This is a brand new display. The 2x14 connector area has never been soldered to. The back of the unit has a ribbon cable for a second type of connection.
The units have an
equivalent chip set to the Hitachi 44780 chip set so driving this from
a Basic Stamp Module, Basic Atom Module or directly from a
Microcontroller like a PIC with with PICBASIC is easy. One command can
do it all.