OTTORO the Smart Robot Vacuum

Posted 25 Jul 2003 at 03:26 UTC by The Swirling Brain

A company in Korea announced that they have created a smart robot vacuum. The robotic vacuum named OTTORO made by Hanool Robotics has 2 cameras, 30 sensors and artificial intelligence to vacuum every bit of a carpet in a room including the edges and corners. The vacuum has three times the suction power of regular vacuums so it's not just a little carpet sweep. The batteries last about 50 minutes, but the vacuum can automatically go back to base and recharge itself. The initial price is $3400 (4 million won) but the price is expected to drop to half when production gets going.

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Techno turkey, posted 25 Jul 2003 at 12:31 UTC by motters » (Master)

Who on earth is going to buy a vacuum cleaner costing $3400 ??

This is a classic example of over-engineering. A robotic vacuum cleaner just doesn't need 30 sensors and two video cameras, and robots that complex are unlikely to be highly reliable or easy to maintain.

I've used a couple of robotic vacs for several years now. The first one I bought was the Cye robot. Cye works fine, but its large size means that it doesn't get under chairs or hard to reach places. More recently I bought a Roomba, and that really does the business - much better and far less complex than Cye. With Cye I needed to hang around and supervise in case it got into trouble, but with Roomba I can confidently start it working and leave the house.

The famous door to door salesman vac's., posted 25 Jul 2003 at 14:57 UTC by earlwb » (Master)

I think it'll be a exclusive with the door to door salesmen. Remember the really neat water filter vac, it sells for about $2k US the last time I asked. Or maybe a Kirby labeled robot vac?

I can't resist....:) They'll come to your home and demonstrate how much it really sucks.

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