🎉  Happy 13th Birthday Raspberry Pi!   🎂   1,000+ deals in store!   🥳
🎉  Happy 13th Birthday Raspberry Pi!   🎂   1,000+ deals in store!   🥳

Inky Impression 5.7" (7 colour ePaper/eInk HAT)

by Pimoroni

Bold, will hold! A big, beautiful, 5.7" (600 x 448 pixel) 7 colour electronic paper display for Raspberry Pi.

This display is considerably bigger than Inky wHAT (check out the comparison photo!) with plenty of screen real estate for text or graphics. The low power consumption e-paper display is crisp and readable in bright sunlight and the image will persist when unpowered. In a first for the Inky series, we've also added four tactile buttons so you can control what's on the screen without the need for extra hardware. The buttons are side-press, so they're accessible even if the display is mounted on a wall.

But the best bit is that this time you get seven whole colours to play with, which means this Inky is very suitable for displaying graphics, drawings or art - we've found pixel art, panels from comics and retro video game art look particularly good.

We can think of tons of uses for this lovely display - its size makes it ideal for displaying detailed graphs and charts from weather stations and sensors. You could build your own e-ink reader, or set it up as a digital dashboard for your kitchen with calendar info and reminders. It would also make a nice rotating display for showing off children's art (or your own art!).

Please note that Inky Impression takes around 30 seconds to refresh the screen, so is best suited to projects that don't rely on constant screen updates.

Features

  • 5.7" EPD display (600 x 448 pixels)
    • E Ink Gallery Palette™ 4000 ePaper
    • ACeP (Advanced Color ePaper) 7-color with black, white, red, green, blue, yellow, orange.
    • Ultra wide viewing angle – >170°
    • Dot pitch – 0.1915 x 0.1915mm
  • 40-pin extension header included to boost height for full-size Pis
  • Standoffs included to securely attach to your Pi
  • Additional pins, including I2C and SPI, broken out
  • Compatible with all 40-pin header Raspberry Pi computers*
  • Python library
  • Comes fully assembled

Multi-colour EPD displays, like the one on Inky Impression, use ingenious electrophoresis to pull coloured particles up and down on the display. The coloured particles reflect light, unlike most display types, meaning that they're visible under bright lights. It takes approximately 30 seconds to refresh the display.

Everything comes fully-assembled, and there's no soldering required (as long as your Raspberry Pi has a 40 pin header attached). The display is securely stuck down to the Inky Impression PCB and connected via a ribbon cable. Just pop Inky Impression on your Pi and run our installer to get everything set up!

We've also broken out some handy pins including I2C and SPI, on the back of Inky Impression, letting you connect additional devices like our breakouts and allowing you to show their data right on the display.

Inky Impression will work with any version of the Pi that has a 40 pin header, including Zero variants. If you want to use it with a Raspberry Pi 400, you'll probably also want to pick up a GPIO extender cable (unless you're into using screens at a highly unusual angle).

Software

Our Python library takes the stress out of displaying text and images on Inky Impression, and we've put together a few new examples to show off Inky Impression's capabilities. 

Notes

  • The Inky Impression display is made from glass so it's pretty fragile. Be careful not to drop it or press too hard on it, or it will crack. When fitting it to your Pi, grip at the edges of the board rather than pressing on top of the screen.
  • Take care when using your own fixings! It is possible to damage the display if you use standoffs/bolts with longer screw threads than those supplied in the kit.
  • We got best results from this display when refreshing it at an ambient room temperature, if the screen is cold you might find that the colours are less vibrant. Solidarity to our chilly production team who discovered this!
  • Overall dimensions: 125.4 x 99.5 x 9mm (W x H x D, depth includes header and display)
  • Display usable area dimensions: 114.9 x 85.8mm (W x H)
  • Licensed Image: Bobbi Freelance / Pixels.com

Resources

25 customer reviews

7 months ago
It's a very nice little gaming console with a decent display and an aluminium case that looks and feels quite sturdy and durable. You can find some games for it on the internet - but the real fun could be writing those by yourself. When I tried I found a reason that makes me write this four-star-only rating. To access the debug pins of the built-in RP2040 you have to open and remove the case. It would have been much nicer if there was one removable panel with those pins behind...
by Thomas about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
7 months ago
Well built, feels very premium. There's a decent little community making games for it, and it can run things like an NES emulator without too much issue. I am not currently a skilled enough C++ developer to make anything worth playing for it, but I did manage some basics reasonably quickly.
by Ed about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
9 months ago
I'm really impressed by what this tiny thing is able to do! I was able to write a simple game in a matter of hours... You can even upload a NES emulator on it.
by Benoît about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
2 years ago
An awesome system based on RP2040. Build quality is very solid and the device has a very nice weight to it. Battery life is also very good. Comes with a nice platformer pre-installed. I haven't made anything with it yet but look forward to adapting my Pico Display games to this one.
by Mircea about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
I am very happy and also surprised, I received all the material in eight days from the order, congratulations! Everything arrived in perfect condition and Pimoroni products are always of excellent quality. Thank you!
by Giuseppe about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
Small, cute and very nice hardware. Especially aluminium body is great.
by Anonymous about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
Great device but haven't got it working on my linux mint install yet.
by Daniel about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
Very clicky buttons, bright screen and looks good in motion. The build feels very solid.
by Matthew about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
Very comfortable in hand. Seem sturdy enough to lend it to my small children. I am in the process of porting one of my web game to it. Very easy to program for it, or, if that's not your thing, to load the few available games on it.
by Julien about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
Amazing little gizmo. Really well made and feels solid. Need to learn about writing my own games and such for it but the hardware and possibilities are fantastic
by Fiona about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
It’s a nice little handheld with a good sdk though I wish the debug pins were more accessible
by Henry about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
Simply amazing! The quality of this product is off the charts! The rest is up me, getting my programming skills to a level where I can make a game worthy of the system.
by Luke about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
The ordering experience was very quick. The delivery to the USA was fairly quick using Royal mail during this time of Covid.
by Gelsomino about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
This is an incredibly well made system. I hope to be able to develop some nice games with it.
by Michael about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
First impression of the RP2040-based tiny game console PicoSystem is really positive. Ridgid build quality, robust FPS and responsive buttons!
by Johannes about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
Oh yeah going to get my game programming on. Default games on the Pimironi website are good too. 10/10 would recommend.
by Rohan about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
System works well, instructions are good. I had issues with tool chain on windows for raspberry pico sdk. Once I switched to Debian in virtual box everything worked fine. I recommend using putty and ssh for programming to get copy paste functionality and winscp to copy files. The hardware is very well built and I highly recommend it.
by Todd about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
Amazing little video game machine in your pocket where programming is as easy as editing a text file on a USB drive!
by Chipp about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
It looks like a commercial games device, it looks really good. Solid build and I cannot wait to start building games and apps for it.
by Stephen about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
The build quality is extremely good. Especially the aluminium case makes it feel great. The screen has a good quality but it’s pretty small which kind of makes the charm of the PicoSystem. The 32blit SDK is great for developing own games and it has an active community behind it. There are also other SDKs available which I haven’t had experience with yet. Overall the PicoSystem is great for getting into retro game development.
by Anonymous about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
A very cool little device. I love the metallic body and front plate.
by Anonymous about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
Great little device! It feels super solid and high-quality, and looks fantastic. The RP2040 is very nice so far, and importantly, both the PicoSDK and the PicoSystem SDK are very easy to use, especially the examples in the PicoSystem repo. If you've dabbled in retro console game dev, the PicoSystem is something like a GBA packed into the size of a GB Micro, and has similar limitations in RAM and ROM, just with a smaller screen (but roughly twice the pixels of the original GB at 240x240 vs 160x144), same button count as the original GB, a much faster CPU, and MUCH better documentation. Highly recommend it; it's a lot of fun.
by Ulises about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
Very nice build quality, but the game library is quite lacking right now.
by Anonymous about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
Fantastic pocket-ready build, both C++ and CircuitPython ready. 32blit SDK has been great to work with so far!
by John about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io
3 years ago
The fit and finish in the PicoSystem is outstanding and the SDK tools provided to get started provided everything I needed to start tinkering.
by Matthew about PicoSystem via REVIEWS.io

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