Cleaning the toilet, and the area around the toilet, isn’t exactly the most exciting way to spend your free time. But up until today, pawning that task off on automatons hasn’t been possible because none of them are small enough to squeeze into those tight spaces. But the new Scooba 230 from iRobot, which is downright adorable, should have no problem making its way into every crevice of even the tiniest of bathrooms.
It’s just 3.5 inches tall and 6.5 inches in diameter, but it still features a three-stage cleaning system that washes, scrubs and squeegees the floors as it does its thing, and it will even vacuum up the excess liquid so floors dry even faster. And in order to remain compact it’s got a clever active reservoir system, where the clean water reservoir shrinks as it’s being used, freeing up space to store the dirty water that’s been sucked up. It also seems to pack all of the features of its larger vacuuming brethren we’ve come to rely on, like smart navigation and Virtual Walls to keep it where you want to it to clean.
It’s expected to be available sometime this Spring for $299, which is about $50 more than the Mint Sweeper revealed at last year’s CES, but the 230′s advanced features seem to make up for the difference in price.
If you’re looking for a robotic building block set it’s really hard not to recommend LEGO’s Mindstorms and Technic. Not only are they compatible with every other LEGO set on the market, but there’s a massive online community making it easy to find help for whatever you’re trying to build. However, maybe you have a vendetta against the LEGO corporation, or some political reason for shunning their products. If that’s the case, might I introduce you to fischertechnik’s robot building sets as an alternative.
They actually look a lot more technical than even LEGO Technics, but are designed to be educational and teach basic mechanical concepts to kids as young as 10 years old. The robot arm pictured above is part of their ‘Industry Robots II Set’ ($265) which can be used to build 3 different factory models of varying functionality, but other sets teach different concepts like pneumatics or locomotion. If you’re still not convinced, maybe the fact that the 32-bit, 200MHz ARM 9 processor-powered ROBO TX Controller is $300 just by itself is enough to convince you that the fischertechnik kits have the technical chops.
CES 2011 is just around the corner, and while endless aisles of 3D TVs and I suspect more tablets than I’ll ever care to poke at have a tendency to wear away at a blogger’s soul, there are hidden gems that make the whole experience worthwhile. Last year it was Qualcomm’s Mirasol displays that got me really excited, and this year I have a feeling a small robotic ball recently dubbed ‘Sphero’ could do the same.
Originally shown as a prototype back in June, the slightly mishapen, smartphone-controlled ball has recently undergone a bit of a facelift for its debut at CES, and the rendered pictured above makes it look a lot slicker than its predecessor seen in the video I’ve included below. But what is it? Well in its simplest form it’s kind of a rubber ball for the 21st century. The ball is the most universal toy of all time, allowing you to play an endless number of games with it. But instead of whacking it with a bat, kicking it into a goal or throwing it through a hoop, you control the Sphero over Bluetooth via your phone’s tilt sensor, steering as it rolls around a flat surface. So imagine you and a friend placing your Spheros on a table and playing a quick game of sumo trying to knock the other ball off, or as a not-so-virtual game of golf where hitting the ball on-screen results in the Sphero actually moving towards a hole.
The company behind the Sphero, Orbotix, has already created an open API so that iOS or Android developers can write games or apps that interact ball which is great because while there’s already exciting potential, you just know that some brilliant idea is going to come out of left field that will make the Sphero a must-have product. We’ll have more info and hopefully a hands-on look at Sphero as part of our upcoming CES 2011 coverage starting in January.
Congratulations robots, you’ve claimed yet another job in your continuing effort to replace mankind. This time around it’s masseuses who are getting kicked to the curb thanks to the WheeMe from a company called DreamBots Ltd. It looks like one of those handheld roller massage thingies that someone else is supposed to drive across your back, but this little guy is completely autonomous. Once it’s running a built-in tilt sensor ensures it never falls off your back, and its wheels are made of soft ‘fingerettes’ that provide “a delightful sense of bodily pleasure.” Their words, not mine.
The WheeMe isn’t available just yet, but will apparently be exhibited at the upcoming CES show in January where our sister site, BotJunkie, will make sure to put it through its paces, probably repeatedly.
Many, many moons ago we brought you news of the Land Walker bi-pedal personal robot suit from Japanese company Sakakibara Kikai. Over the years it has served as a popular promotional tool for the company, and many people have had the chance to hop in the driver’s seat, except for kids. The company figured putting a kid behind the wheel (or control sticks or whatever) wasn’t the smartest of ideas, so instead of putting up one of those ‘You have to be at least this tall to pilot the giant mech’ signs, they went ahead and built a smaller version designed specifically for children!
Their Kid’s Walker comes in at around 5 1/4 feet tall (1.6 meters), weighs just under 400lbs and (thankfully!) features kid-friendly controls that limit the mech’s capabilities because let’s face it, you stick a kid in a powered exoskeleton suit and his problem with bullies are over. The Kid’s Walker technically doesn’t really ‘walk’ either, but shuffles along on a pair of wheel-equipped feet kind of like someone learning to use roller skates, but again, it’s all to keep kids safe. The cost of the suit is estimated to be around $21,000, though Sakakibara Kikai has no plans to put it into production. The last thing the world needs is shopping malls full of exoskeleton-equipped mallrats, that’s for sure.
The big downside to all the toys and gadgets you get to see and play with at CES is that often times it takes a while for them to officially hit the market. Such was the case with Evolution Robotics Mint Sweeper cleaning bot, which was one of the cooler things I saw at CES 2010 back in January, but has only recently become available for sale.
Over on our sister site BotJunkie, Evan Ackerman has just posted his review of the Mint Sweeper and if you want to know what he thought about the $250 alternative to the Roomba and other robotic vacuums, you’ll want to head on over and read all about it.
The way I see it, if you’re going to go to all the trouble of building a replica R2-D2, why not go the extra mile and build one you can actually ride in? That’s exactly what YouTube user ‘dmalford1‘ has done with his version, which also has sounds, internal cooling fans, LEDs and a requisite rotating dome. And yes, I’m aware that actor Kenny Baker did spend time in an R2-D2 ‘suit’ for certain shots in the Star Wars films, but there’s no way a guy like me, who can barely fit in some cars, could ever squeeze in to one. So why should I miss out on the fun? As a bonus, you’ll still look cooler riding around inside a make-believe droid from a fictional space opera, than riding a Segway.
I’ve lost count how many years Elmo has been on the ‘most wanted’ list for Christmas, but this year a small robotic chimp named Dave is hoping to be the source of holiday shopping-related stampedes. Tech Digest recently had a demo of Dave, who’s designed to strap to your shoulder and perform one of 30 different actions with accompanying monkey sounds thanks to an included wireless remote. And besides entertaining kids of all ages, he also seems like the perfect sidekick for pirates who might be allergic to the real thing. He’ll be available for ~$40 (£24.99) in the UK at least, and since you’ll be able to find him at Toys ‘R Us stores hopefully it means he’ll be available in North America at some point as well.
If you remember, last year Panasonic set a world record for “the longest distance covered by a battery-operated remote-controlled model car” with their small Evoia robot which was powered by a couple of their EVOLTA AA batteries. It ended up traveling an impressive 14.82 miles around the LeMans race circuit after 24 hours, but now they’ve created an even bigger challenge.
Their upcoming EVOLTA World Challenge III, which begins on September 23rd, will see their new robot, Robo-Garage, tackling the 310 mile route from Tokyo to Kyoto Japan. Now obviously a single set of batteries isn’t going to last anywhere near that long, which is why the new bot will be making pit stops at recharging stations along the way. So given it’s not expected to finish the course until December 10th, I assume the challenge is a publicity stunt to demonstrate how often and reliably the batteries can be recharged. We’re rooting for you little guy!
Related Tags: Household, Robots
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