A CMOS decoder/driver IC for Chinese numerals

The design of a 16-pin CMOS decoder/driver IC for Chinese numerals is presented. The IC was fabricated using a single layer metal 5- mu m polysilicon gate p-well CMOS process technology. The die size for the chip is approximately 3.1 mm*3.0 mm. The nine outputs of this IC correspond to the segments of a proposed Chinese numeric display. Nine 970-ohm resistors are used to interface the outputs of the chip to the LEDs of the display. An off-the-shelf 14-segment LED display was used for the test evaluation, but only some of the segments are used. The circuit also incorporates a feature that allows one to blank-off the display if required. >