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Valve open-source the Steam Machine e-ink screen so you can make your own

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Re: Valve open-source the Steam Machine e-ink screen so you can make your own

#31

Post by weberer »

voidUpdate wrote: post #18
artisinal wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For a small gaming box it is a good price. If you don’t care that much about size, HDMI-CEC or SteamOS there are faster alternatives for the price.

Especially since, afaik, you plug it in and it just works. No messing around with installing operating systems, setting up users (aside from signing into steam) or anything. It's essentially a console that plays PC games, but it's also a PC for the purposes of upgradability and ability to do other, non-console stuff with it

>No messing around with installing operating systems

This is the real killer feature. So many people that I talk to know they want Linux, but are deathly afraid of installing it themselves.

Re: Valve open-source the Steam Machine e-ink screen so you can make your own

#32

Post by Rebelgecko »

whatisthiseven wrote: post #21
dgellow wrote: post #3

In case you're wondering and don't want to click around, the display is a standard Adafruit 5.83'' eInk panel: https://www.adafruit.com/product/6397

Anyone know what the refresh rate for these displays are, at least with the stock firmware? Reading the datasheets didn't help, though maybe I didn't know what to look for.

Partial refresh on these can often be surprisingly fast, even when full refresh takes seconds

Re: Valve open-source the Steam Machine e-ink screen so you can make your own

#33

Post by cubefox »

orbital-decay wrote: post #29

Is it even useful as a faceplate? An active display would be way more accurate at displaying hardware stats when the machine loses power (it'll shut down).

That's an interesting case of a display being off actually indicating something ("loss of power") which can't be replicated with a bistable screen.

On the other hand, you probably don't want that glow of an active screen all the time. Status LEDs are annoying enough.

Re: Valve open-source the Steam Machine e-ink screen so you can make your own

#34

Post by tl »

delecti wrote: post #28
rbanffy wrote: post #11

Is the Steam Machine a decently priced desktop compared to the "generic" ones?

You can't build a machine which is as powerful, small, quiet, and cheap, nor can you take for granted that a machine you build can have a controller that can wake it from sleep, or which has HDMI-CEC (both are possible, but take extra work or hardware). You can rather easily build a machine with multiple of those attributes, but you'll have to pick ones to sacrifice in the name of the others.

I like the SteamDeck I have, but it doesn't do HDMI-CEC or controller wake from sleep today. Valve needs to prove the Steam Machine doesn't fail here.

Re: Valve open-source the Steam Machine e-ink screen so you can make your own

#35

Post by jdiff »

cubefox wrote: post #33
orbital-decay wrote: post #29

Is it even useful as a faceplate? An active display would be way more accurate at displaying hardware stats when the machine loses power (it'll shut down).

That's an interesting case of a display being off actually indicating something ("loss of power") which can't be replicated with a bistable screen. On the other hand, you probably don't want that glow of an active screen all the time. Status LEDs are annoying enough.

This screen is entirely independent, with its own power source, so unlike most bistable screens this one could also report when its connection with the Machine is lost, and in a different way than simply turning off.

Re: Valve open-source the Steam Machine e-ink screen so you can make your own

#36

Post by cubefox »

jdiff wrote: post #35
cubefox wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's an interesting case of a display being off actually indicating something ("loss of power") which can't be replicated with a bistable screen. On the other hand, you probably don't want that glow of an active screen all the time. Status LEDs are annoying enough.

This screen is entirely independent, with its own power source, so unlike most bistable screens this one could also report when its connection with the Machine is lost, and in a different way than simply turning off.

It's own power source... Let me guess, solar cells? Batteries? A separate power plug?

Re: Valve open-source the Steam Machine e-ink screen so you can make your own

#37

Post by jdiff »

cubefox wrote: post #36
jdiff wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This screen is entirely independent, with its own power source, so unlike most bistable screens this one could also report when its connection with the Machine is lost, and in a different way than simply turning off.

It's own power source... Let me guess, solar cells? Batteries? A separate power plug?

Just a lithium battery.

Re: Valve open-source the Steam Machine e-ink screen so you can make your own

#38

Post by delecti »

tl wrote: post #34
delecti wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't build a machine which is as powerful, small, quiet, and cheap, nor can you take for granted that a machine you build can have a controller that can wake it from sleep, or which has HDMI-CEC (both are possible, but take extra work or hardware). You can rather easily build a machine with multiple of those attributes, but you'll have to pick ones to sacrifice in the name of the others.

I like the SteamDeck I have, but it doesn't do HDMI-CEC or controller wake from sleep today. Valve needs to prove the Steam Machine doesn't fail here.

The Steam Deck itself doesn't have an HDMI port, but the official dock does, and that does support HDMI-CEC (support was added to SteamOS a couple years ago). The Steam Deck also does support controller wake from sleep (added in the past year or so); I've actually seen people complaining about their Steam Decks waking up when they didn't realize that feature existed.

And all of the reviews I've seen about the Steam Machine talk about how well both of those features work.

Re: Valve open-source the Steam Machine e-ink screen so you can make your own

#39

Post by mrheosuper »

whatisthiseven wrote: post #21
dgellow wrote: post #3

In case you're wondering and don't want to click around, the display is a standard Adafruit 5.83'' eInk panel: https://www.adafruit.com/product/6397

Anyone know what the refresh rate for these displays are, at least with the stock firmware? Reading the datasheets didn't help, though maybe I didn't know what to look for.

The refresh rate of eink is kind of...muddy. It depends on temperature and target contrast. With the right waveform and voltage, you can push it pretty far(like 30hz+).

The thing is, Eink's waveform is kind of secret afaik, everyone has different tuning.

Re: Valve open-source the Steam Machine e-ink screen so you can make your own

#40

Post by p2edwards »

westurner wrote: post #10

Looks like Waveshare has a E6 full color ePaper/eInk/EPD display in 3.6" and 7.3" but not yet in 5.83": "5.83inch E-Paper Display (G), E-ink Display, 648 × 480, Red/Yellow/Black/White , SPI Interface" https://www.waveshare.com/5.83inch-e-paper-g.htm?sku=32584

Full color, except for certain shades of blue
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