Writing by Evan Ackerman on Wednesday, 26 of March , 2008 at 12:05 am
This little round robot is named ApriPoko. He’s an 11 inch tall, 5 pound prototype under development by Toshiba to be used as a voice-activated universal remote system. Place him somewhere within eyesight of your entertainment system, and whenever you use one of your remotes, ApriPoko will notice the IR signal, perk up, and ask you what you just did. When you tell him “I just kicked my massage chair up to Shiatsu” he’ll remember your voice and the IR code from the remote. Next time, you can speak the command, and ApriPoko will rebroadcast the IR signal back to the device. I imagine that you’ll be able to assign specific voice commands to different combinations of devices, like a preset for “let’s watch a movie” or “hey baby, how ’bout a drink?”
Ultimately, it may just be easier to pick up the remote and push the button, but Toshiba is hoping to have a viable product sometime soon… And I’d like to see a remote that’s as cute as this. Heck, I might even pay for it.
Writing by Evan Ackerman on Friday, 21 of March , 2008 at 12:00 am
The Samsung Hauzen VC-RE70V vacuum robot is one of the few foreign models I’ve seen that isn’t a poorly disguised and partially dysfunctional knockoff of an iRobot Roomba. In fact, it’s got a mapping feature that is a noticeable departure from the way Roombas operate. A small camera in the Hauzen takes pictures of its surroundings and creates some kind of map, which it uses not only to clean more efficiently, but also to return to it’s charging dock and (if necessary) resume cleaning where it left off. This means that the Hauzen will clean much more faster and more efficiently than Roombas do, with their random, insecty logic. The advantage of the Roomba’s approach, however, is that it cleans each spot 3 or 4 times during one cleaning cycle. It remains to be seen which approach is best, or even if there is a best approach. The Hauzen is supposed to be released later this month in Korea, so hopefully more details will be forthcoming.
Writing by Evan Ackerman on Monday, 18 of February , 2008 at 6:35 am
Robot cooks are shaping up to be one of the next big things when it comes to automation. If you think about it, robots should be ideally suited to cooking, since it’s basically a construction project involving a set of components being assembled according to an instruction manual. This robot makes octopus balls entirely from scratch, hand-turning them to make sure they cook evenly, and adding sauce and seasonings after moving the finished ones over to a serving tray. I’ll confess to not being exactly sure what an octopus ball is, but what the heck, if a robot cooked it for me, I’d totally eat it.
Writing by Evan Ackerman on Thursday, 14 of February , 2008 at 7:09 am
Next time you’re at Kita Kyushu airport in Japan and are too lazy to carry your own luggage, you might be lucky enough to get to use one of these robotic skycaps, the RoboPorter. It’s 4 feet tall and responds to audio commands, so all you have to do is put your bags on it and tell it where you’re headed, and then meekly follow along. It has a touchscreen interface if you’re not in a chatty mood, and can carry up to 110 pounds. The only thing is, this little guy doesn’t look quite large enough to cope with the volume of baggage that you now see at most international airports. Personally, I’m either traveling with a very small amount of luggage (i.e. carry-on) or a very large amount of luggage (i.e. the entirety of my worldly possessions). In either case, this robot would not be particular useful to me, but I appreciate the step towards mitigation of all physical activity.
Writing by Evan Ackerman on Tuesday, 12 of February , 2008 at 6:23 am
The fact that Yasukawa Electric Corporation’s SmartPal V knows how to sort laundry by color and type, and then hangs it up, makes me instantly distrust it, simply because it’s smarter than I am. When it comes to laundry, anyway… But is sorting laundry really so different from enslaving humanity? Hm? Is it? IS IT? Yes, yes it is.
SmartPal V was designed from the ground up to be a service robot, helping people in their homes with daily tasks. It stands nearly four and a half feet tall and weighs an intimidating 280 pounds. At least you can outrun its top speed of 2.2 mph. Using 4 CCD cameras and voice recognition, it can recognize and respond to individuals, or just wander around and keep things tidy on its own. 21 joints including a bendable waist allow it to pick things up off the floor, and it can continue to do so until its battery runs out after about 2.5 hours, or until you get tired of listening to it use its voice synthesizer to complain about how it’s got a brain the size of a planet, but you’re making it pick up trash and sort laundry.
Definitely too early for availability, but I’m fairly confident that production is in the cards, since Japan seems to be looking towards robots for elder care in the near future.
Writing by Evan Ackerman on Monday, 28 of January , 2008 at 6:59 am
Is it just me, or does this robot look really freakin’ creepy? Called Robovie, he was deployed in the Universal Citywalk Osaka shopping center to assist shoppers. Robovie has 16 cameras and 6 laser range finders, and is able to watch up to 20 people at a time and diagnose their mood based on their actions into one of 10 categories, including waiting, wandering, walking fast, running, hopelessly lost, totally freaking out, etc. (those last two, I made up). When it encountered disoriented patrons, Robovie pointed them where they wanted to go. Otherwise, he recommended local shops and restaurants. No word on what his recommendations were based on, but I assume it’s not personal experience.
The good news is that Robovie will be available for hire starting in June, in Japan.
Writing by Evan Ackerman on Thursday, 13 of December , 2007 at 5:58 am
The clips in the above vid are from a demonstration at Honda’s headquarters in Tokyo of the latest incarnation of their famous Asimo robots. The part that blew me away is that if you’re only half paying attention to what’s going on (or if you let your eyes go out of focus a little bit), Asmio looks remarkably human as he walks around the office environment. His human co-workers look terrified, but that’s to be expected, right? Asimo doesn’t have much new in the way of hardware to show off, but his AI has been vastly improved, and multiple Asimos are now able to work together to distribute and accomplish tasks:
“The robot can, for example, recognize drink choices and carry a tray with the requested drink to the person who placed the order. [It] also does a better job of moving around people because of technology that allows it to better predict people’s movements so it doesn’t get in the way. The robot can even automatically head off to the nearest charging station when its batteries fall below a certain level.”
This latest version of Asimo will be at Honda’s headquarters serving eggnog for the next few months if you feel like stopping by and sharing a drink with him.
Writing by Evan Ackerman on Friday, 7 of December , 2007 at 6:40 am
I’m no violinist, and neither is this robot, but still… Wow. That’s pretty good, I’d say, since playing a violin (I imagine) takes a lot of finger dexterity and precision control. Heck, robots playing the violin well is a work in progress even in 2366. The humanoid robot (android, rather) is 1.5 meters tall and weighs 56 kilos. It has 17 joints in its arms and hands, and is designed to be helping us out with household chores by 2010 (which is really not that long from now); they’ll begin testing in hospitals and Toyota-related facilities next year. By the way, when the violin solo was done, I clapped. That’s right, here in front of my computer at 3:41 am, I clapped for that robot violin solo even though nobody in the audience did. Just wanted you to know that.
The second robot is a “mobility robot.” It has a top speed of 6 kph, and a range of 20 km (!) after a 1 hour charge (!!). It can climb slopes of up to 10 degrees and avoid obstacles. Although it’s designed for people who really need one (the elderly, for example), it’ll hopefully be available to lazy people like me around the same time as the violin robot.
Writing by Evan Ackerman on Tuesday, 13 of November , 2007 at 2:31 am
Gibson isn’t the firstcompany to develop a robotic guitar tuning system, but their “Robot Guitar” with its sexy blue sunburst finish is undoubtedly the slickest implementation so far. Not only will the guitar tune itself, it’s also able to switch between a variety of different tuning presets depending on what you want to play. Check it out:
Now, it’s certainly a very cool piece of work, but as a musician, I feel like part of the appeal of playing an instrument is the tuning process itself. I find it rewarding to start out with a discordant sound, and then be able to adjust it into harmoniousness. It’s almost like zen or something. ‘Course, I play the bagpipes, so it’s a bit extreme when they’re out of tune, but I still think my point is, uh, sound. Plus, isn’t it kinda cheating to have any instrument tune itself? It’s one of the fundamentals, right? And odds are if you’re serious enough to manage to get your hands on one of these limited edition guitars, you can probably tune the thing in your sleep.
No price has been mentioned officially that I can find, but rumor has it that the limited edition will be about $2200, and the regular production run will be around $1600.
Writing by Evan Ackerman on Tuesday, 13 of November , 2007 at 1:59 am
What’s the worst thing about air travel? Besides the ticket prices, I mean. And going through security. And delays, and no legroom, and no food, and- Okay, nevermind. One of the bad things about air travel is having to lug your luggage (funny, right?) all over the place. Robotronic, a Russian company, is developing a robot suitcase which should relieve some of the strain by following you around on wheels. An electronic card in your pocket tells your suitcase where you are and sets its following distance. Mostly, the robot can handle itself, with ultrasonic and infrared circumferential obstacle avoidance sensors, alert lights, and a gyroscope to compensate motor torque for slopes. If you get too far ahead of it, though, the robot will freak out like a lost child (it sets off an alarm, anyway). Internal batteries should power it for 2 hours on a charge, and it’ll come with international plug adapters. With a carrying capacity of 65+ pounds, you’ll incur heavy baggage fees even if you don’t fill it up all the way. Price? 49,000 rubles (about $2000), expected to be available in 2009.
This idea was conceptualized by Peter Yeadon last year, which is where the image comes from. If you want to see the what the real thing is supposed to look like, click here, but I guarantee you’ll be disappointed.
Place him somewhere within eyesight of your entertainment system, and whenever you use one of your remotes, ApriPoko will notice the IR signal, perk up, and ask you what you just did. When you tell him “I just kicked my massage chair up to Shiatsu” he’ll remember your voice and the IR code from the remote. Next time, you can speak the command, and ApriPoko will rebroadcast the IR signal back to the device. I imagine that you’ll be able to assign specific voice commands to different combinations of devices, like a preset for “let’s watch a movie” or “hey baby, how ’bout a drink?”
