Daylight Computer – New 60fps e-paper tablet

[Dopedangel]

According to them this is a new display tech and not from eink. Looks good might actually be the thing that most people wanting to use eink as a monitor will be happy with.

https://daylightcomputer.com/product


Discussion on hackernews

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40456834

[BionicGecko]

Looks interesting and perhaps promising, but at 729$ I think I’ll wait for the reviews to roll in.

[Quoth]

Is it actually a mono LCD with matt glass surface and orange LEDs for backlight? Matt displays are 40+ years old. It's simply cheaper to have a shiny surface.

The interview suggests it's not bistable.

There’s still many cases where traditional Eink is going to be better (bistability, viewing angle, white state color, etc),

So that means power consumption while you read. Real epaper of the eink type uses no power till you turn the page. CPU and display controller sleeps while you read.

If it was really a fast epaper using new technology they'd sell panels, not an ereader?

Also it's Android, which suggests they are lacking in SW development skills.

We built an android tablet around it

It's very sketchy on what the display technology is. Maybe a transreflective mono LCD with orange LEDs? It's not going to be the basis of a desktop eink monitor.

no ghosting and high refresh rate - 60 to 120fps

Needing a big battery. However that's doable.

A mono LCD lets more than x4 the light through of a colour model

You can get very good tablets (TCL Nxtpaper). TCL is a very large company that makes displays, Alcatel phones, TVs, Nokia phones.

You can also get some models of LG (23″) and Samsung 4K desktop monitors that are flicker free, no glare or reflection and can be almost like paper to use. I recently also got a tablet like matt QHD 16″ portable display for my Pi or laptop that while it's not as good as TCL Nxtpaper, it's better than Apple screen in the showroom last week. Sits in front of the laptop HD screen for a better experience.

[Quoth]

This is a good point too

You should probably eliminate the "blue light free" claim. Per results on clinicaltrials.gov, blue light conclusively does not impact sleep outcomes.
This is complex for a layperson to investigate, but you have to search for insomnia, sleep disorders, wakefulness during the day, and only studies with results. There are many uncompleted studies - it is typical for studies that have no chance of producing an interesting outcome are dropped by their investigators even when registered. However, those uncompleted studies produce many conflating results.

For example, https://clinicaltrials.gov/study/NCT...00?tab=results specifically investigated using blue light blocking lenses compared to clear lenses. This was not blinded. The differences in all their measures were within 1 standard deviation between the groups, so the result is conclusive that (1) insomnia scores vary very widely among people as a baseline (2) if there is a real effect, it is pretty small and would require a larger sample size to measure. Of course when they measure the part where you don't know if you're looking at blue light, like when you are actually asleep, there is no difference between groups.

This is just to say that the whole blue light thing - placebo effects are real. People perceive this blue light thing as real, particularly tech people. Seed.com is successful. You can do placebos. But you should do the right thing and cut weird claims with no real evidence that are really small brained.

I had a Toshiba clamshell portable computer once. Mains only but looked like a laptop. It had an orange plasma screen.

I once had a company assembling Thorn mono 12″ TVs converted to monitors. We bought them in bulk without the CRT and fitted green or orange CRTs. Sold to schools for Apple II and BBC Micro computers. Our logo plate fitted over where the tuner was and the video connector replaced the aerial socket. Nicer than the metal box 9″ and 12″ screens dealers were selling.

White CRTs were not more tiring. Green or Amber was not better. It turned out that what tires is reflections from too shiny surface. The ACT Sirius 1 / Victor 9000 was bettter becaus of the fine matt black mesh over the green CRT, not because it was green. Years later there were some 17″ and 19″ colour CRT monitors with matt flat face plates that were like looking at soot when off. No pale grey or reflections or shine at all.

It's been rare on LCD due to cost. Shiny is cheap and looks better in a showroom with over-saturated demo video.

[Quoth]

It is a mono trans-reflective LCD* and full of hype. Not at all the "first blue light free" computer, which isn't even needed.
https://www.androidpolice.com/the-da...ablet-is-here/

Likely quite dull without the orange LED backlight (more than about about 25 years old).

It's up to 120 Hz refresh (so LCD) and non PWM brightness is very hard on the battery at 20% compared to PWM.
[* 30 year old technology updated]


Other links
Less accurate https://www.theverge.com/2024/5/23/2...blet-livepaper
Also inaccurate https://www.zdnet.com/article/best-small-tablet/

The claims on blue light are debunked. It's the stimulation of active content and simple brightness or reflections is what causes wakefulness or eye strain.

I had a trans-reflective LCD phone twice. One was about 25 years ago and the other maybe 16 years ago. Mono in direct sunlight and colour in dim light with backlight on, but this is a mono LCD, so doesn't need as high resolution and is likely a little brighter without the back light.

Some versions of the the OLPC may have used trans-reflective LCDs. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_La...ild#Technology

[Quoth]

Also the 8000mAH power cell is larger than average for an Android Tablet. Same as the TCL Nxtpaper 11, which really is very like coloured paper, very matt and natural.