Anyone used a eink or epaper display with the Propeller ?

Bean · 2019-01-08 23:32

I want to make a bike computer for my electric bike and I would like to use eInk so it is visible in bright sunlight.
All the ones I see for sale are for the Pi, or are just the bare display (no driver).

Anyone have any recommendations ? I'd like to have about the 3" display.

Thanks,
Bean

PropGuy2 · 2019-01-09 00:27

eINK and its knockoffs have been one of my on-again / off-again projects for several years now. It is not had to interface, just a voltage pulse on one "surface" electrode to display a character / graphic image. And a voltage pulse on a second "surface" electrode, to reverse the character / graphic image It is still very expensive as far as displays go. I have ended up using the traditional graphic LCD displays for now. Hint use non-reflective picture frame (frosted) plastic as an overlay to get rid of glares in sunlight.

localroger · 2019-01-09 01:08

There is almost no information to be had on repurposing salvaged e-ink displays, such as from dead Kindles, and the few developer's kits with documentation I've seen have been outrageously priced in line with industrial development. There simply haven't been enough divergent consumer applications developed for the know-how to have trickled down to our level yet.

Whit · 2019-01-09 02:06

From the Blockly for Microcontrollers Facebook page,

Roy Eltham posted, "Hey Ken Gracey, I ported the Arduino code for the WaveShare 1.54" Tri-Color display over to Propeller C (SimpleIDE with SimpleTools.h). It just dumps an image (embedded in the code) to the display, but it's a starting point. It could easily be changed to dump a frame buffer that code has drawn to, similar to the oled display.

It needs a PASM SPI driver, again similar to the oled display, so that it's not so slow downloading the image. However, it does take a fair bit of time to update the display once the image is dumped into it. So you aren't going to be updating this in real time like other displays.
Anyway, here's a video showing it working:"

Video and post here - https://www.facebook.com/groups/blockly/permalink/2236704469884907/

And added this comment, "he single color variants update a fair bit faster (2 seconds for the 1.54", and 4 seconds for the 4.2"), still not real time, but much nicer. They still recommend long update intervals, even though you can update them more often."

Rayman · 2019-01-09 14:09

I posted a driver for one near the bottom of this thread:
https://forums.parallax.com/discussion/158160/p8x32a-and-pervasive-display-2-7-264-x-176-117-dpi-code-samples

Ken Gracey · 2019-01-09 15:20

@"Roy Eltham" and I have been working towards having one of these in stock at Parallax with driver support. He's done everything necessary for us and it's a matter of integrating his work into a library, putting it in BlocklyProp, and getting the chosen model in stock. We only want to stock one or two of these and support them properly.

We will need Spin drivers, too. It seems Rayman may have pointed us to one.

I need some more help in Parallax to get these things done, it seems. We're short-staffed and P2 has diverted some of our team.

Ken Gracey

Buck Rogers · 2019-01-09 15:36

Rayman wrote: »

I posted a driver for one near the bottom of this thread:
https://forums.parallax.com/discussion/158160/p8x32a-and-pervasive-display-2-7-264-x-176-117-dpi-code-samples

Hello!
Ray I just finished re-reading that amazing thread. Now my question, what's the name, behind that incredible Prop board that the display is connected to. It looks incredibly custom to my mind.

Rayman · 2019-01-09 15:47

That's a Propeller Platform board.
I can't sell them anymore, but the design files are here:
http://www.rayslogic.com/propeller/Products/PPE/PPE.htm

Looks like there is a version for sale here:
http://mghdesigns.com/propeller/mgh-designs/dna.html

Roy Eltham · 2019-01-09 17:03

The code I provided Ken is in the form of a Simple Libraries library to be used with SimpleIDE. It's API is modeled after the existing oled display library one in the Simple Libraries. This was done so that it could be easily integrated into BlocklyProp.
There are some things missing, like it doesn't have the scrolling (each eink display update takes a long time, so scrolling would be pointless). You can draw lines, shapes, and text in a few sizes (using fonts stored in the upper eeprom just like the oled display library).

It currently only works with the 2.9inch B/W waveshare display, and it could easily also support the 1.54inch B/W waveshare display. The other sizes of displays require completely different setup code, and sometimes even have different SPI commands or work slightly different with their memory. It's rather annoying. Also, supporting the 3 color versions requires double the buffer memory and yet still different setup code and SPI commands to drive.

These display appear to work differently than the one Rayman wrote a Spin/PASM one for... still SPI, but a different way to update the display's pixels.

Tracy Allen · 2019-01-09 20:01

Newhaven COG trans-reflective displays are very readable in daylight, at least I can vouch that for the character displays I've used. This one appears to be about 3" square, 128x128, 3Vx1mA power, exclusive of optional backlight.

Another thread:
looking-for-a-recommendation-on-a-low-power-display-updated-with-results
For small instruments, I settled on the 1.3" Sharp memory LCD, LS013B7DH06, with 128x128 pixels, 12µW power at 3V. Pervasive like eInk, so the display can be viewed at any time at a glance in daylight while consuming practically no power. My driver creates the text and bar-graph line by line on the fly, so the memory footprint is small. Sharp makes larger memory LCDs, but they are hard to come by in small quantities.

jmg · 2019-01-09 22:02

Tracy Allen wrote: »

For small instruments, I settled on the 1.3" Sharp memory LCD, LS013B7DH06, with 128x128 pixels, 12µW power at 3V. Pervasive like eInk, so the display can be viewed at any time at a glance in daylight while consuming practically no power. My driver creates the text and bar-graph line by line on the fly, so the memory footprint is small. Sharp makes larger memory LCDs, but they are hard to come by in small quantities.

Silabs use those 1.3" ones in their STKs.
The LS027B7DH01A shows as stocked at Arrow, and WPG
The LS032B7DD02 looks hard to find

Bean · 2019-01-10 01:46

Thanks for the suggestions guys.
I'm not worried about power, it just needs to be readable in direct sunlight.

Bean

Tracy Allen · 2019-01-10 21:00

This chart from https://www.newhavendisplay.com/product_knowledge_center.html
Column 4 is "sunlight readable". Type "sunlight" into the Newhaven search box for the category, including those TFTs that score better in contrast and brightness.

Rayman · 2019-01-10 21:42

I think e-ink would be better than any LCD in direct sunlight...

Buck Rogers · 2019-01-10 22:45

Rayman wrote: »

I think e-ink would be better than any LCD in direct sunlight...

And it is. The crowd are repurposing some e-book readers to pose as glider support contraptions. And one individual did indeed do all of that to one for his sailboat. The most famous actually runs a simplified example of Linux inside it. And the lesser of the two is actually an Android one inside its e-ink display.

Not surprisingly my support is the one for the biggest something store on that planet then for the one who does everything else, although I freely admit I did see a Sumo bot and its TAB book when walking into it several years ago. *(They are no longer present at their Forest Hills NY location.)

Oh and I did ask on the Adafruit site's fora for the Sharp contraption regarding the Prop and my favorite dot-net platform. Question is still open.

Anyone used a eink or epaper display with the Propeller ?

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