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by thelazyone 1051 days ago
If the update was truly pixel based there should be no ghosting/artifact whatsoever. Looks like global refreshes or cleanup are still relevant, while ideally each pixel could be completely independent.

Trade-offs are a problem, but in this case i don't see any physical reason for this to be a theoretical trade-off. More like a limit of the current technology.
3 comments
arp242 1051 days ago
It is pixel-based, it just doesn't result in perfect updates. I'm not entirely sure why this is the case: maybe the power is too low (as a trade-off between speed and accuracy), maybe clear a cell affects neighbouring cells, or maybe something else.

E-ink displays are hardly new and lots of people have been thinking about/working on the slow refresh rates for over 2 decades. Do you really think that anything you can come up with on HN in 5 minutes without any knowledge of the tech is something people hadn't thought of before?

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thelazyone 1051 days ago
There's a big difference between having a solution and point out that there is no theoretical hard trade-off. ^^"
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mdp2021 1051 days ago
> If the update was truly pixel based there should be no

Why? Nobody said that the cell is "reset". The cell is modified. The resulting state depends on the former state. This causes ghosting.

To achieve what you are suggesting, the procedure would be e.g. to first set the pixel black, then white (reset to a base state), then the greyscale value of the intended content. This would slow down rendering dramatically, and make regions flicker.

And, note, this may be something that some "EPD waveforms" do - but there are tradeoffs... E.g. Fast? Ok, lose the greyscales. Detailed? Ok, get lots of flashing at update. Mid-way? Ok get some degree of ghosting.

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thelazyone 1051 days ago
That's a fair point, well made. In that case --- yeah, we just have to wait and hope for better solutions/materials for our screens!
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Brian_K_White 1051 days ago
It is pixel based logically, which comes out only imperfectly physically. Believe what you will.
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thelazyone 1051 days ago
Yeah, the other replies were pretty convincing about that point.
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