Heroically avoiding any puns about blowing … raspberries, I’m delighted to report that a Kickstarter campaign to create an e-paper display for the Raspberry Pi has succeeded past all expectations, and looks on track to exceed its target by at least 50 percent, with 24 days still to go at the time of writing. The Raspberry Pi, as many will know, is a family of single-board computers, usually running a Linux-based OS, originally started as a teaching aid for schools, but now with an increasingly wide and fervent fan following among hackers, geeks and general users. And now one enthusiast has launched his own bid to put e-paper into the mix.
“I made a printed circuit board (PCB) which meets the Raspberry Pi Foundation’s HAT specification,” explains Neil Matthews, who operates via Percheron Electronics Ltd. “The board is able to drive a 2.7″ 264 x 176 pixel E-paper display panel and I’m really rather pleased with the way it looks. It can also drive the 1.44″ and 2″ display panels from the same manufacturer.” Matthews’ solution was designed to fit on top of the Raspberry Pi board, with no trailing cables. At such a pixel count, applications for the current screen size are naturally slightly limited, but Matthews instances possible uses including a desk or wall clock, a Twitter feed display, or a weather station.
As of now, the project has attracted 270 backers, with £14,177 ($19,713) pledged against its £10,250 ($15,294) goal. There’s no sign yet of a larger ereader size screen for the device, but seeing as someone else has already built a working mobile phone around a Raspberry Pi, perhaps there is hope …
