Hello Richard,

You made a comment, that this is your first project...

One projects as such, it is best to go the very BASICS of everything. Do not add bells and whistles *until* you get the crazy thing working. You said it was HD44780 compatible...

Sending a Dec 13 will turn on the display and allow you to print ascii to it. This should be your main concern... NOT whether it blinks, does whistles, changes lines, smokes cigarettes for you, or drinks beer. 8-}

AFter you get just those two things to work.. THEN experiement with one added command at a time....

You are slowly eliminating variables... one at a time... instead of trying to elminate 15 variables... in which one of those 15 could be what you really need!

Dwayne