Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Building an E-Ink Laptop

alexsoto.dev

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

141–150 of 160 posts

Re: Building an E-Ink Laptop

#141

Post by stainforth »

robinsoh wrote: post #115
_ph_ wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From what I read, the way eInk conducts their business, it is very difficult to launch new eInk products. This limits the available offerings which means there is no competition to drive the market priced down. I bought a reMarkable 2 because it seems to be perhaps the only device on the market which doesn't require a jailbreak or such to do even the most basic customizations. The only other alternative I have seen s…

> From what I read, the way eInk conducts their business, it is very difficult to launch new eInk products. I have not read such claims. What I have read are individual small-scale customers approaching base layer producers like E-Ink and being disappointed after expecting assistance in getting their product ideas to market. That's analogous to a 10,000 unit/month or less customer approaching say a liquid crystal sup…

This sounds like a chicken or egg argument. Of course you'll give me wholesale pricing on volume in any market. But are product creators scared off when a big part of each unit's cost will go to license the screen technology?

Re: Building an E-Ink Laptop

#142

Post by alex-a-soto »

smusamashah wrote: post #104
alex-a-soto wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

https://politepol.com/fd/YzxwhAIhCZer

Re: Building an E-Ink Laptop

#143

Post by alex-a-soto »

twiclo wrote: post #131
alex-a-soto wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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!

I would also appreciate an RSS feed

https://politepol.com/fd/YzxwhAIhCZer

Re: Building an E-Ink Laptop

#144

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.

https://politepol.com/fd/YzxwhAIhCZer

Re: Building an E-Ink Laptop

#145

Post by mvanbaak »

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.

Why nixos?

Context: https://hands-on.cloud/why-you-should-never-ever-use-nixos/

Re: Building an E-Ink Laptop

#146

Post by FlyMoreRockets »

ggm wrote: post #75
FlyMoreRockets wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I loved my OLPC, especially the sunlight readable, low power display! Could it easily be grafted onto something like a RasPi, maybe with a mechanical keyboard and trackpad and lots of Li cells?

The word "easily" aside, yes. My reasoning, it was actually talking to an arm RTOS core which was the soft bus to the cpu doing the gui and sugar.

Good point, thanks. The OLPC once was heavily documented, perhaps the relevant portions still exist somewhere.

Re: Building an E-Ink Laptop

#147

Post by ggm »

FlyMoreRockets wrote: post #146
ggm wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The word "easily" aside, yes. My reasoning, it was actually talking to an arm RTOS core which was the soft bus to the cpu doing the gui and sugar.

Good point, thanks. The OLPC once was heavily documented, perhaps the relevant portions still exist somewhere.

Searches peter out around 2017/2018 for people trying to do what you want to do. the qanta screen was interesting but it didn't become ubiquitous, so its down to the scavengers who have an olpc and want to hack. Circuit diagrams I think will be easy, block-logic-structure stuff.

I did find people who cheated and used X $DISPLAY. I don't think thats quite the goal here :-)

Re: Building an E-Ink Laptop

#148

Post by robinsoh »

stainforth wrote: post #141
robinsoh wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> From what I read, the way eInk conducts their business, it is very difficult to launch new eInk products. I have not read such claims. What I have read are individual small-scale customers approaching base layer producers like E-Ink and being disappointed after expecting assistance in getting their product ideas to market. That's analogous to a 10,000 unit/month or less customer approaching say a liquid crystal sup…

This sounds like a chicken or egg argument. Of course you'll give me wholesale pricing on volume in any market. But are product creators scared off when a big part of each unit's cost will go to license the screen technology?

> This sounds like a chicken or egg argument.

I don't follow. I also don't see how it is different than any other industry be it bricks or CPUs. Buy a few and the per unit price is high. Buy millions and the per unit price is low.

> Of course you'll give me wholesale pricing on volume in any market.

Yes.

> But are product creators scared off when a big part of each unit's cost will go to license the screen technology?

I keep seeing this claim. I believe it is wrong and asked for evidence. In response to which OP has promised to correct the article. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26247268

Re: Building an E-Ink Laptop

#149

Post by alex-a-soto »

robinsoh wrote: post #115
_ph_ wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From what I read, the way eInk conducts their business, it is very difficult to launch new eInk products. This limits the available offerings which means there is no competition to drive the market priced down. I bought a reMarkable 2 because it seems to be perhaps the only device on the market which doesn't require a jailbreak or such to do even the most basic customizations. The only other alternative I have seen s…

> From what I read, the way eInk conducts their business, it is very difficult to launch new eInk products. I have not read such claims. What I have read are individual small-scale customers approaching base layer producers like E-Ink and being disappointed after expecting assistance in getting their product ideas to market. That's analogous to a 10,000 unit/month or less customer approaching say a liquid crystal sup…

Thank you for your comment. I updated the article and did a strikethrough in the sentence about e-ink and patents, 'Correction, this is an unsubstantiated claim.'

Re: Building an E-Ink Laptop

#150

Post by chx »

alex-a-soto wrote: post #137
chx wrote: post #116

A very different eInk laptop recently was at https://hackaday.io/project/177716-the-open-source-autarkic-... Also note my tech EDC/emergency kit at https://imgur.com/a/xmRmYSn which also uses a Dasung device, the 7.8" not-eReader as an external monitor to an also 7" laptop. Also note Dasung within the next few months intends to start shipping in China at least a 25.3" eInk monitor.

Amazing project! Thank you for sharing. I will be following for progress/updates. How do you like the 7.8 not-ereader. I've contemplated getting their 103 model.

It was love at first sight. Since the Android update it's even better. It does what I want from it: it reads eBooks and becomes a second screen in an emergency. Most of my work is text focused so black-and-white is not a problem here. I know in theory it could do even more but I don't need that. I am reading a lot, I had an eReader with me for more than a decade now always and if it doubles as an emergency monitor, that's insanely valuable to me. I can't really say how good a tablet it is, I have zero interest whatsoever in using it as such.
Post reply on HN