[marcjuul]

It's actually simpler than a table of voltages. It's a series of trinary values that indicate whether to use positive, negative or zero voltage. The actual voltage used is static (even the specialized EPDC PMIC (which _is_ a separate chip) doesn't allow changing it on the devices I've seen). The waveform (as they call the lookup table) is sometimes actually stored on a separate flash chip soldered on to the display's built-in cable. Years ago I wrote a tool to decode and convert the proprietary formats used by the E Ink corporation for these: https://github.com/fread-ink/inkwave

[robinsoh]

> I wrote a tool to decode and convert the proprietary formats used by the E Ink corporation for these: https://github.com/fread-ink/inkwave

Just curious, I previously saw claims on HN that E-Ink is a very brutal cruel company that is evil and attacks everybody. That didn't line up with how their staff, at least the materials science guys, seemed to be when I encountered them at SID. I've been asking for evidence for this on HN. Did they try to take down your tool or anything like that?

[captainmuon]

Yes, but at the same time I think it is more complicated than a table of voltages. I don't know about the OG kindle, but more recent e-ink displays have a multi-parameter look up table. The applied voltage and duration also depends on this history of the cell (the current color you think it is showing) and the temperature. Depending on how many color and temperature steps you use, the tables can become very big.

In hobbyist displays, the tables are very simple, and I'm pretty sure this is one source of quality differences.