Interactive ePaper
Are you looking for a more advanced Electronic Paper Display solution?
Melrose offers cutting-edge interactive ePaper technology for your project.
Interactive ePaper
ePaper display (EPD) technology has been used successfully in consumer solutions such as ebook readers. The constant development of the ePaper made it increasingly useful for businesses. For example, we’re seeing more ePaper applications appearing in digital signage and transport applications.
Melrose teamed up with Unisystem, the technology partner of E Ink, to deliver the best possible ePaper solutions to our clients. One of them is interactive EPD achieved thanks to innovative EPD controllers that allow controlling the displayed information.
EPD controllers
We offer three types of controllers that support the most popular sizes of ePaper displays used in industrial applications. The first supports displays from 7.8’’ up to 11.3’’, including the medium-sized 9.7’’ displays. The second is dedicated to ePapers with diagonal of 13.3’’ – both BW (black & white version) and BWR (black, white & red). The last one is for the largest ePaper display type – a 31.2’’ display.
When designing the controllers, our partner, Unisystem, needed to combine the ease of integration and implementation of the complete component in the end product and facilitation of the complex image control. The controller is powered from a single source (5V) and enables communication through both SPI and USB interfaces. It supports 4-bit graphics, which helps to extend the range of applications to digital signage.
Image refresh
EPD is recommended for static applications with interactive elements. The most significant issue present in ePaper solutions is the low refresh rate of the shown image. Currently, it’s possible to make EPD solutions that display information using various modes that differ in the frequency and accuracy of the mapping. By reducing the projection’s precision, we can achieve a much smoother image.
Our clients can choose from several modes presented in the table below:
| Mode | Global / Local | Grayscale mapping | Ghosting | Refresh time [ms] | Usage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| INIT | Global | n/a | n/a | 2000 | Display initialization |
| DU | Local | 4-bit to 1-bit | Low | 260 | Monochromatic menu, text input |
| GC16 | Global | 4-bit | Very low | 480 | Monochromatic menu, text input |
| GL16 | Global | 4-bit | Medium | 480 | Text on white background |
| A2 | Local | 1-bit | Medium | 120 | Fast page scroll at low contrast |
| DU4 | Local | 4-bit to 2-bit | Medium | 290 | Antialiased text on touch menu |
Interactive modes
The Animation mode is a flashless mode used for frequent and rapid content changes and simple animations. The image quality and ghosting are reduced, and the response time is faster. This mode works only with black and white graphics currently.
The DU4 mode supports grayscale transitions. It’s flashless and resembles the Direct Update mode. Each pixel in the 16-level grayscale is changed to a pixel in 4-level grayscale (0 – black, 5, 10, 15 – white). The combination of fast reaction time and the grayscale works great for anti-aliased text (for example, a restaurant menu).
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