Squix (Daniel Eichhorn) has designed a 2.9″ ESPaper Lite Kite is a battery powered kit based on a black and white ePaper module, and ESP-WROOM-02 module based on Espressif Systems ESP8266 WiSoC.
2.9″ ESPaper Lite Kit specifications:
- Wireless Module – ESP-WROOM-02 WiFi module with Espressif ESP8266
- Display – 2.9″ B&W ePaper module with 296×128 pixels resolution connect over SPI to ESP8266
- Debugging / Programming – 6-pin serial port header
- USB – 1x micro USB port for programming
- Misc – 3 buttons: Reset (wake up from deep sleep); S0 (flash/GPIO0); S1: user button connected to GPIO12; power switch; charging and (firmware) flashing LEDs
- Power – JST connector for LiPo battery; charging circuit
You’ll need a 3.3V USB to TTL debug board for flashing the firmware to the board, and a LiPo battery to power it up. The solution is particularly useful if you want a battery powered display that is infrequently updated, since such display only consumes electricity when updated. They could run the module for several weeks with a 800m Ah battery while updating weather info every 20 minutes. MiniGrafx library provides drivers and samples for the board. It is available on Github.
The 2.9″ ESPaper Lite kit can be purchased for $39.90, but if you want something easier to get started you may want to get the 2.9″ ESPaper Plus Kit instead for $49.90, as it adds a USB to serial converter, a 600 mAh battery, an enclosure, and a USB cable.
Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.
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The screen is quite small. I prefer the bigger e-paper screens. E.g. the 4.3″ version. Needs more DIY skills though
That’s nicely integrated, but it’s quite a premium for that integration. As someone who is interested in ePaper, I’ve been looking for something like this, but at 2x the price of the parts, it doesn’t really appeal to me.
@willmore
But looks pretty good. In fact, looks awesome for a fancy implementation.
Is I2C available somewhere to allow connect to local sensor?
@Lightwave
Sort of. You could solder it to the I2C pin on ESP-WROOM-02 module. See pinout diagram: http://www.quitsq.com/download/develop/ESP-WROOM-02_pinout_diagram.pdf
@willmore
pricing is a bit high compared to just a wemos d1 mini connected to an epaper module. There are cheap epaper modules on aliexpress or taobao.
This project looks interesting, is there a basics guide for building this stuff, new to soldering stuff.
@zoobab
Agreed. The marginal benefit from combining those parts is well less than the incremental cost of this device.