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E-Ink, Haptic Touch and MEMS

Jake Schwartz

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Imagine a single handheld embedded with all HP calcs….

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Touchscreen Calc Proposals Before

Circa 2000

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Touchscreen Calc Proposals Before, contd.

1989: HP28 functions on right of clamshell,Full touchscreen on the left

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Touchscreen Calc Proposals Before, contd.

1990s: emu48 2000: emu49 iPAQ version

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Touchscreen Calc Proposals Before, contd.

2009: HP Voyager Apps on the Apple iPhone

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The problem with those- No Tactile Feedback!

One solution: “Haptics”•Device vibrates when display is touched•However, they vibrate no matter where the screen is touched

PLEASE VIBRATE!! PLEASE DO NOT VIBRATE!!

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Another recent technology: Electronic Ink

• Extremely high contrast• Display remains “on” until modified

Samsung e-reader Samsung Alias 2 mobile phone with E-Ink keyboard

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Electronic Ink, ContinuedIn 2005, Tim Wessman’s proposed calculator with E-Inkdisplay surface around the keyboard keys was the winner of HP’s Design-A-Calculator contest

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The Case For MEMS(MicroElectroMechanical Systems)

TI DLP ChipExample:An Array of SwivelingMirrors

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The Case For MEMS, continued

• Consider an imaginary MEMS device consisting of an array of “Surface Elements”• Each is touch sensitive and has a size of 75-by-75 to the inch• Each contains an addressable 4-by-4-pixel E-ink display on top (net 300 dpi)• Each may be either “disengaged” or “engaged” • When engaged, surface exhibits miniature “oilcan” snap effect when pressed

Close-up of asingle “Surface Element”(“SurfEL”?)

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The Case For MEMS, continued

•Software would specify groups of SurfELs to be engaged at the same time, with each group acting as a keyboard key, and labeled as such on the display on top

•Like on the iPhone app,the top of the screencould act as the displaywith the lower portionacting as the keyboard

•When disengaged, thescreen could be writtenon with a stylus, if desired

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The “Final Fantasy”

•After turning on the application, it asks the user to choose the series•Then it requests to choose the model