Revive Your Old E-Ink Tablet For Timetable Helper Duty

Josephine J. Romero

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In our drawers, there is gonna be really a couple of previous units that we have neglected about, and most likely we should to make them work for us rather. [Jonatron] uncovered a Nook Basic Contact in his drawer – with its E-ink screen, wi-fi connectivity and a workable Android variation, this e-reader from 2011 has the guts for usually-on screen responsibility. Sadly, the delicate contact covering on the again disintegrated into a sticky mess, as comfortable contact does, the LiIon battery has absent flat, and the software program support’s lackluster. Both of these are likely to materialize for a whole lot of tablets, which is why we’re happy [Jonatron] has shared his tale about this e-reader’s revival.

The tablet in question with back cover removed, battery wires connected to a USB cable for powerThe comfortable contact layer on the back again did not go absent with assistance of alcohol, but by sheer luck, an acetone bottle was close by, and an acetone scrub aided get rid of the disagreeable stickiness. The tablet’s charging circuitry turned out to be unsophisticated – the pill would not boot from MicroUSB enter, and [Jonathan] wired up 5 volts from a USB cable straight into the battery enter. Thoughts you, this could not be advised, as Lithium-Ion battery variety is from 3 volts to 4.2 volts and a regulator would be called for, but [Jonatron] says it is been performing just wonderful.

Ordinarily, you could just set a webserver on your regional network and provide a webpage with handy facts, introducing code to refresh the site periodically – but the Nook’s browser didn’t aid automated refreshes. Not to be stopped, [Jonatron] wrote an app for the Nook’s Android install as an alternative rooting was needed but went seamlessly. The Android set up is previous, and Android Studio for it is no longer downloadable, so he employed an more mature growth toolkit in some way however out there on-line. There is still a little Python-written webserver jogging on a spare Pi, conditioning the facts for the app to fetch. Next ideal hacker traditions, both of those the app and the server are open-sourced! With assistance of a 3D printed stand, this tablet now shows coach departure schedules – fantastic application for an aged e-reader like this.

Got a Nook Basic Touch in a drawer? Now you know you can easily convert it into a hackable E-ink show! We’ve viewed a lot of pill restorations before, replacing charger ICs and eMMC drives, turning them into videophones to chat with our relatives and wise property controllers, and there is even restore databases to enable you in your revival efforts. We’ve been obtaining rather a several jobs like these in our previous Hackaday Prize installment, Hack It Again, and we hope to see additional these rebuilds for our Wildcard round!

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