I have quite a bit of experience with that exact screen. For development purposes I'd highly recommend getting this breakout board
https://a.co/d/04WE1ew
This will allow the screen to function and it will give you access to the gpio that isn't used by the screen on the 2nd set of headers. And for your second question, yes, you can still use the gpio that are light green. Additionally, if you don't use the SD card functionality of the screen, you can reallocate their associated gpio for whatever purposes you need (gpio18-22). Additionally, if you don't need the touch functionality, that frees up even more IO.
What is your end goal use case for it? You definitely can get crafty and try to solder to the unused pins but it will prove to be way messier and more difficult than just buying that breakout board. My permanent solution was to design a PCB that sandwiched in between the pico and the female headers on the back of the screen to pull out the unused gpio for my other purposes.
https://a.co/d/04WE1ew
This will allow the screen to function and it will give you access to the gpio that isn't used by the screen on the 2nd set of headers. And for your second question, yes, you can still use the gpio that are light green. Additionally, if you don't use the SD card functionality of the screen, you can reallocate their associated gpio for whatever purposes you need (gpio18-22). Additionally, if you don't need the touch functionality, that frees up even more IO.
What is your end goal use case for it? You definitely can get crafty and try to solder to the unused pins but it will prove to be way messier and more difficult than just buying that breakout board. My permanent solution was to design a PCB that sandwiched in between the pico and the female headers on the back of the screen to pull out the unused gpio for my other purposes.
Statistics: Posted by jamalsquatty — Fri Feb 14, 2025 1:42 am