Seeed Studio’s reTerminal E1001 and E1002 are two ePaper displays featuring an ESP32-S3 WiFi and Bluetooth LE wireless microcontroller suitable for dashboards or digital signage applications.
The only difference between the two reTerminal E-series displays is that the E1001 features a 7.5-inch monochrome display, while the E1002 integrates a 7.3-inch 6-color ePaper display. Both come with a 2,000 mAh battery offering up to 3 months of battery life, a 32MB SPI flash, a microSD card slot, a microphone and a buzzer, temperature and humidity sensors, an 8-pin GPIO header, and a few buttons and LEDs.
reTerminal E1001/E1002 specifications:
- Wireless SoC – Espressif Systems ESP32-S3 dual-core microcontroller with 8MB PSRAM
- Storage
- 32MB SPI flash
- MicroSD card slot up to 32GB (FAT32 file system only)
- Display
- E1001 – 7.5-inch Monochrome ePaper display with 800×480 resolution
- E1002 – 7.3-inch “Full Color” (i.e., 6-color) ePaper display with 800×480 resolution
- Audio
- Microphone (3) for voice interaction
- Buzzer for sound alerts
- Wireless Connectivity – 2.4GHz 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi 4 and Bluetooth 5.0 via ESP32-S3
- Sensors – Temperature and humidity sensors
- Expansion – 8-pin expansion header with GPIO, I2C, VDD, and GND (9)
- Misc
- 3x buttons to control the display (2)
- Power Switch (5)
- Status (6) and Power (7) LEDs
- Battery – 2,000 mAh, good for up to 3 months
- Power Input – 5V/1A via USB-C port
- Dimensions – 176 x 120 x 53mm with stand, or 17mm without stand
- Temperature Range – 0-40°C
On the software side, the ePaper display ships with SenseCraft HMI firmware, featuring a no-code UI platform that allows users to easily create dashboards without requiring any programming skills. Smart Home users can switch to ESPHome firmware for Home Assistant integration, and users requiring more flexibility can roll out their own firmware with Arduino, PlatformIO, or the ESP-IDF framework. The TRMNL platform for E Ink dashboard management is an option, but requires a $50 one-time payment. You’ll find all resources to get started with either model on the wiki.
Those are not exactly the first ~7-inch ePaper displays with an ESP32 microcontroller on the market, and alternatives include Seeed Studio’s own XIAO 7.5″ ePaper panel, the TRMNL wireless E-Ink display, and Inkplate 6 MOTION, among others. DIY users can also purchase a similar 7.5-inch E-Ink display with an SPI interface for ESP32 boards. As I see it, the main benefits of the new reTerminal E wireless displays are the extra features for audio, sensors, and expansion, SenseCraft HMI no-code platform, and extensive documentation for various user requirements.
The reTerminal E1001 monochrome display sells for $69, while the E1002 6-color version goes for $99. Both variants should eventually become available on the Seeed Studio’s Aliexpress store.
Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.
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It’s getting interesting. However they’re never showing the refresh time, I suspect it’s not much fast and could limit the use cases…
The black and white (4 grey levels, actually) version is probably the same screen as this one which has listed refresh times ranging between 1.5 and 4 seconds, but it supports partial refresh (listed at 0.4 seconds).
The color one is likely the same as this one which as a listed refresh time of 12 seconds, no partial refresh. Also available here listed at 15-22 seconds refresh time. Spectra E6 screens have nice colours but they are terribly slow. There’s supposed to be a Spectra 6 Plus coming with a faster 7 seconds refresh, not sure if it’s available yet. The Kaleido and Gallery ranges are much faster but have terrible colours and I believe require a more powerful CPU to drive them. If only they could come up with a Spectra 6 with partial refresh…
They seem to be nice devices, but I’m still waiting for one with a more power-efficient CPU, and especially power-efficient touch screen which works in standby mode without draining the battery too fast.
[ with watching the video it looks like it changes the picture/app information almost instantly with transferred firmware changes for being the new application firmware/adjusted secondary binaries for to manage the display pictures/data?
Is it several seconds for refreshing the pixel buffer/preparing for switching the pixel color/’delay’ between display updates or is it for actually/physically redrawing the screen?
“Physical Mechanism:
E-ink displays work by physically moving charged particles (pigments) within microcapsules. This is a slower process than LCDs, which use liquid crystals.”
“Common reasons include the display’s slow refresh rate and the need to perform slower, full-screen “clear” waveforms periodically to prevent “ghosting”. Other factors such as low temperatures, the communication interface (SPI vs. parallel), improper software configurations, and the panel’s reliance on specific waveform cycles for achieving good contrast also contribute to refresh delays.” (thx) ]
What I don’t understand is why they’re not making large screens by assembling many small ones, because the update time seems related to the number of pixels, as if the controller had to scan the whole device. With more independent devices we could have many small and fast screens assembled as a large fast one. This technology remains bizarre.
BTW I agree with your point that the colors are pretty correct on this one, compared to other ones I saw which were mostly tarnish or just pastel.
I’ve asked Seeed Studio:
OK thanks Jean-Luc for asking!
30 days battery life? I guess that depends a lot on how you use it. They could have said 30 years, if you only update the screen once from flash and then enter lpm, then, “technically”, you’ve done something with the screen…
Eh, the S3 also consumes something…
The spec says 8uA in ulp mode. With the 2000mAh battery the battery life would be… 10e4 hours, or something.. ok not 30 years, but more closely to a year..
My point was that 30 days is meaningless without sharing what you’re actually doing
I was told the “refresh interval” can be set as low as once every five minutes to ensure long battery life. So I guess that’s probably what they used for the 3-month battery life.
Would it be possible to combine the monochrome epaper with an RGB backlight?
That would allow to show contours in epaper and shine it in whatever colour you like…
Bizarrely I had a similar idea recently, but as far as I know there are no “transparent” e-paper displays, which is logical given how they work. However there are transparent LCDs. Not sure if there are any transparent bistable (which keep their state without power) LCDs though (and most bistable LCDs I’m aware of are relatively small and with low resolution, but I didn’t really look into it much.