How to add a Raspberry Pi 7-inch display to Radxa ROCK Single Board Computers

ROCK SBC’s are compatible with many of the accessories and add-on boards available for the Raspberry Pi and the popular 7-inch display with touchscreen is one of them.

This guide shows you how to easily connect any of your ROCK boards to the 7 inch display.

We cover the physical connection, any additional cables you may need and how to use the Radxa rsetup utility built into the Official Debian images to make the display work.

There is even a PVC case available that can be adapted to house the ROCK and display, making mounting simple.

Applications include control panels, kiosks and building portable computers.

Parts

Here’s a summary of board support and additional FPC Cable if required:

Step 1: Hardware

ROCK 3A / 3B / 3C and 4SE all have full-size MIPI DSI connectors located at the edge of the board above the SD card connector. These all use the FPC Cable supplied with the 7-inch display.

ROCK 4C+ and 5A both have a mini MIPI DSI connector located near the top corner of the board.

ROCK 5B has a mini MIPI DSI connector located on the underside of the board close to the centre line.

ROCK 4C+ / 5A & 5B all require an FPC Adapter Cable (256-4995) sold separately to the 7-inch display.

Step 2: Mounting

All the boards with the exception of the ROCK 5B can be mounted directly on the back of the display using the stand-offs provided. The ROCK 3B board is too large to fit in the standard case though.

With slight modification to the connector outlets, these will fit into the Raspberry Pi Display Case sold separately (193-5380) .

Due to the larger form factor of the ROCK 5B a custom mounting solution is required.

Step 3: Connections

With the display facing downwards, connect the FPC Cable to the connector on the driver board attached to the back of the display.

ROCK 3A / 3B / 3C & 4SE boards

These all use the supplied FPC Cable as shown below:

• Gently pull back the black tab on the connector to open it.
• Insert the FPC Cable with the metal strips on the cable facing upwards and the blue marker strip facing down.
• Push evenly on the connector tabs until they are flush with the connector body to close.

ROCK 4C+ / 5A & 5B boards

These all use the FPC Adapter Cable as shown below. This is not supplied with the display:

• Gently pull back the black tab on the connector to open it.
• Insert the FPC Cable with the metal strips on the cable facing upwards and the black marker strip facing down.
• Push evenly on the connector tabs until they are flush with the connector body to close.

Connect the Black and Red power leads supplied with the display to the GND and 5V pins on the driver board’s 5-pin as shown below:

Now attach the ROCK board to the stand-offs before making the DSI connection.

ROCK 3A / 3B / 3C & SE boards

These all have a full-size MIPI DSI connector as shown below:

• Remove the SD card to avoid any damage.
• Gently pull up on the white tabs of the DSI connector to open it.
• Slide the FPC Cable into the connector with the metal strips facing towards the centre of the board and the blue marker strip facing away from the board edge.
• Push down evenly on the white tabs to close the connector.

ROCK 4C+ / 5A & 5B boards

These all have a mini MIPI DSI connector:

• Remove the SD card to avoid any damage.
• Flip up the black tab on the DSI connector to open it.
• Insert the FPC Cable into the connector with the metal strips facing downwards and the black marker strip facing upwards.
• Fold the black tab down until it is flush with the connector body to close it. This requires firm pressure.

Step 4: Power

For all boards, connect the Red power lead to the 5V pin and the Black ground lead to the GND pin on the ROCK's GPIO header.

Both the ROCK and the display are powered by the USB-C power connector on the ROCK board.

Step 5: Operating System

We recommend downloading the latest Debian Desktop OS release from the OKdo Software and Downloads Hub.

Visit the page above and select the appropriate Desktop image for your board (XFCE or KDE) then click the link to download it and flash it to SD card media in the usual way using BalenaEtcher.

Step 6: Rsetup

Start by attaching a monitor and keyboard to the ROCK which can be removed after setup if required.

Power on the ROCK and set it up as usual. There are specific instructions for many of the ROCK boards on our OKdo ROCK Hub.

Open a Terminal window and execute the following command to start rsetup which is the Radxa configuration utility for ROCK boards.

sudo rsetup

• Choose System Maintenance then System Update and follow the prompts to pull in the latest updates. Sometimes this can take a few minutes depending on the number of packages needing updating.
• When the updates have completed, press the Esc key several times to return to the terminal prompt.
• Now reboot the board.

When the board has rebooted, open a Terminal session again and re-enter rsetup.

• This time choose Overlays, accept the Warning and select Manage Overlays.
• A list of overlays will display, scroll down to the Raspberry Pi 7-inch display and press the SpaceBar to select it so that it is marked with an asterisk, then Tab to OK.
• The overlay will be enabled after rebooting.

Step 7: Touch Screen

Power the board off, remove the HDMI monitor cable and reboot the board. You should now have a lovely high-resolution display on the 7-inch screen.

Here’s the display in the case being used with the ROCK 3A, showing sensor data built using Grafana.

The 7-inch 800 x 480 touch screen display is even sharper and more vibrant in real life.

Summary

The Raspberry Pi 7-inch Touchscreen Display adds a high-quality touchscreen to your ROCK board for when you need graphical output in situations like kiosks, point of sale and industrial automation local displays.

Radxa have provided an easy-to-use setup utility (rsetup) that allows configuration of the 7-inch Display Driver when using the Official Radxa OS images, simplifying installation and configuration of the Display.

Most of the ROCK boards mount directly on the back of the display using the included mounting hardware and connect with the included ribbon cable. Note that some boards require an additional cable as listed in the table above.

The whole assembly can be mounted in a custom case and ready-made commercial cases are available.

[Updated Aug 2023]