Using old IDE cables is a very good idea.
Note that there are many types of cable available, but most of them will be either
40 wire or 80 wire cables. the difference in the newer (ATA) 80 wire cables is that
every other wire is used to separate and shield the signal wires. All 40 ground wires
will be connected either to the even side or the odd side of the connector, 2 adjacent
wires to each pin.
In the older cables, there is no ground wire; each signal is routed through each of the
40 pins. It will work, but provides no shielding. Note also that he signal path in the
ATA cables has been cut from 40 to 20 wires. That will make little difference to a
lcd connection. The electronic difference is in the interface port.
It is a good idea to use the 80 wire cable and determine which side is ground, and then
connect that side to ground. That will provide shielding for the signal wires and will
cut down on RFI considerably.
Note that these connectors have 2 rows of 20 pins each. You will be connecting 16
pins for a 16x2 display. Usually, also, these connectors have a center connector for
another drive. Cut the cable so that the shortest of the two connectors are at the ends
of it. Note also that the result will usually be a cable with 2 female connectors, so
that you will have to make a sort of adapter to provide the normal M-F ends.
I don't know if all of this information is exactly correct, but I do know that they work very well.
john
AD5YE
