that can process one (they are called monitors).
Perhaps others have more info on this?
@@RalphBacon I have an esp32 with cam module. It can display resolutions from QQVGA (160 by 120) up to UXGA (1600 by 1200). I can get decent still pix on all resolutions but video only on the lowest. CIF (400 by 296) and down does allow video. He may be able to get low res pix on that display. I get my pix over wifi, never tried connecting a display or laptop directly.
The 5" version actually has better I2S functionality and has a bunch more onboard components. I wonder what PCB way thinks about you playing on Easyeda lol
Drat, I should have gone for the 5" version! Regarding the CAD package I use, well it's a fact of life (something I tried to explain to them) but I don't exactly throw it in anyone's face which package I use.
I often need to manually put ESP boards into boot mode before flashing. I've also noticed that I have some ESP32 dev boards that stay in boot mode after being reset by platformIO after flashing. I don't recall if this is something that changed with a recent PlatformIO update or not.
Thanks for the info! Since I started fitting that cap on the RST pin I've not had an issue with getting into boot mode automatically nor resetting afterward. But this board has that cap so I'm not sure what would cause this issue here.
@@RalphBacon I've had success with a capacitor between EN and GND as well and now that I've looked at the schematic, they have the equivalent of a 10.2uF capacitor to GND installed in addition to a 10K ohm pullup resistor tied to 3.3V. They seemed to be careful to "tune" the capacitor value (using 3 capacitors), so I assume they are trying to achieve very specific timing here.
Indeed, but 10μF seems a lot, I've always used 1-2μF with complete success. Perhaps I'll desolder their caps and just leave the low value one in place, see what happens!
Regarding Aliexpress and VAT yes they do charge the seller the Vat , but it is funny on the declaration on the package that is sent the item has got much cheaper so less tax, I could be wrong of course 🙂
If the HMRC every knocked at my door (figuratively speaking) saying I owe tax on anything shipped from China I would be very firmly pointing them in the direction of the invoice that includes it!
@@RalphBacon you already paid the correct VAT to the seller, but is the seller passing that on to the HMRC is the question🙂
I'm sure the majority of sellers are passing it on (I think AliExpress controls all the finances and just passes the cost of the product to the seller, and gives the VAT to the UK/EU).
But there are alleged known VAT scams operating from the Far East where UK addresses are being used to "register" a business so they can claim back the VAT (or something along those lines). But thankfully few and far between.
Ralph: My home made home automation system is web based. Have an arduino mega serving up the web site via ethernet card and cable to router. To control the system (turn lights on/off, set timers, monitor furnace, etc) I must log on using a laptop or pc or ipad. I was thinking that having some of these in major rooms(living room, bedroom) that were always on and logged to the website would be more convenient than using a computer. My html code is very simple, no graphics just text and click boxes.
Do you think something like this could fit that role? Have you tried going to a website other than the samples provided by the manufacturer?
If you need a browser to control your home automation then this is not the solution. You say you use a laptop or PC so I'm guessing that's the case (your phone would work too). But you could use a RasPi (one of the older ones would work too as you're only using a browser).
That all said, if all you want to do is format some simple HTML strings you could do that (with a bit of work) - after all, my ESP32 units all send out and reply using HTML, but it's simple stuff using GET commands, mostly. I have to parse some of the HTML's JSON in more sophisticated scenarios but there is a library for that.
You could _emulate_ a simple web page, it just seems quite a lot of work to me (but look at my Pond Controller video, I show the HTML etc that I send out to the phone - you probably want to do it the other way round).
@@RalphBacon Thanks Ralph. Yes the phone works for accessing my system, but it is usually in another room on a charger. But that gives me another idea....my old phones that no longer have cell service can still access my wifi and therefore my automation system.
Indeed, repurposing an old phone that just connects to Wi-Fi is a great idea.
The handy thing about lvgl is the GUI builder for prototyping a gui on the lappy. I just switched to using it for my last project and my GUI is next level.
It is very low level so no overhead. The code generated is much the same as I would write myself.
If I run lvgl on top of the high performance espi library it scrolls very fast. I am not sure why this screen is so crappy. Maybe it is i2c and not spi?
The screen is deffo connected to the SPI lines (I got it working doing just that). But why it is so (relatively) slow is a mystery to me.
When I say slow, I mean in that demo. It seemed just fine in all other sketches I threw at it (using the TFT_eSPI library).
ps, I am using Arduino_ESP32SPI with Arduino_GFX and doing an lvl_disp_flush with those and the screen scrolls amazingly well, but the ttgo is only 135x240 so maybe it is faster due to the much smaller display.
Hmm. A mystery why the demo was a bit sluggish then. Perhaps Elecrow will comment. Well, once I've told them about this video, they might!
@@RalphBacon mystery solved as to why my scrolling is fast. I am just text scrolling. If I scroll a plane it is not very fast.
Good info, thanks for sharing 👍
Hello Ralph, I have the same board with the ESP32-Wrover-B micro, which I choose becouse my current project is based on the TTGO T7 V1.3 ESP32-Wrover Mini micro. I intend to replace the 16x2 LCD display wtih this TFT 3.5" Touch Screen & ESP32-Wrover-B micro to display an off-line png tile map and two pairs of GPS coordinates to track our travels on the many off road trails (attacned - Tupperware 2.0.MOV).
So far, I have been successful in passing two pairs of GPS coordingates from the T7 to the Display as verified by the Serial Monitor; now working on how to open the SD card's map to display both positions.
Any assistance, suggestions or knowledgeble sources/references would be much appreciated.
I just found an excellent resource down below, Rui & Sara with Random Nerd Tutorials! I have been working with them for a while, this was a Gold Mine of a find, thank you for the reference!!!!
Yes. they have a whole wealth of resources, especially for the ESP32.
Wow! Why is the screen update rate so awful slow?! 😮 I consider this as unusable for programs which needs a quick update (e.g. Games). Ralph, do you know how the Display is connected to the ESP? SPI or via 8 bit parallel Interface. The latter would be much better for performance sakes but occupies more IO pins from the ESP… I suppose that they decided for SPI due to save IO pins though…
I think it's just the software they used; I've seen other demos where the fresh rate was very good. I can't tell how the screen is connected but there are more than 4 SPI wires going into that screen for sure, so maybe they do connect it 8-bit parallel?
i have a few great LCD screens that going to be great for your future project how to send you these LCD screen i have 10 types of it
You can always 📧email me (details in every video description). Look forward to hearing from you!
AliExpress only adds VAT on order up to £130, any order over that they charge no VAT at all. You are meant to pay it locally to the courier but the last few times I've never had a request.
Prices for small Chinese goods have gone up for a few reasons:
-I believe the Chinese government used to subsidise the shipments years ago.
-China Post used to pay much lower rates to overseas post offices, Donald Trump intervened due to loses at USPS
-VAT has put the prices up
The third point you list has put up prices by 20%. And, unlike UK web sites, all the AliExpress prices are shown _pre-VAT_ so you get a nice "surprise" at the checkout. Joy.
@@RalphBacon because the VAT is ONLY for some countries - for others the price on the page is the final one (+ shipping ofc)
They could have a button (like the UK websites selling to both trade and individuals) whether to show VAT-inclusive prices or not. After all, they know exactly the rate of VAT for each of their targets, otherwise they wouldn't charge the right amount at the checkout. Am I right?
@@RalphBacon not really: I might use the same account to buy goods and use different destination addresses: one in EU/UK and one in UA - you can know the final VAT/no-VAT when you are about to pay and you already told them where to send it
The point is that (a) we are now forced to pay VAT on low-value Chinese goods that we never paid before and (b) the website advertises an artificially low price (ex-VAT) that lures customers in.
It's the reason why UK websites MUST include VAT prices for non-business users. After all, £10 is a good price, £12 (incl VAT) might be the same as Amazon! £100 must be a bargain, £120 not so much.
And the Chinese government doesn't seem to be subsidising the shipping any more (not to the same extent anyway) so that's another kick up the proverbial for use hobbyists!
Ralph, I am very interested in working with ESP32/TFT ILI9488 combo board from Elecrow. Have you or aware of others who have configured the onboard ESP32 micro to display real-time live GPS coordinate positions to an off-line map downloaded on board?
You mean like a James Bond-style car-tracking device? If so, this may be more complex than you think as I was once involved with maps and routing in my day job and it was quite complex to do.
For starters, the map you speak of has to be supplied by someone (at cost) and you have to know how to get the longitude and latitude displayed correctly. Even Google Maps is not free for this sort of project, but can be done without too much trouble.
The ESP32 (or whatever device) can use a GPS (Ublox) device that sends very accurate GPS coordinates and I did a video on that a long time ago, video #70, I believe?
@@RalphBacon would an off-line map rendered as jpeg, png, etc. be applicible; as I am attempting do such with my ESP32-Wrover-B display as noted in my comment above?
Your ESP32 board looks very useful - where can I buy a few of those please?
All links in the video description! As always. 😀
@@RalphBacon Yes but I couldn't see a link for your own design of PCB that you didn't get time to talk about!
I've not published that design yet (because we haven't looked at it properly and I'm designing my first project with it).
But if you can use an EasyEDA project I can send you the files?
its a shame the SPI pins are not exposed on a connector as that would make connecing SPI peripherals easier i am looking to make a dab and internet radio and would look to use the VS1053 mp3 decoder and the Si4688 dab ic bith of these require SPI communication
Look at other modules they do. I _think_ the 5" version exposes more pins but I'll leave it to you to research!
I just posted something regarding SUNTON displays as rather nice alternative - not only do those expose more GPIOs but also the SPI bus... maybe you wanna look into those 🙂
@@RalphBacon nope - the 5" display exposes exactly 1 pin (GPIO38, if I remember correctly) + UART rx/tx - see my comment above :-)
Could be a neat board, what I couldn’t see is all the remaining GPIO pins for user I/O (I know read the schematic lol)
No, no, quite a sensible observation. I too looked for other GPIO pins (so I could connect my MP3 decoder up for the Web Radio project) but could not find many that were not exposed via those sockets.
I wonder if they are just "not connected". As you say, we should both look at the schematic!
I have designed very similar board to be used with SPI display and display took only 8 GPIOs (touch of course, and that includes backlight GPIO). All remaining are free to use
Indeed, the same as my ESP32 Web Radio and I controlled the backlight with a PWM. But I need 4 lines (I think) for the mp3 decoder (although some might be SPI lines).
Looks like most of the GPIO pins are allocated to the display and the connectors, but GPIO 17 to 22 are not used, the pads are on the PCB but do not go anywhere. With careful soldering you could connect these to your hardware.
Sounds like something I will be looking into very carefully. 👍
Good video Ralph, and yes we pay taxes in Texas🤣
The scourge of modern living, hey?
Regarding the board-reset-after-code-upload problem (ua-cam.com/video/EMpF5-0YeSM/v-deo.html). From the schematic, the design omitted the "auto-restart" circuitry so, yes, unfortunately the manual reset-boot sequence is required. For the sake of a couple of cheap transistors and resistors, they could have greatly improved the user experience-especially for beginners who would find the two button finger dance confusing.
Thanks for another superb video!
That's a shame, and I hope Elecrow take note of this annoying deficiency in their design. A case of spoiling the ship for a halfpenth of tar! (Old UK proverb)
@@RalphBaconand @xylopyrographer9664, for those you do not like that "two button finger dance": Do you have any recommendation for an alternative display with similar size and with touch functionality that can be used together with an ESP32? I know there are quite some other displays available, but I am just a beginner and thus would appreciare your advice.
Does it works whit Esphome?
I don't see why not, the ESP32 is just a standard device that can be programmed any way you like. They have others with more GPIO pins exposed too.
Is there a way to connect to a 3.5" AMOLED screen? Like done in the following video with a smaller AMOLED screen: ua-cam.com/video/FuD-QmKn1uo/v-deo.html
Well, the library used in that video is the one I eventually used in the demo (and is what I use for my ESP32 Web Radio project).
So you could connect any ESP32 device (including one from Elecrow) to an AMOLED screen like he shows. Whether Elecrow sell such a screen I don't know but I'm sure their website will have details if they do.
@@RalphBacon Thank you for your reply 👍
Yes, they add US state sales tax to purchases. Whether the states get the revenue, I don't know.
And that's the $64,000 question! But I'm sure it's all legit. 🤥
I recall when they started the tax crap, it was at the demand of our governments since they thought they were loosing to much tax revenue to the Chinese. They demanded the Chinese set this up and take our hard earned cash. I would guess the businesses were complaining as well that much of the money we spend in China is not going their way. @@RalphBacon
Nice review. Interesting board. It would have been nice with stronger ESP32 and more GPIO pin´s but I think it would be great for most constructions.
Changed your name you said,seems you spend some long hours with photoshop too. No App is that good. 😂😂
You can easily dampening you printer, but a box over it foam or fabric inside or just put it on another table.
Now just a thought, nothing political - Of course you have to pay taxes and VAT like everyone else. You can buy it all in UK (probably import from china) and thereby support your country but if you insist (or just don´t care) you can keep on buying your stuff in china and help developing the country and support their government. Do not complain about VAT and taxes, we both live in one of the better places in the world, that cost.
Putting a soundproof (or, at least, sound dampening box over my printer isn't going to work for me, as there just isn't enough space on the bench top. But it's a valid idea, and if I were to get a "proper" enclosure, it would mean I could print some of the more "difficult" (aka warping) filaments too.
Yes, I'm playing devil's advocate regarding the VAT we now have to pay for purchases outside of the EU. I fully understand the reasons, it's just that this was (very) small and overlooked concession (loophole?) that we hobbyists took advantage of in the past; no more, however.
Is there a Hello World example or something simple to load? So far the only thing I can get to load and run is their useless demo example.
I used the TFT_eSPI-2.2.23 for my Web Radio and this worked fine here, although it is a full blown library.
It does have some easy examples, but in this case you do need to do some prep work to get it all set up correctly (resolution, chip type) which means reading and editing the included config files.
It's the UK government that force the seller to collect the VAT at source. It was hit and miss before, whether customs intercepted your package to collect the VAT.
At least you now know what you're paying.
I once bought a £20 camera, customs intercepted it charged the VAT about £4 then royal mail wanted a handling charge of about £15 marking it nearly twice as much.
Yes, I recently got "caught" with a £16 bill - £8 tax (VAT) and £8 to Royal Mail for the privilege of administering this service 🤬
it is NOT Aliexpress who is "guilty" that we need to pay the tax while buying - this law has been enforced by both: EU and UK. If the business exports goods to EU/UK this business has to pay VAT in the rate as if the goods were produced in the destination country. Above 150 Euro however, the payment obligation goes to the buyer.
Hmm. Funny how we (the UK) decided to keep _that_ particular EU law/directive alive since Brexit.
And I wonder whether the UK Treasury is aware of how it affects small businesses and hobbyists (like you and me) - to the extent I rarely order from China these days as the prices are now comparable (and we get quicker delivery locally!)
It just annoys me that this was quietly imposed.
@@RalphBacon actually it is not a problem for me as I always deduct this VAT from my VAT. And if I buy something > 150 Euro (GBP), there is no VAT invoice and I don't deduct. If Royal Mail is too good and pays VAT on behalf of me, then I get an invoice and I deduct from my VAT. If not then there is no issue. But for the people who have no business or no VAT registered, it is extra 20% to the price - in such case sometimes it is cheaper (and in 99% faster) to buy on Amazon
Well summarised. Exactly the case as I see it.
you have green hair.
Sometimes it's pink or blue, depending on what hair colouring my wife has available 😆😮🤔
Yes they Pushing that ESP too hard with web Pages...lol
I think it is the way they have coded it, the ESP32 can play some very fluid video so a few web pages should not be an issue.
Ralph - Indeed, we are now taxed on every purchase on the internet as well. While ours is not that high in my home state, it still is a pain in the rear, like all taxes. Seems to me we had a little fight with the UK over that some 245 years back indeed, if I remember my school learning properly, that fight was said to be about taxation without representation. Ah well, governments are now so big, and we have let them have so much power that it is easier to just pay the taxes and bitch to each other. Thank God we have a Supreme Court that told our would-be dictator with dementia where to go when he started the ministry of truth last year.
Hello Jerry, nice to see you here again! Hang on, you say we (the UK) had a fight with the USA? Probably you upstarts trying to be independent or something I should think 😁. But I agree that we just don't seem to be able to dodge taxes anywhere now. Drat and double drat.