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E Ink faces growing competition in the "paper-like" display space - Liliputing (liliputing.com)

submitted 2 months ago by Alphane_Moon@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world

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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/19284817

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[–] sxan@midwest.social 4 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

I know E Ink is a company, but for most of us it's become a de-facto term referring to the technology, like kleenex, or q-tips.

I have every Pebble model, and used them until the last one's battery finally gave out. I've been using various e-ink (e-paper) readers, from the first Sony to my current Kobo & reMarkable (one for leisure reading, t'other for PDFs and writing). Are those displays different technologies than E Ink's? Does the display process E Ink uses differ from other e-paper technologies? Are they not all based on polarized, bi-colored balls?

I have nothing against pedantry, but I also think E Ink has lost (or won, depending on how you look at it) the identity game; I suspect the majority of people - if surveyed - would neither realize E Ink is a specific company, nor that the correct generic term is "e-paper." Everyone I know (with whom the topic comes up) just call it "e-ink," whether or not it comes from that company. Similarly, I've never heard anyone call it "e-paper" IRL.

P.S. I just did a search for "e-paper watches", and most results call them "e-ink." Maybe they all use E Ink-brand displays, but I can't really tell since none seem to capitalize or (tm) the term. There's a bunch of cheap watches on Alibaba which are called "e-ink" watches - are those all really using E Ink brand displays?

[–] JohnEdwa@sopuli.xyz 1 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

E-paper is the category for any display that looks kinda like paper. E-ink is a specific technology (by a specific company, yes,) that uses blobs suspended in oil in small capsules that are controlled by magnetic fields.

Pebble uses a Sharp memory LCD, which as the name suggests, is a liquid crystal display. If you categorize pebbles as a "eink watches", then a gameboy is one low-power memory chip away from being an eink handheld gaming console, the display tech is otherwise identical - a transflective lcd.

[–] sxan@midwest.social 1 points 2 months ago

Thanks; TIL.

Pebble advertised their displays as "e-ink", and I never thought to question it. The best lay resource I found while digging into this was an article on TechRadar, which was about a new product but gives a good overview of the technology and history.