I've been attempting to replace the 16x1 LCD screen in my RZ1 with a proper LED backlit one as the inverter for the EL backlight causes a ridiculous amount of whine on the audio outputs.
At first i accidently bought a 16x2 display, and the RZ1 characters displayed perfectly on the top line of the screen, so i bought a 16x1 screen only to find that it would only display the first 8 characters.
From a bit of research on the net i've discovered that there are two types of 16x1 display. The first is very common these days and is in fact the equivalent of two 8x1 displays side by side. This type is used in virtually everything and can be bought for about £3-£4 from ebay. The second is much rarer these days, and uses an extra 'auxiliary driver' chip on the display board to actually display 16x1 characters.
Guess which version the RZ uses?
It seems that if you use a new 8x1 side by side display with a machine that wants a rarer 16x1 display, the screen will work as if its displaying two lines of 8 characters, one above the other. Obviously with a single line display this means you only get the first 8 characters visible.
Does anyone know where to get a 16x1 display with an auxiliary driver chip on board these days? Or is there any kind of bodge job i can do to get a newer screen working?