Spectrum design concepts revealed!

[Dario]

Hello Eve Family!

It’s time for a beefy update. We now finally have the 3D renders we have all been waiting for! Today we present to you five design concepts that were prepared for us by our design partner Propeller in Sweden, based on your detailed feedback.

Before we dive in: a quick recap

For those of you hearing about our crowd-developed monitor Project: Spectrum for the first time or anyone else who needs a recap on all the decisions so far, we have created a status topic to keep track of everything to do with the project. Here you can find all the decisions and discussions with the community to this day, as well as the latest confirmed tech specs.

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The 5 Concepts are here!

As you may remember, we shared very high-level design direction with you in the previous step. We’ve received a ton of valuable feedback on each direction:

The concepts we’re revealing now are much more refined. Like in the previous step, we want to discuss them with you and define the product design direction we will take from here. Don’t worry if any single concept does not perfectly match your preference. We can combine a few concepts together to create the perfect one!

Things to keep in mind

• All the concepts have the same panel, technical specs, port selection, etc., even if the images shown here do not always reflect it. You can find the latest confirmed specs in this topic.

• Some of these renders might have some of the no-brainer features missing. It’s because these are still design concepts. Final designs will have all the I/Os, functions and other specs as crowd-developed with our community.

• All the concepts aim to keep multi-monitor setups in mind. More about this will be shown later on once the final design is locked.

• Each concept pictures has a small code number in the corner to make it easier to refer to the design elements you are commenting on. (For example: “You can see it in picture 1A” is a lot clearer than “You can see it in that one picture with the stand and the back of the screen of the first design”).

• The stand and monitor will be sold separately, so be sure to consider the monitor designs by themselves without the stand as well!

Concept 1: BLADE

Inspired by the Big V concept seed.

This is how Propeller describes the concepts
“The thin edge display that swells out in the center where the components are stacked. The concept continues the slim edge thinking in the stand where it is minimal at the base, almost disappearing from view, curving its way up to house the necessary parts for tilt and height adjustment. The Blade uses metallic plastic and cast metal to communicate a sharp look.”

“Blade is sharp. The front black anodized aluminum frame chamfers back to the plastic housing, hugging the display as tight as possible. The stand has a similar sharp front profile with a steady width and base.”

Concept 2: BLOXY

Inspired by Clean Slate & Better Together concept seed:

“Bloxy is a minimal machine, straight forward, no fuss. The internal parts and structures are represented by form-fitting blocks, there are no unused volumes of air. Efficient and minimal, the specs speak for the machine.”

“Bloxy is a stack of blocked volumes. The forms aim to be as thin as possible with straight extruded volumes around components where needed. The stacking is done in a way to promote overlapped areas where buttons, lights and ports are placed.”

Concept 3: FLOAT

Inspired by the Big V and Clean Slate concept seed.

“Float is as light as air. The idea with the Float concept is that it feels a bit magical. The display is emphasized, with and without the stand. The stand fades into the background.”

“Float has a metal monitor frame with a “flipped” plastic back to house the display components. This minimal approach provides a clean and compact approach that is echoed in the transparent stand.”

Concept 4: STATIONARY

Inspired by Better Together & Control Center concept seed:

“Stationary is organized elegance. It provides subtle, interior inspired elements that help with everyday office organization.”

“Stationary was designed to make our lives easier and more enjoyable with intuitive organization. The ribbed elements allow for objects to be effortlessly placed, wedged, propped or charged at the base.”

Concept 5: RING

Inspired by Little Furniture concept seed.

“Ring is precision at its best. It showcases mechanical precision not just in the display itself but in the stand construction. By exploiting the beautiful components of the stand we elevate this product to a desirable interior home decor object, enhancing the environment in which we live.”

“Ring was inspired by desktop interior objects such as lamps. The bezel uses a round-shaped bottom for a more furniture inspired look. The stand is cast metal meant to look like bent aluminum piping used in lighting.”

Make your choice!

Time to vote on the concepts we like and the ones we don’t. But before we proceed it is very important to know why we choose what we choose. As you may know the reasons we select a product are more important than just a vote, because the next step will be to merge the most valuable aspects of these concepts into a final product design.

So make sure to comment below what you most like and dislike about each concept!

Please select the concepts you like the most and explain in the comments below why.

• I like BLADE
• I like BLOXY
• I like FLOAT
• I like STATIONARY
• I like RING

Please choose the concepts you do not like and explain in the comments below why.

• I don’t like BLADE
• I don’t like BLOXY
• I don’t like FLOAT
• I don’t like STATIONARY
• I don’t like RING

General questions

The concepts presented are very different, they have different features and design solutions.

Q1: Please comment below which are your favorite features among all the concepts.

Q2: Would you want to merge two concepts into one? If so which ones would you merge together?

Q3: Please tell the one thing, from all the concepts, that would stop you from purchasing that specific concept.

Thank you for your feedback!

What’s next?

We will collect all the comments and votes from this post and create the final design (it will take the best things from various concepts based on your responses and mix them into one ultimate design )! After it get’s reviewed with our community we will proceed with the mechanical design, engineering and tooling!

[dibadibadu]

Blade: V shaped hole for cable management is nice, the vertical part of the stand is too “doughy” imo for “blade” and does not fit to the other parts. Centered buttons are good.
Blocks: the red V indicator light is great, the ventilation pattern is ugly, looks like 90’s tech. the double material foot is not “blocky” enough and is questionable for cleaning: sharp inner edge…
Float: Best imo. The Kickstand like shape is really great. It should become part of the gadges to have the possibility to really put the screen without stand to a desk like this. Even to mount a VESA arm you always need smth. or somebody to have the monitor vertical… Makes spectrum kinda portable standalone… The buttons have to move to the center and to the front in this case… maybe as touch-buttons… side ports are great. I would like to have this one with the V shaped hole in the kickstand and the V indicator light on the front…
Stationary: really ugly imo. Looks like a 70’s eternit asbest roof. The smartphone and pen holder in the middle can’t work with the centered buttons.
Ring: no words but: is the monitor siting on the toilet having a “big one”?

[Javild]

I share the same thoughts, especially on stationary, that design makes it look bad quality

[Matsleight]

For me ring and stationary are not nice looking. Blade is very minimalistic and i love it.
Stationary a good 2nd favourite. If you need to merge i would go with that and blade.

[Javild]

Concept Blade

Concept blade looks great, very sleek and modern, while keeping a professional look. This is probably the best concept, just make the ports more accessible since they seem pretty hard to reach without turning around your monitor.

Maybe place the navigational controller a little lower

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Concept Blocks

Concept blocks looks very good, a more traditional design, can’t go wrong with this one. Looks very professional, that tone go grey looks very good and professional. I can’t decide if I like this or concept blade more

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Concept Float

The monitor design for concept float is amazing, it makes the ports very accessible, especially the ones on the sides, the stand on the other hand, looks low quality, I don’t thin it is a very good idea to make a stand completely out of plastic, much less clear plastic. This monitor with a better stand like the one on Concept Blocks would be great.

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Concept Stationary

I personally dislike this concept, the white and reflective colors make it look bad quality, and that plastic look makes it look old fashioned. The wireless charging is a nice feature but I wouldn’t get that monitor.

The button layout is also not so good, the controller on the other monitors is better.

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Concept Lamp

This concept isn’t very bad but it doesn’t look very professional. The white reflective plastic makes it look bad quality, and like I mentioned before, if you are going to use plastic, you should use matte colors that look like metal

And also, from what I see it isn’t VESA compatible, that is very important and removing VESA would make you loose many customer

[TheGunnyPT]

@Dario

in this topic

Love the Blade!

Just a question regarding wireless charging (for phones) how much would it add to the monitor price?

[Javild]

I am not completely sure but IIRC, wireless charging does not work through metal, it would need to be plastic or glass

[Lend]

From the images it appears only Bloxy has rotation adjustment right?

[dibadibadu]

Q1: Done
Q2: I would like to merge the stand of BLADE in matte black with clear edges (not so doughy) with the FLOAT monitor design and a little V-shaped 5 directions stick on the frontal center (with red backlight). On/off button could be on the side with the ports…
Q3: Everything that is not matte black

Question: Why do the controls always have to be hidden?

[Konstantinos]

It is a very affordable technology. I think the key is making it look nice since it requires quite a lot of plastic there and added thickness. But I don’t think it will add more than 10-15 USD to the end price. Especially since we are offering stand and monitor separatelly it makes a lot of sense!

[MikeKing67]

I think Blade is the cleanest design, and does not look like other manufacturers offerings. I would really like it to be able to be rotated into portrait mode. I do a lot of work with documents and find that being able to put one monitor in portrait mode is very useful.

[kronic1218]

Will any or all of these designs have the edge to edge glass? I couldn’t tell from the specs whether it was included. Some of the designs appeared to have a glossy front but wasn’t sure if it was just the concept art.

[TheGunnyPT]

Thank you for the reply!

I was hoping we could have this accessory sold separately if possible. I plan to use the monitor with my MacBook Pro and wanted to have a charging solution for the iPhone nearby as well without having to resort to a 3rd party.

Looking forward to the release!

[Frederico_Marques]

Blade 1 and bloxy 2nd. Maybe A merge of the two. Not crazy about anything else, but it’s purely a design aesthetic.
An infinity edge to edge glass screen would be awesome. Saw it once 20 odd years ago!

[Jasper]

I like the elegance of Blade- the slim stand and fine bezel give a classy appearance.
I somewhat like Bloxy, just not as much. I sometimes have used a monitor in Portrait mode so I like the idea of having rotation adjustment. I also like the downward-facing ports on both of these concepts as I dislike the look of cables sticking out sideways. (I also feel that downward-facing ports help to extend the life of a cable!)

I dislike the transparent stand in Float- I think transparent computer products have had their day and they seem almost old-fashioned now.

Stationary looks like a dust catcher! If people really want to keep pens & phones organised on the base of the monitor stand, then those few people can get a desk tidy. For those who don’t want one, I imagine they’d prefer the clean and tidy appearance of the first 2 concepts.

Ring just doesn’t appeal to me of a variety of reasons- it seems to be trying to be a “fun” product. The stand makes me think of one of those novelty store tins of paint, where the tin appears to be held up by the paint ‘pouring’ out of it. And, of course, it too has back-facing port

[weakie87]

I like the Blade, but it would look nicer a but darker like the V ended up being in the end. aluminum as a material is something I like if its possible to do inside reasonable budget. black plastic and too many lights would be too “gamery” imo.

what I dont like too much is the last one the ring… I like the hinge on the stand but the way it sits on the table reminds me too much of those cheap parts you can buy and twist into any shape as a stand for your camera or phone etc. or is it just me?

[Koa_Beam]

They all look nice in the concepts but I would bet all would benefit from a slightly wider base for stability and whichever one you go with really should have rotation if you really are considering people would want a multi monitor setup. The ring design looks interesting but not stable and it looks like it should rotate but doesn’t list that as a function. For me it will come down to finalized color delta, resolution and connection types.

[gtataki]

BLADE
I like the visuals of the blade but I would make the triangle larger to make sure the cable headers fit.

BLOXY
Bloxy does not feel special, it resembles DELL monitors we have at work but with less practical aspects.

FLOAT
This design feels that it has more character and also practicality. I am a fan of side facing ports and LED status.

STATIONARY
Originaly I like the idea however I don’t believe it will be very good in practice. The crevices will probably end up collecting dust and they will be more of a hassle than of use.

RING
I like visual of the design but I do not believe it is a very good idea to implement. The base shape will require extra long cables if they will be hidden or end up in the way. I like the quote though, very nice touch!

Extra feauture
It would be nice if tilting the monitor was very easy and in order to go from landscape to portrait without hassle it would great if the OS changed the orientation automatically. I bet people would rotate the monitor more often if it was frictionless both on the hardware and software.

[Helios]

The designs, one by one

Concept BLADE

The design is very clean, but there are a few issue with it such as the recessed, covered ports that will be very hard to access. Not an issue for the permanent display signal cable, but I don’t see me quickly connecting anything through the monitor. Apart from keyboards and mice for one-cable USB-C set-ups, I’d think the main use for the USB ports would be quickly connecting temporary things like USB hard drives or flash drives to a port that’s more easily accessible than the back of a computer tower…

Also, despite the thinness of the stand being one of the driving ideas behind the design, I’d really like the bottom part of the stand (the twisty design itself of which I think is really cool!) to be thicker. Not because it needs to be, but because it’ll look more solid and stable.

Concept BLOCKS/BLOXY

The cleanest design, and my favorite. Ports are easily accessible, and all the thickness is in the middle meaning you won’t see it unless you look at it from an extreme angle. The back of my monitor will be almost against a wall, so thin all around the edges makes the entire thing look thin.

The stand is straightforward and functional, which I like. The offset plastic part that reinforces the ‘blocks’ concept may be a bit too big though. I’d rather forego the Eve logo there and have the offset be down to 2mm or so.

Concept FLOAT

You’d think that ‘Big V’ would inspire slanted edges and a gently curved back. A bit like an iMac. I’d have never considered adding a fake kickstand… I suppose it leads to a thin monitor for most of the device since all the electronics can go into the bottom, but the weird shape somehow just doesn’t do it for me.

The stand idea with the faded gradient in the plastic is interesting and definitely original, but I’m afraid that transparent plastic will make it look decidedly cheap.

Concept STATIONARY

My first thought was ‘late 90’s Packard Bell’. It looks like a cheap budget peripheral.

The stand continues that design, and makes it worse. The upright doesn’t flow into the base at all, and makes it look tacked together. Even though I’ll admit that having the ridged base may actually have a useful function as shown in picture 4F.

Concept LAMP/RING

The back of this monitor is what I’d expected ‘Big V’ would turn into, and it looks really smooth and clean.

Then comes the stand, though. The round open hinge looks really original and I kind of like it, even. But the bent pipe stand looks absurd. Also, using the cable insulating sleeve as anti-slip padding means you can’t use the stand without a cable tied into it or risk scratching your desk surface. That means it’s not cable management, it just shortens your cable. Also will be an issue if you use a cable of different thickness…

Some design elements of note

Buttons

We see buttons on the bottom and on the back, centered or off on a side. I’d prefer controls centered and on the back, as shown in 1F. It makes them easy to find blindly, and you can hold onto the edge of the screen with your palm as your fingers work the controls. That means your hand isn’t floating and your arm getting fatigued as it would when spending any time playing around with bottom-controls like those on picture 3D.

Ports

Port placement will also be important for usability. I’ve already touched on the way BLADE’s ports will be a pain to reach. But similarly, centered ports facing backwards (like 3C) will be blocked by the stand. I’d say ports are most useful when centered (clean cable management) and facing down (no cables sticking out the back), or on a corner either facing sideways, down, or back. A combination of those two options might work: more permanent cables like image signal cables could be centered and facing down, whilst more temporary ports like USB-A ports could be on a corner facing sideways, down or back. Since sideways will block ports for people using arrays of multiple monitors, down or back would be best for those.

And the actual questions posed

Q1: favorite features

Though I abhor the stand as a whole, I really like the open ring hinge of LAMP/RING. I also like the subtlety of the cable management hole in BLADE’s stand being an Eve logo. That could of course be applied to any other design as well, and is in these renders not at all big enough (c’mon designers, not every cable has a tiny plug like USB-C!).

Q2: which ones would you merge

The monitor design of LAMP/RING as it’s super clean, with the stand design of BLADE since it’s got an awesome and potentially iconic shape?

Q3: tell the one thing that would stop you from purchasing

BLADE: Can’t reach the ports. BLOCKS/BLOXY: No dealbreakers. FLOAT: Stand looks cheap. STATIONARY: Everything looks cheap. LAMP/RING: Metal tube stand is too weird.

[Helios]

Now that I’ve got my personal opinions out of the way, it’s time to put on my Eve-hat (Hey @Konstantinos, when do we get Eve headwear?) and answer some questions…

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@Lend

From the images it appears only Bloxy has rotation adjustment right?

@kronic1218

Will any or all of these designs have the edge to edge glass? I couldn’t tell from the specs whether it was included. Some of the designs appeared to have a glossy front but wasn’t sure if it was just the concept art.

Well spotted! The designers intentionally moved and changed some design elements to show different possibilities. So ports are shown in different places and orientations, as are button controls. But another thing that differs between these concepts is that some are shown with cover glass and some without, and only the BLOXY concept features a horizontal rotation adjustment.

Ultimately, any of these designs could be made with or without, depending on what we decide to go with. For the stand adjustment it will largely depend on what our manufacturers can deliver and what it will do with the price. And cover glass is still on the list of things we’re looking into!

@weakie87

aluminum as a material is something I like if its possible to do inside reasonable budget. black plastic and too many lights would be too “gamery” imo.

We may end up with an aluminium bezel around the front for the sexy aluminium look, but then plastic for the back where using aluminium would make materials, milling, and so forth much more expensive. Black plastic isn’t too much of a problem in my opinion, as long as it’s textured and matte. Black glossy plastic always tries to look premium but ends up looking cheap after it scratches. And it will scratch.