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Evertop: E-ink IBM XT clone with 100+ hours of battery life

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Re: Evertop: E-ink IBM XT clone with 100+ hours of battery life

#21

Post by ct0 »

jmward01 wrote: post #15

I think there is a class of device here that is missing. Low power but forever devices that have some basic functionality. Over time I could see this taking over laptops and the like as ultra-low-power became more and more capable.

There are a few commercial products popping up and marketing. I think youll find what you find here interesting: https://old.reddit.com/r/writerDeck/ Im using a Boox palma 2 on a stand, and a Thinkpad Keyboard 2 to emulate the same thing. The battery life may not be 100 hours but considerable.

Re: Evertop: E-ink IBM XT clone with 100+ hours of battery life

#22

Post by kovac »

Love it! Any idea how long the display can last? I've been playing around with e-paper (nothing as impressive as this!) dashboards. I use Waveshare displays that has a max of 1 million refresh cycles. The display you've used seems more capable.

My own humble e-paper projects:

https://www.asciimx.com/projects/e-reader/ https://www.asciimx.com/projects/etlas/

Re: Evertop: E-ink IBM XT clone with 100+ hours of battery life

#24

Post by nine_k »

jmward01 wrote: post #15

I think there is a class of device here that is missing. Low power but forever devices that have some basic functionality. Over time I could see this taking over laptops and the like as ultra-low-power became more and more capable.

Most people sell or give away fully functional, very powerful mobile phones, because of the end of the software support.

Hardware is more than capable for a long time, and is often very durable. But it takes a special kind of audience to put up with decade-old unsupported software, let alone with IBM XT-level software (which I remember using).

Security is not a consideration for such devices, because of their very limited number. Nobody is going to crack into your internet-connected Amiga except maybe some of your friends, as a prank. But a forever-device used for something substantial, something touching money in any way, would have to be much more up-to-date.

Re: Evertop: E-ink IBM XT clone with 100+ hours of battery life

#26

Post by nine_k »

sedatk wrote: post #6

Not an XT clone per se. XT had 8088 CPU, CGA/Hercules display adapter, and a 640KB RAM with a PC speaker. This one has 80186 and 1MB RAM with MCGA (VGA) and Adlib emulation too. It's better than an XT.

It's some XT++, but it's below the AT specs. That's the material difference.

It also sort of sets the expectations for the sloooow screen.

Re: Evertop: E-ink IBM XT clone with 100+ hours of battery life

#28

Post by kstrauser »

keyle wrote: post #19
kstrauser wrote: post #3

Take my money. No, really, this is precisely the sort of thing I've wanted for ages, and I don't have the time or resources to build it myself.

I don't know if you've seen the videos, but the latency from input to result on the screen is, very, very bad. I don't think this is actually what you want. We all want low-power retro computing but expect reasonable latency in usage. We also want WIFI working in every room and e-ink that doesn't suck and doesn't cost half a car... And the ability to browse the web (HTTPS). It's just not there yet. When someone will…

Rats. Those are good points and you're right. I do so want that, though.

Re: Evertop: E-ink IBM XT clone with 100+ hours of battery life

#29

Post by userbinator »

bombcar wrote: post #12
saulpw wrote: post #7

Man, I want this, but IBM AT level, 32-bits with at least a 386 and 8MB of RAM.

There were a bunch of those appearing on the various Chinese sites recently. https://www.tindie.com/products/cycle/pocket386-retro-dos-co...

Looks like someone found a good way to get rid of a bunch of new-old-stock embedded/industrial boards and/or SoCs that were sitting around in a warehouse somewhere in China.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40750371

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35995959

Re: Evertop: E-ink IBM XT clone with 100+ hours of battery life

#30

Post by idiotsecant »

nine_k wrote: post #24
jmward01 wrote: post #15

I think there is a class of device here that is missing. Low power but forever devices that have some basic functionality. Over time I could see this taking over laptops and the like as ultra-low-power became more and more capable.

Most people sell or give away fully functional, very powerful mobile phones, because of the end of the software support. Hardware is more than capable for a long time, and is often very durable. But it takes a special kind of audience to put up with decade-old unsupported software, let alone with IBM XT-level software (which I remember using). Security is not a consideration for such devices, because of their very li…

There are a lot of 'forever devices' currently touching money in major financial institutions.
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