How to configure VFD

General Guides & How-tos
30

You can run the openvfd driver in test mode to check which exact configuration your display needs, and the order of the dots/indicators (the colon is an indicator too).
Make sure to disable the OpenVFD Kodi addon first.
SSH to box, then run the following:
kill $(ps aux | grep '[O]penVFDService' | awk '{print $1}') #this command will kill the current openvfd process
Followed by
/usr/sbin/OpenVFDService -t -dt 0x01000007 &
It’ll start cycling through all supported chars, and at the end it’ll cycle through the digits and after that it’ll cycle through the sections of each digit/indicator.
Here’s an example video of how it should look like:

It’s best if you could post a video, or at least list the order of how each of the sections were lit up.

You can then reboot the box to go back to normal mode.

31

Works great! Thank you!!!

Is there a way to install your service on Armbian Ubuntu?

Here have turned #2 TV box with displayin to an automation server.

32

I know that people have managed to get the driver (don’t know about the kodi addon for indicators) to work on Armbian, but I’m not familiar with that OS, so I can’t really tell you how.
Did the VFD I attached work right for you without any changes? I’d like to know so I can add it to the vfd repo.

33

I send you the vfd file of tvbox T10 Max so you can upload it to the repo. Everything works perfectly. Colon too. Thank you for your help as alwaysT10Max-vfd.conf (1.2 KB)

34

@miankel @pete

Thanks for the confirmation and the correct config file. Both of them have been pushed to the repo.

35

I have a Kingbox K3 S912 (2G) box, and when I tried to run the

/usr/sbin/OpenVFDService -t -dt 0x01000007 &

test mode command, I got a “Open device failed. No such file or directory error”. Could you tell me what I’m missing? I installed using the gxm_q200_2g.dtb device tree and everything works fine except for the front lcd display. Should I try a different device tree? If so, which one?

36

You must follow the directions in the first post. Without a vfd.conf file, the driver will not load, and you’ll get that error.
The test mode isn’t much relevant in your case because you don’t have a config file yet, and the display isn’t working at all.
Go over the available vfd.conf files, and see if any one of them gets something on the display, then we’ll have something to work with.

37

Sorry, I should’ve mentioned I did download a config file (m82-vfd.conf) and renamed it vfd.conf and placed it in the /storage/.config directory. I also installed the Openvfd service plug-in from the kodi repository. My display was blank after I did all that, and then I ran the test demo command and got the “Open device failed” error …

38

Reboot the box and post the url resulting from this command (in SSH)
dmesg | paste

39

Here is the URL:

http://ix.io/1HpA

Thanks!

40

Odd. What about systemctl status openvfd | paste?
Also, try systemctl status openvfd | paste

41

Sorry, I just realized that I had openvfd disabled when I did the last dmesg url.
I re-enabled it and rebooted and here’s the new dmesg url

http://ix.io/1Hur

And here’s the url for " `systemctl status openvfd | paste"

http://ix.io/1Hus

Thanks!

42

You’re using the wrong DTB. You need to use a DTB from the device_trees folder on the root of the SD card. Place it in the root of you SD and rename it to dtb.img.

43

Could I just replace the dtb.img with another one from the device_trees folder and reboot? Or do I have to re-install 9.0.1 from scratch with the new device tree?

44

OK, I just went ahead and replaced the existing dtb.img with one from the device_trees folder and rebooted. The lcd display is on now!! However, it’s scrambled (see attached) I guess I’m using the wrong vfd.conf file. Could you suggest one that might work.

IMG_6336
IMG_63364032×3024 1.25 MB

45

Which vfd.conf file did you use?

46

I just picked a random one (m82-vfd.conf) because I didn’t know which one to use.

47

I confirm, that everything works correctly.

48

Now you can try and follow this post How to configure VFD
Try using this command, instead of the one in the post above.
/usr/sbin/OpenVFDService -t -dt 0x00000000 &

49

I got the correct time to display now, after turning off the advanced setting toggle in the OpenVFD plugin. However, none of the other symbols/icons (not even the colon) are showing up.

When I ran the test mode command:

/usr/sbin/OpenVFDService -t -dt 0x00000000 &

All the characters are scrambled, but they seem to be cycling …