We love to ask him the weather because he reacts to it: On a rainy day, you’ll see clouds and rain drops over his eyes. His display will show that information as well. You can ask him for certain bits of information such as the weather and the time, both of which he’ll speak aloud. Vector is very much a companion right now, more so than a robot with tons of utility. ![]() And he’s really happy when you ask him for a fist bump and then give him one. He often raises his arms quickly to make gestures of happiness too. When you play with Vector, his eyes look around and light up. He even purrs a few times like a cat after that. When he goes to his charger, he makes a little happy sound and then his eyes droop to appear like he’s sleeping. His moves, sounds, and facial expressions are in a word: cute. Plus it brings a world of potential.įrom a fun factor, Vector’s animations were created with input from Pixar. And at this price point, that’s impressive. Of course, when Vector is in use or wandering about he’s actually mapping his environment as well. “There he goes again! I wonder what he’s doing?” she’ll say when Vector decides he’s been bored for one millisecond too long. My wife, who is generally not wowed by technology in general, actually loves this aspect. Sure, they’re not very exciting things - he may go explore his surroundings or play with his (included) cube - but it’s fascinating to see he just wander off his charging station, making little sounds and rolling around as if curious. Vector will respond to voice commands but he also does things on his own. It’s this combination of radio chips and the processor that brings a bit of autonomy to Vector, something Cozmo didn’t have. He has a Snapdragon 200-level chip, a capacitive touch sensor, a beamforming, 4-microphone array, 120-degree wide angle HD camera, four drop sensors, an IR laser scanner with three-foot range, a 6-axis gyroscope/accelerometer, color IPS display, Bluetooth, and Wi-Fi radios. Inside, however, Vector has quite a bit of smarts and connectivity. From the outside, you can’t really tell the difference between the new Vector and the old Cozmo model. What makes Vector interesting to me is that all of the processing power has moved from a smartphone app - which is how Cozmo worked - directly into the robot. Anki introduced Vector as a Kickstarter project so I got my little robot for $199 it’s available now online and in retail locations for the full suggested price. So let’s do that, starting with the $249 Anki Vector, a follow up to Anki’s Cozmo that launched two years ago. The answers are brief and to the point, though sometimes hard to understand due to the robotic voice.We need to talk more about robots here. You can ask it questions to get Wikipedia-type answers, though this is a slow, three-step process that requires you to trigger it, then pause, then say “ I have a question”, then pause, then answer your question. Through the trigger phrase of ‘Hey Vector’, you can ask for the weather (below), set a timer, play Blackjack (but no other games), take rather low-quality photos. There’s something I really like about Anki trying to replicate an animal or person with its own needs and desires, rather than a only-there-if-you-need-me, stately home servant persona of Alexa or Siri.īeyond being a companion, Vector’s functionality is rather limited. ![]() It then responds with noises of its own as if to say ‘hey, remember way’. ![]() Even when sent to sleep, Vector will sometimes wake up, which seems to be if it detects a noise. The whole time it burbles to itself and to you, and there’s no way to silence this short of telling it to go to sleep, or turning it off – which some people will find irritating.
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