Check out adafruit on youtube and their store. They have some nice diy eink options that sound exactly like what you are suggesting. I agree it would be nice for this to also be available for non diy people too.
Re:The Stasis of E-Ink
by HuwFulcher on Thursday January 04, 2024 @10:54AM
(#38868477)
I’ve heard of adafruit before but haven’t looked at their stuff. Will check it out
Re:The Stasis of E-Ink
by octobus2021 on Thursday January 04, 2024 @10:04AM
(#38867823)
Check out "The Invisible Screen" recently profiled here (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38773669). I've seen quite a few people playing with e-ink, the problem is these things are still way too expensive...
Re:The Stasis of E-Ink
by HuwFulcher on Thursday January 04, 2024 @10:54AM
(#38868467)
Thanks will take a look! At the risk of sounding ignorant, I can’t understand why such seemingly simple peripherals are so expensive
Re:The Stasis of E-Ink
by orbital-decay on Thursday January 04, 2024 @11:11AM
(#38868702)
Low volumes mainly, also EPD displays are hard to tame.
Re:The Stasis of E-Ink
by octobus2021 on Friday January 12, 2024 @03:47PM
(#38973796)
Seeing this way too late, apologies. Apparently the company which invented and patented the technology is trying to get as much revenue from it as possible. I think this is starting to change as people finding alternative approaches or at least something meaningfully different so as to not be covered by the patent, but it has not translated into more competition as of yet.
An example:
A voice-enabled tablet (ala Echo Show) is intrusive and disrupts the aesthetics of the home. An e-ink display that has low/no interactivity but provides useful information blends into the home a lot better.
Unfortunately the smart-device market isn't interested and building your own seems to be difficult.
Does anybody know if there are useful libraries for displaying e-ink? It should be simple to use a low cost RPi board like a pico and connect it to an e-ink display fitted into a frame.