Valve open source the Steam Machine e-ink screen so you can make your own

I wish more hardware companies treated these kinds of optional add-ons as something the community can run with instead of either productizing them badly or locking them away completely...

In case you're wondering and don't want to click around, the display is a standard Adafruit 5.83'' eInk panel: https://www.adafruit.com/product/6397

Hold on , i gotta recharge my front plate

I'd love to see an easy guide to doing this with the Framework Desktop form factor. I didn't buy any of the silly little squares for the front of mine since I figured I could 3D print some later, but six months in still haven't gotten around to it.

This is so cool! Coincidentally, I'm currently building something in a similar vein that pushes system metrics out to an Android app so an old phone or tablet can be used as a case screen. The app has widget plugins that expose a repo of metrics received and a GL surface, that can then be used to display fancy visualisations.

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.

Is it even useful as a faceplate? An active display would be way more accurate at displaying hardware stats when the machine loses power (it'll shut down).

"Valve will not be making and providing their own e-ink display for the Steam Machine"

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.)

Is the Steam Machine a decently priced desktop compared to the "generic" ones?

Looks like Waveshare has a E6 full color ePaper/eInk/EPD display in 3.6" and 7.3" but not yet in 5.83":

"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

Clickbait, I want to make an actual eInk display myself. Not just buy one from Adafruit.

It would have justified the price had they included this in the base model - this is the next best thing I suppose. Valve is really coming out as the good guy here in the video game industry and we should really support and applaud all that they're doing to hold the line for consumers and fans.