Comments on: Palm-Based Robot Goes Commercial

A few weeks ago, a design for a cheap DIY fully autonomous robot built with off the shelf parts with a Palm at its heart was posted by the Carnegie Mellon Robotics Insitute. The robot can drive itself around on flat surfaces, using optical range sensors to sense nearby obstacles and walls. They give links to parts suppliers but hundreds of people asked to buy all the parts as a kit. As a research team, the Carnegie Mellon folks weren't interested in opening a store. Therefore, they have licensed the design to Acroname, who will sell the kits. They are offering two versions, the BareBones Kit for $260 and the Easy Kit for $300.

 Yeah!

I.M. Anonymous @ 10/31/2000 8:09:37 AM #

Sweet! I was looking forward to building my own from scratch, only now I'm debating whether the kit might be cheaper. Tho the "thrill of the hunt" would be rob from me if I did buy the kit intead... :-(

 OUCH!!

I.M. Anonymous @ 10/31/2000 12:37:50 PM #

That darn robot'll cost more than my palm! There's gotta be a cheaper way....cardboard and
chopsticks anyone? :)