Hasta La Gadget!

Greetings from the distant future of 2013. We stand in a basement of a wasteland once known as “New York City,” to deliver you tales of the impending Robopocalypse. We’ll take you to “San Diego” where former Wired editor-in-chief Chris Anderson and his 3D Robotics business partner Jordi Muñoz are offering up the technology to help turn robotic helicopters into autonomous drones. Next up, author Daniel H. Wilson discusses his own prophecies in the bestselling Robopocalypse (soon to be a Spielberg-directed motion picture). Wafaa Bilal, the NYU professor who had a camera implanted in the back of his head, tells us about his life as an cyborg — and what it’s like having strangers on the internet shoot you with paintballs.

We’ve got a trip to the Robot Hall of Fame in Pittsburgh where we speak to BigDog creator Marc Raibert, iRobot in Massachusetts, Bot & Dolly and Keepon-maker BeatBots in San Francisco and Willow Garage, home of the PR2. We’ll also travel to MIT, Carnegie Mellon, Georgia Tech and Northeastern University to find how some of our nation’s top schools are contributing to the forthcoming robotic apocalypse. And, seeing as how it wouldn’t be an Engadget Show without the Gadget Table, we crack open a time capsule from 2012, to check out some of the top consumer electronics of the day including the Microsoft Surface, iPad Mini and Nexus 4 and 10.

Be sure to watch this very special episode of the Engadget Show. Your life — and everything you hold dear — just might depend on it.

Download the Show: The Engadget Show – 038 (HD) / The Engadget Show – 038 (iPod / iPhone / Zune formatted) / The Engadget Show – 038 (Small)

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Continue reading The Engadget Show 38: Robopocalypse with Chris Anderson, Daniel H. Wilson and our future robot overlords

Filed under: Robots

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Remember the toy car that transforms into a robot? The inventor Kenji Ishida is playing Santa to those of you who wished you could buy one. He’s selling 10 units of the latest version of his robot, which has a couple of new tricks up its robot sleeves.

In addition to being remote controlled and transformable, the 1:12 scale robot can now fire plastic projectiles from its arms and has a camera that can send live footage over a Wi-Fi connection.

You can order the robot from Ishida’s company Brave Robotics (his site is currently experiencing heavy traffic). The price isn’t listed, but you can bet it’ll be expensive. The robot will come fully assembled and programmed along with a wireless controller, four rechargeable batteries, a battery charger, a “motion edit software” and a serial cable. If you think you won’t be able to afford this model, keep saving: Ishida plans to release a life-sized robot car by 2030.

[via Jalopnik]

If you’re like us, seeing that transforming RC robot in the spring was a mild form of torture without any clues as to when (and if) we could try it for ourselves. Kenji Ishida has clearly been busy assuaging our fears since then, as he just took the wraps from what should be the finished version of his brainchild. The now Brave Robotics-branded machine is more polished, with a 3D-printed shell, but it’s the technical upgrades that will have more of us scrambling for the product page: the production model is toting a missile launcher in each arm as well as a WiFi camera to follow its exploits in both car and robot modes. Anyone who wants the robot as quickly as possible will have to contact Ishida-san, if it’s not too late; there are just 10 units in the initial batch, and pricing is only available on request. A one-month wait for shipping will scuttle any hopes of getting one as a timely gift, too. That said, we can only imagine that any robotics fan would be ecstatic to get an IOU under the tree for Brave Robotics’ project.

Continue reading Transforming RC robot reaches production form packing heat and a WiFi camera (video)

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Via: Hobby Media

Source: Brave Robotics (translated)

One thing’s for sure – nuclear power plants are not exactly the safest place in the world to be, never mind that it delivers far more energy to the world compared to traditional methods, although there is the issue of disposing of nuclear waste in a clean and efficient manner. After all, all of that garbage will still need to go somewhere, right? Well, the massive earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan in March last year still lingers on in the memories of many, where entire towns were leveled, and the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant of Tokyo Electric Power Company Inc. was crippled, resulting in it being a radiation hazard to the general public. It was rather ironic that Japan had to enlist the help of robots from the US in order to help in the clean up, which is why the Japanese decided it would be best to come up with home grown robots just in case something similar (keep your fingers crossed that it doesn’t) happens sometime down the road. Toshiba has come up with a version of a four-legged robot that will help out in nuclear plants.

This particular Toshiba robot will see action for surveillance as well as recovery operations in areas where it is not deemed safe for humans to work. Boasting a camera and a dosemeter among other hardware specifications, this Toshiba robot can be remotely controlled in order to check on the state of power plant’s innards, especially in areas where the radiation levels are way too high for a human to venture into safely, lest he or she turns into a green rage monster – or something.

Sporting an algorithm which Toshiba came up with in order to control the robot so that it can walk on an irregular ground or steps alongside its multi-jointed structure, this particular puppy is capable of getting up and about on all four legs, all the while avoiding obstacles in addition to navigating through stairs without missing a beat – in both directions. This would allow it to operate in areas where wheeled and crawler-type robots are unable to work in.

Toshiba is also kind enough to throw in a tiny vehicle which can be hooked up to the four legged robot with a cable, where this add-on will be tasked with snapping photos of the facilities around, various equipment and pipes that are located at the ends of narrow paths and behind structures. Toshiba intends to continue developmental work of the robot so that it can be more utilitarian, installing shields, stopping water leakage, as well as taking out obstacles.

Source
[ Toshiba 4-legged robot to venture into nuclear power plants copyright by Coolest Gadgets ]

End-of-year engineering school projects often pique our interest for their creativity. It’s not every day that they can carry a bassline, however. James McVay’s robot project for his honors year at the Victoria University of Wellington, the supremely well-named MechBass, wouldn’t have much trouble keeping up with a favorite band. It centers on a custom, Arduino-compatible board that controls the plucking, fretting and damping of four strings to faithfully recreate bass guitar sounds from MIDI input. The design even accounts for the unwanted noises of actuators and motors, while virtually everything was either 3D-printed or laser-cut just for the task at hand. Sounds good? There’s more in the pipeline: an upcoming Swivel robot will experiment with different playing techniques, and McVay ultimately sees his work teaching us about robotic music’s interaction with human performers. For now, we’ll be happy with the video after the break and hope that MechBass takes requests.

Continue reading MechBass robot nails bass guitar sounds with Arduino and a stone cold groove (video)

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Source: Hack A Day