[gcanyon]

Are (large) e-ink displays expensive because of lack of scale in manufacturing? Or is there something inherently expensive about them? This display is literally almost ten times the cost of a generic 4K monitor, which has color, a higher resolution, and a 60 hertz refresh rate.

The only advantage here is the reflective display and the ultra-low power consumption. I'm not saying that there aren't use cases where those could be critical/decisive, but given the cost differential it seems like the decision between the two is effectively automatic: the products don't compete, in the same way an SUV doesn't compete with a Cessna: if you need to fly, you buy the plane; otherwise the car is a no-brainer.

I ask because I would love to have a second monitor like this display: easy on the eyes, distraction-free, etc. But at this cost it's a ridiculous non-starter for that purpose.

[eli]

I chatted with the guy from Visionect about this once and he said that it was basically all about scale. There is massive demand for the panels that go in those generic LED monitors and many huge factories dedicated to making them.

The eink display looks gorgeous, by the way. But it's not a computer monitor and doesn't claim to be.

[fmajid]

You'd think there would be a large market for signage, and the process for manufacturing electrophoretic e-ink screens isn't that different from web printing (rotary presses), which is both mature and scalable (in size).

[dirtyid]

I think eink does not perfrom well in freezing temperatures which removes a lot of large format addressable signage market. Otherwise I'd expect economics to drive cheaper large format eink screens

[dbttdft]

To be fair it will have a good viewing angle even better than IPS as well as not shining a flashlight in your face with a terrible spectral power distribution but I don't expect a real analysis by someone who compares 2 watt power savings as if this is the bottleneck of display tech or anything close to it.

[ptman]

I wonder what these cost? https://www.pinterest.com/pin/652670170980558713/