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Building an E-Ink Laptop

alexsoto.dev

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Re: Building an E-Ink Laptop

#101

Post by alex-a-soto »

miles wrote: post #38
alex-a-soto wrote: post #2

Hey folks, I've recently had the idea of building an e-ink laptop from the devices I had at home. I decided to document the process and share each step of the way: Some of the posts planned for the series are: Dasung Paperlike HD-FT teardown, Thinkpad T480 teardown, Creating the prototype, Installing and configuring NixOS, M-x e-ink-laptop-mode If you have any questions or comments, feel free to reach out.

Can you please add an RSS feed for your blog? Would like to subscribe for updates.

Thank you for the reminder! Will do!

Re: Building an E-Ink Laptop

#102

Post by alex-a-soto »

iamcreasy wrote: post #34
alex-a-soto wrote: post #2

Hey folks, I've recently had the idea of building an e-ink laptop from the devices I had at home. I decided to document the process and share each step of the way: Some of the posts planned for the series are: Dasung Paperlike HD-FT teardown, Thinkpad T480 teardown, Creating the prototype, Installing and configuring NixOS, M-x e-ink-laptop-mode If you have any questions or comments, feel free to reach out.

Cool project. What's the refresh rate of the screen? Can you scroll down a webpage without a lot of latency?

Thanks, according to arandr, the screen refresh rate is 75hz; when adjusting the modes(M1, M2, M3 etc) it's entirely usable. I've used it for watching videos, meetings and doing my day-to-day activities with it.

Re: Building an E-Ink Laptop

#103

Post by alex-a-soto »

rambojazz wrote: post #100

What you didn't say is that Dasung displays cost thousands of dollars. It's just too expensive to play with.

My apologies; I should have stated it in the post. You are correct. My hope with this project is to document the process, share what I learn, and in the future, iterate on this project and make it accessible to more people.

Re: Building an E-Ink Laptop

#104

Post by smusamashah »

alex-a-soto wrote: post #9
torgoguys wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What a coincidence! I just (2 days ago) started planning a somewhat similar project. I'm converting a different model thinkpad, adding an e-ink display. I will be watching this project with great interest for tips, inspiration! Thank you for writing it up.

Thank you! And I agree, what a coincidence! What Thinkpad and panel are you thinking of using? I look forward to your project as well. Best of luck!

Can you have RSS on your blog to follow the next posts?

Re: Building an E-Ink Laptop

#105

Post by pbronez »

Very interesting - wasn’t familiar with these e-ink screens. I wonder if the power draw is low enough at you could power the screen and a Rpi4 off a USB battery bank.

You could make a rear “shield” that connects to the monitor via VESA. The shield could hold the the Rpi, batteries, and an adjustable kick stand. You’d connect a keyboard via USB.

The upcoming Quartz64 [0] mentioned in the article might simplify this, thanks to the included ePD connector. Unfortunately I haven’t been super impressed with my PineBook Pro. Mostly the suspend bug is annoying.

Maybe a luggable form factor and e-ink display would help, since there’s no lid to close and the low-draw display can stay on longer without killing the battery. [0] https://www.makeuseof.com/quartz64-e-ink-sbc/

Re: Building an E-Ink Laptop

#106

Post by alex-a-soto »

fouc wrote: post #49

The backlight on the Dasung HD-FT in the picture from the blog post seems to be way too bright, makes it appear to be lower contrast than it probably is.. https://alexsoto.dev/static/building-an-e-ink-laptop/eink-t4...

Thank you! I'll make sure to include pictures without the backlight on.

Re: Building an E-Ink Laptop

#107

Post by alex-a-soto »

awiesenhofer wrote: post #93

Finally a nice hacking project that doesn't use a Raspberry Pi at its core! Every Pi article on HN has the same comments about how old repurposed laptops or nucs/usffs are better for the current usecase, its nice to actually see a project that takes that to heart.

Thank you! In past attempts, I've used an e-ink monitor with a raspberry pi, Intel Compute Stick, an X230T, etc. I agree; it wasn't until the Raspberry 400 came out that I thought about re-purposing an older laptop.

Re: Building an E-Ink Laptop

#108

Post by alex-a-soto »

gopaz wrote: post #95

Did you record the difference in battery life before/after the eink monitor?

I need to run more tests; with the eink monitor connected to the T480, I was getting about 8 hours of battery life, could probably optimize settings further. However, I may try instead powering the eink monitor with a power bank.

Re: Building an E-Ink Laptop

#110

Post by AshamedCaptain »

polshaw wrote: post #98
AshamedCaptain wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But other screen technologies have actually _better_ contrast than eInk in direct sunlight (e.g. reflective LCD, mirror-backed). State-of-the-art eInk technology these days has actually WORSE contrast than in the early days! -- https://blog.the-ebook-reader.com/2021/01/20/contrast-on-e-i... (proving how much people care about it) eInk's primary advantages are power (and only if your idle period is long enough; if you…

Transflective LCD, ie pixel Qi.. look vastly more difficult to see in sunlight; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5UEqd-AnGeI The company also doesn't exist and only produced 10" 1024x600 screens, which are barely usable. If you know of another usable product, or have anything to back up your claims, please do share.

To put it simply: ask people who have the Pebble. Most of them incorrectly believe it is an eInk screen, but it is a reflective LCD.

I also have the Metawatch. These are purely reflective, not transflective. They boast whopping 20:1 contrast ratios -- https://www.sharpsma.com/products?sharpCategory=Memory%20LCD... . Even at its best days (carta) eInk didn't reach that 15:1 https://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/E_Ink_Carta , and nowadays it's more like 10:1.

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