Nintendo DS touchscreen module on an Arduino

Code: http://tinyurl.com/bgw3qq

I've connected an old Nintendo DS touchscreen module to my Sanguino and figured out what pins do what. In the video, I mixed up which pin was X, and which pin was Y, but in the code, it explains correctly which pin does what. This should be useful to anyone wanting to connect one of these nice cheapies to their embedded project!

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• Nintendo
• DS
• Arduino
• touch
• screen
• embedded

[dextermty107]

how you can connect the cables to the tiny interface in the touchscreen??

[jf8943pkg]

@dextermty107 very carefully. ;) I used some really thin wire and even then I screwed up. ONe technique you could use is to sand off some of the insulation to make the exposed areas longer so you have a bit more area to solder to. You can then solder the wires so they're not right next to each other by using various areas of teh space you sanded off so they don't bridge as much. Lastly, you could buy a small socket, but that has small pins as well.

[mehilainen]

You are reading the screen wrong way, there's no any X or Y pins.

To get X position you must first apply Vdd to pin 1 and GND to pin 3 and then read ADC on pin 2 or 4.

Same way for Y position, but Vdd to pin 2, GND to pin 4 and read ADC on pin 1 or 3.

There's good application note from TI about it, just google for: resistive touch screen msp430

[jf8943pkg]

Thanks

[dextermty107]

@jf8943pkg thanks a lot i better get the breakout board i dont want screwup the touchscreen

thank you

[Rine4968]

is there maybe a cheaper alternative? or are arduinos the cheapest one can use to get the touchscreen working on the pc? the thing is that, just as you said, the nds touchscreens are cheap as hell (around 2$, wow!) so i thought it might be cool to hook one up on the computer to.. play around with it and maybe use it to draw little things or make a signature or something.

combining this with windows 7's handwriting recognition is also a delicious thought =D

thanks for the reply!

[jf8943pkg]

Thanks

[jf8943pkg]

Yeah, it's not too hard, you'll just need to measure the distance the finger/stylus was dragged and send data to the PC accordingly. You can buy Arduino boards for about $27, and if you only want to interface via PS/2, you don't need any extra hardware.

[Rine4968]

cool!

is there any way to get the nintendo ds touchscreen work like a mouse? i mean some kind of cheap touchpad.

how much does the arduino and the other components (beside the touch screen itself) cost? and is it easy to write the driver to emulate the mouse or rather not?

[jf8943pkg]

I got it during high school, but here are longer nicer ones. I'd try looking on eBay for cheap ones. As far as I know, you can't go wrong with a breadboard, regardless of manufacturer.

[buggyiscool]

where did you get that breadboard? im looking for a good one