He hopes the work will inspire others to experiment with what’s possible using the dinky MCUs you generally find in second-hand shelf labels.Ĭontinue reading “Driving E-Paper Displays With Memory Limited MCUs” → Posted in Microcontrollers Tagged 8 bit, e-ink, e-paper, Electronic shelf label Combined with his existing work with image decompression on constrained hardware, he’s able to rapidly draw out full-screen TIFF images using an Arduino UNO as demonstrated in the video after the break. For example, a 1-bit 128 x 128 image would consume 2 KB of RAM - more than four times the available memory on an ATtiny85.Īs explains, his alternate approach is to write data to the display in columns that are only one byte wide. The problem is that these displays generally expect to be handed a fully-formed image, which can easily exceed the free RAM on a low-end chip. In a recent write-up, he goes over his experiments with driving e-paper displays (specifically, salvaged electronic shelf labels) with 8-bit MCUs that on paper shouldn’t have the resources to run them. For many projects we don’t even have to consider optimizing our code, because we aren’t even scratching the surface of what the hardware is capable of.īut sometimes you don’t have the luxury of using the latest-and-greatest chip, and have to play the hand you’re dealt. It’s easy to become jaded by modern microcontrollers: for just a few bucks you can get a MCU that’s powerful enough to give a desktop computer from the early 90s a run for its money while packing in contemporary technology like WiFi and Bluetooth. Continue reading “Low Power Challenge: E-Paper Shelf Label Becomes Ultra-Frugal Clock” → Posted in clock hacks Tagged e-paper clock, Electronic shelf label, nRF52832 You can see how cleverly everything snaps together in the video embedded below. One side can be opened to access the internal components, although that’s really only needed to charge the battery. The clock is housed in an enclosure that’s simple but effective: a 3D-printed triangular prism with a slot for the screen and space for the 18650 lithium battery. Power on the left, e-ink on the right: the custom PCB is clever and compact, too It’s based on a 128×296 pixel e-ink display paired with an nRF52832 BlueTooth Low-Energy SoC and uses just 65 micro-amperes on average: low enough to keep it running for more than a year on a single battery charge. Luckily, has managed to reverse engineer many types of shelf labels, and he’s demonstrated the results by turning one into an ultra-low-power clock called Triink. While such electronic shelf labels are now easy to find, actually re-using them is often tricky due to a lack of documentation. Over the past two decades, e-paper has evolved from an exotic and expensive display technology to something cheap enough to be used for supermarket price tags.
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