Easy e-paper finally comes to microcontrollers, with this breakout that's designed to make it a breeze to add a tri-colour eInk display. Chances are you've seen one of those new-fangled 'e-readers' like the Kindle or Nook. They have gigantic electronic paper 'static' displays - that means the image stays on the display even when power is completely disconnected. The image is also high contrast and very daylight readable. It really does look just like printed paper!
We've liked these displays for a long time, but breakouts were never designed for makers to use. Finally, we decided to make our own!
This breakout has a 2.9" tri-colour (red, black, and white) display. It has 296x128 black and red ink pixels and a whiteish background. Using our CircuitPython or Arduino libraries, you can create a 'frame buffer' with what pixels you want to have activated and then write that out to the display. Most simple breakouts leave it at that. But if you do the math, 296 x 128 pixels x 2 colours = 9.5 KBytes. Which won't fit into many microcontroller memories. Heck, even if you do have 32KB of RAM, why waste 10KB?
So we did you a favour and tossed a small SRAM chip on the back. This chip shares the SPI port the eInk display uses, so you only need one extra pin. And, no more frame-buffering! You can use the SRAM to set up whatever you want to display, then shuffle data from SRAM to eInk when you're ready. The library we wrote does all the work for you, you can just interface with it as if it were an Adafruit_GFX-compatible display.
For ultra-low power usages, the onboard 3.3V regulator has the Enable pin brought out so you can shut down the power to the SRAM, MicroSD, and display.
We even tossed on a MicroSD socket so you can store images, text files, whatever you like to display. Everything is 3 or 5V logic safe so you can use it with any microcontroller.
This display breakout also features an 18-pin "EYESPI" standard FPC connector with a flip-top connector. You can use an 18-pin 0.5mm pitch FPC cable to connect to all the GPIO pins when you want to skip the soldering. Comes assembled and tested, with some header. You'll need a soldering iron to attach the header for breadboarding or installing into your project.
Revision History
As of June 14th, 2024 – We've updated this PCB with a new EYESPI connector along with the Adafruit Pinguin to make a lovely and legible silkscreen.
Also, this has been updated to have a 2.9" Tri-Color eInk display with a UC8151D chipset
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