Valve open-source the Steam Machine e-ink screen so you can make your own(gamingonlinux.com) |
Valve open-source the Steam Machine e-ink screen so you can make your own(gamingonlinux.com) |
The thing is, Eink's waveform is kind of secret afaik, everyone has different tuning.
> Image update time - 25 ºC - - 4 - sec
I'm guessing you could probably push that somewhat by going beyond the specifications, would wager a guess how far though.
The other idea I keep noodling about is creating modular gears and perhaps using a servo for a really cool dial indicator instead, but alas, it hasn't made it further than my ideas bin.
Check it out here: https://github.com/xfoa/humours. It's not finished yet, but the basic functionality works. It just has one widget at the moment that draws a spinning cube with temps, etc.
https://www.crowdsupply.com/modos-tech/modos-paper-monitor/#...
$700
13.3-inch E Ink Carta ™ 1300 Display or E Ink Kaleido ™ 3 Display
Touch support
3200 x 2400 resolution (300 PPI)
Up to 60 Hz refresh rate
Sub-100 ms latency
USB Type-C with DisplayPort Alt Mode
"5.83inch E-Paper Display (G), E-ink Display, 648 × 480, Red/Yellow/Black/White, SPI Interface" https://www.waveshare.com/5.83inch-e-paper-g.htm?sku=32584
A better way to look at this is valve is trying to hedge it's self against microsoft. By creating an ecosystem of devices and software that's full open so they're not reliant on Microsoft. The goal of Valve hardware ISN'T to make money. It's to encourage others to build devices free of Microsoft that Steam can be installed on.
They have nothing to gain by being closed, and everything to gain by being open.
Efficiency is not a word I would use when speaking about rent-seeking. Landlord that 20 years ago bought some land that later became valuable and who is today renting it out is infinitely efficient as they are doing jack. And amount of respect they get is about equal to their economic output.
Steam has been an incredibly good steward of its position, but I fear for the day when capitalism finally sinks its claws into the platform.
Capitalism has nothing to do with short term greed.
Some CEOs are just too arrogant and think that optimizing for the short term won't hurt goodwill. That's their own failure. Capitalism says nothing about how a business should be run. It's merely defining the idea that humans who own things (capital) allocate their resources and keep the result.
On the other hand, you probably don't want that glow of an active screen all the time. Status LEDs are annoying enough.
My kindles usually show a dead battery graphic when I get back to them after a long time away... With enough power storage and the right trigger, this could be done.
I remember a few years ago when many custom PC cases had 5.25"-bay displays to control their fans / show temperatures. Some rackmount server appliances also make use of them
What would you suggest instead?
If we are talking past tense, "Valve have open-sourced.."
And if we are talking American "English," then "Valve has open-sourced..."
Too bad. The picture in the articles looks awesome. Like a device from some alternate reality. Neither retro nor the standard flat-panel LCD.
I don't want to mod a pre-build $1,049 device. I want it to be good our of the box and I'd rather pay more to get more. (If it was a $3K top-of-midrange machine, I would buy it in a second.)
The result is that for about 70 dollars less you can put together a somewhat more powerful PC than the Steam Machine, but not for that form factor, it would still be bigger.
IMO, the Steam Machine is not a bad purchase if you are in the market for that type of product.
The steam controller would work just fine.
Valve supports SteamOS on other hardware.
For the same price I can get a prebuilt desktop PC with double the performance (Ryzen 7 5700 + RTX 5060 Ti)
Even if you go mini ITX you can get a better PC with 50% more performance (Ryzen 7 5600x + RTX 5060) https://pcpartpicker.com/forums/topic/498435-diy-45l-steam-m...
If you don’t care that much about size, HDMI-CEC or SteamOS there are faster alternatives for the price.
Compared to an average prebuilt? You can probably find large tower PCs at a lower price, but they'll likely have a low quality motherboard or power supply.
Compared to an average prebuilt that ships with Linux? Absolutely
Regulation can also break things if done incorrectly/poorly/inefficiently/corruptly.
This is the real killer feature. So many people that I talk to know they want Linux, but are deathly afraid of installing it themselves.
But they'll also be bigger, louder, probably not support HDMI-CEC, may or may not support waking via bluetooth, and it's a gamble whether they'll support Linux as well. Both are totally valid options, it just comes down to which tradeoffs you prefer.
Same with Steam. You are absolutely free to sell your game not on Steam. Except that unless you're a super massive giant selling highly anticipated game you might get no sales. But the choice to eat or starve is always up to you.
And all of the reviews I've seen about the Steam Machine talk about how well both of those features work.
SteamDeck as a handheld is great plus or minus a few nits baked onto the power / battery life choices Valve made. SteamDeck -> TV and SteamDeck -> USB-C KVM are both workable, with caveats. I had hoped we would see the bug fixes you describe before the Steam Machine release. Alas, no.
Bluetooth wake made available for LCD Decks in September 2025 (it was already available in OLED models) https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1675200/view/4983336...
I will say that the Deck has less than stellar bluetooth reception in my experience too. I settled on an 8bitdo controller because my XBox Elite couldn't stay connected from across the room. The Steam Machine has a dedicated antenna for Steam Controllers though.
SteamDeck supports HDMI-CEC as of 3.7 ~2 years ago, using the original dock or select third party docks.
---
How to Enable CEC:
Press the STEAM button and go to Settings.
Navigate to the Display tab.
On the right side of the screen, find and toggle on Enable HDMI CEC Support.
Ensure Wake TV when device resumes from sleep is also enabled.
We had some secret eink sauce (propriety waveforms) to get the high refresh rates and colour contrast without a full flashing screen reset, but even then you need to run longer maintenance refreshes occasionally.
Pixels are just vertical columns of viscous fluid with charged ink particles. A waveform is just voltage changes over time to these columns to shift the particles up and down. More black to the top = darker shade of grey. Colour (in the gallery display, at least) is the same, just with each CMY particle group having different charges and responses to different waveforms.
Every once in awhile this vertical column gets messy with loose particles distributed through it (ghosting, muddy contrast) so performing a hard rail-to-rail voltage reset forces all the particles up and then down, and gives you a clean slate.
I have a question, hope it's not too sensitive, how do you guy protect your secret waveform ? One with enough tool and determination can just measure voltage at pixel and reverse the whole thing, the chinese can do that in less than a week i bet.
Also when pushing for high refresh rate, you may need to use higher voltage, to make the droplets rise/fall faster. But sometime, those droplets are driven too hard and kind of stuck forever, so yeah, that's a trade off.
Sounds like a battery, or maybe even a dishwasher.
eInk mostly fixed the calibration issue years ago before the first eink monitors came out, and most eink products these days use beefier graphics processors.
It is my understanding (but I'm not even remotely an expert) that e-paper panels can suffer from permanent display burn due to the charged ink particles sticking to the glass. The stock waveforms take this into account and prevent it from happening. However I'm not entirely clear on the low level details or if this only applies to some subset of panels or etc.
If you have 2 or more controllers, you're often better off going with wifi dongles.
Versus someone drawing on the screen with a lot of zooming and panning. People with the tablet would notice that when they stop a series of these actions that were back to back, the screen will "clean" itself after about 5 seconds of idleness.
[1]: https://github.com/prashnts/betty-epd/blob/master/notebooks/...
But I was too lazy and/or uninterested to attempt low level tinkering with e-paper myself and these days you can finally purchase some reasonably(ish) fast panels off the shelf.
But still, that does not prevent one from measuring the voltage directly at pixel.