Raspberry Pi display
Les Pounder gets hands on with the long-awaited official Raspberry Pi touchscreen display, hopefully after licking his jam-smeared fingers.
Despite selling six million units, the Raspberry Pi has one port that has never been used: the display. Located on the reverse of the Micro SD slot, the display port was designed specifically for the newly released official Raspberry Pi display.
The official Raspberry Pi display features a seven-inch screen with a resolution of 800x480 pixels and provides a capacitive touch interface. The display is surrounded by a black bezel which gives the appearance of a tablet, which you need to be careful with as it’s rather thin and can be easily bent. The display doesn’t come with a case or stand as the Raspberry Pi Foundation is keen for the community to fabricate their own and companies, such as Pimoroni, to meet the need.
On the back of the screen are two thin connectors for the video and for the touch interface and these connect to a driver board. This board has three ribbon connections: two from the display and a third which connects to the Raspberry Pi Display port. Your Pi can sit on top of the driver board and is secured in place by four screws. Power to the display is provided by a Micro USB port which is best powered by a 5V 2A power supply. The Pi can then be powered in two ways: By connecting to the USB port via a USB to Micro USB lead, or by connecting two jumper cables from the 5V and Ground pins on the driver board to the Raspberry Pi, the latter option will prevent the use of add-on boards.
If the latest official Raspbian image is used, the Pi will automatically detect the correct resolution for the display
Software installation is exceptionally easy and requires nothing more than a simple sudo apt-get update and sudo apt-get upgrade to install the touchscreen drivers. This is a refreshing change to other displays, such as Adafruit’s 5-inch touchscreen which uses the AR1100 touch controller and requires calibration via a Windows PC.
Portable touch
The touch interface on the Raspberry Pi display reacts to input very quickly. We tested it with a Pi 2 and found no stuttering or slowdown. The interface can detect ten points of touch at once, enabling multitouch possibilities for your projects. For general desktop use, the touch works well, but there’s currently no right-click functionality, which is a limitation of X not really being designed for a touchscreen.
The display is bright and has a comfortable viewing angle and while the resolution is smaller than we are now accustomed to there’s still plenty of space for hacking in your favourite application. The display can be used with an HDMI screen, opening up the prospect of a dual display system, but that requires a few configuration changes for applications to use the correct screen.
At this time the display is sold as a kit, which requires a small amount of assembly, but it’s envisaged that future revisions will come pre-built.
The official display will not replace your main monitor but it does fulfil two needs. First, the need for a portable screen for use in hackspaces and classrooms. The size of the display and its price-point lend it well to this. Second, the display can be easily embedded into a project enabling the Pi to power a number of touchscreen controlled solutions.
The official Raspberry Pi 7-inch display is a lovely piece of kit. As it just works as a touchscreen, we will see this display powering a slew of great projects in the coming months.