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New Electrolux Trilobite 2.0 Vacuum Robot
i4u writes "The first version of the Electrolux expensive vacuum robot was launched last May. Electrolux announced the new metallic green Trilobite 2.0 on their Swedish site. The Electrolux Trilobite 2.0 is programmable like a VCR, it also recognises stairs and offers smarter cleaning. Electrolux has carried out 200 improvements. Photos on I4U." And at this rate, perhaps MkIII will be out next spring.
Robots prepared to work for less than minimum wage. Corporations outsource to robots. Indian unemployment at an all time low.
Wanna play Trilobite yourself? :)
This was my first (and last) Java Applet. JRE 1.4.1 required: Have fun
Well, I didn't elaborate the applet as far as I wanted, but it was fun learning Java/GUI programming and fundamentals of path finding (A*) at the same time.
It's, "Electrolux," not "Elextrolux."
if only it could learn how to avoid me stumbling on it every other day
They wasted their time then. There are only 6 people in the world capable of programming it to do what they want.
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
the Electrolux Trilobite 2.0 is programmable like a VCR
Does it mean I'll have to fiddle with a 8 x 7-segment green display, a bunch of buttons and knobs, and a manual written in engrish?
Unless Amazon's Trilobite Price-tag of $1,799.99 is a typo (which it is not), why is this robot 10 times more expensive than the Roomba ($159.99) ?
I think I would just buy 10 Roombas. Then I would have the added benefit of racing/fighting them.
01100010 01101001 01110100 01100101 00100000 01101101 01100101
After looking it seems the only differences from the Roomba is ultrasonic sight instead of bumpers, and a price tag an order of magnitude higher (Roomba == $160, Trilobite 2.0 == $1800).
I guess the sonic thing is a more geekish way to go about things, but is it really more effective than bumpers? Is it worth the massive price tag?
1800 US is a big whack of change to pay for a vacuum cleaner. I dont mind vacuuming and it only takes 10 mins to do the house so I think I will stick with the manual version for the time being.
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
The headline on the site reads "First self-propelled vacuum now in stores." I've had my Roomba for about a year, and it had already been around for awhile.
I'm always put off by products where the first promo description I read is totally untrue.
"The Electrolux Trilobite 2.0 is programmable like a VCR" Aww jeez, I'm screwed. What about those of us who are better shellcoders than VCR programmers?
"Better to be vulgar than non-existent" -Bev Henson
How the hell does it know what to hoover up and what not to?
I mean I a messy person and a bit lazy so this would be ideal for me. BUT if it is going to suck up all my money and keys and socks (that I store on the floor) then that would "suck"!
OK. So they move independently. Is that all that's necessary for a "robot"? So, like, if I rigged up a remote control car to drive mindlessly back and forth, back and forth all day, is it now a "robot"?
Where is the dividing line between "automatic mechanized device" and "robot"?
Honey, I shrunk the Cygwin
Okay, so it's ten times more expensive than the Roomba. Let's just hope it isn't ten times as competent, or human-kind could be in a world of trouble.
i'd hit it so hard, if you pulled me out you'd be the king of britain [bash.org]
Another device to aid the terminally lazy, I'm sure the few minutes of minor exercise saved by this device will be well used to perform such important tasks as "eating", "programming perl" and "reading slashdot".
Well, it's your heart attack, I'm just the guy whos taxes pay for your heart bypass at 52.
Well, this is in the dictionary:
;)
robot, n: a mechanism that can move automatically.
So I guess there is no line
I don't think it is wise to name a product after an extinct critter. Would you buy a PC called the "Dinosaur 99"?
Table-ized A.I.
I would love to see one of these crossed with one of those lawnmower robots. It could vaccum your house, then go outside to mow the lawn. Maybe it could sit by your front door at night and bark menacingly like a hungry pitbull when it's built-in motion sensor was tripped. Then I would buy one.
And if it could fetch a beer from the fridge... I would buy two.
Pubcrawler.ca
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I've started Roomba Wars: Episode I... Somebody want to "lend" me an Electrolux so I can continue the story?
I'm afraid of these things... what if I happen to like drinking Pepsi?
But Maaa! Everyone else has a
I suggest you check what engrish is, especially the paragraph where it says it has nothing to do with anti-asian racism in the faq, before posting your misinformed politically-correct, knee-jerk reactions.
Don't you know how to laugh a bit?
By the way, I'm surprised a man with such anti-racist convictions like you posts as AC...
How to mod your Vacuum bot into a fellatio-bot. Electrolux sales at an all time high.
Is this the proper place to tell of my romantic attachment to our pool filter?
Table-ized A.I.
Having owned a Roomba (the much cheaper, competing product from USA) for some time, I can only say that the next big thing will be a robotic floorwasher :-)
Let's hope they choose a different ad company other than the one that gave us "Nothing sucks like an Electrolux."
And it's true, Electroluxes do suck, but in a good way.
One of at least two times I can think of where sucking is a good thing.
Not necessarily, but that display will blink "12:00" on most units.
I bought an electrolux perhaps 6 years ago, it still works liek brand new today. My aunt however has bought about 5 vacumes varying from hoover, to the wind tunnel thing paying an average of $200 a pop. I'm not saying this is the reason it costs so much but those things are built like world war two battle ships.
I can now program my vacuum cleaner to follow my cats and kids around and vac up everything that they drop in their wake. Considering the sheer amount of flotsam they leave, 1800 $US is money well spent. Trilobite here I come!
----- One learns to itch where one can scratch.
btw, im a researcher in an intelligent robotics lab...
The trilobyte is probably the closest thing to the autonomous research robots I work with, thats really aimed at the consumer (albeit, the wealthy consumer...). From my understanding, trilobyte uses sonars for navigation and has internal mapping and localization. Those are necessary for it to find its charger base automatically, but it also can make cleaning faster and more efficient than say, roomba's spiralling and wall following algorithms.
Its kind of high priced, but not too bad considering the amount of research that localization and mapping has had over the years, and the hardware requirements to support it. Sonars are tricky devices to use and require quite a bit of computation to do accurate mapping with.
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but it doesn't do windows...
Sig temporarily out of service.
10x's the price of a Roomba may be a bit steep, but this thing can automatically recharge itself, and keep sweeping.
If it could empty itself too, it'd almost be worth the price (especially for places like restaurants and such).
Meet RoboMop.
He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.
Wasn't the Electrolux the name of the thing in Who Frammed Roger Rabbit?
Don't think that a small group of dedicated individuals can't change the world. It's the only thing that ever has.
http://www.robocleaner.de/a /servlet/ArticleNews/print/CTVNew s/1065533332984_99/?hub=SciTech&subhub=PrintStory& articleURL=
and
http://www.ctv.c
The trilobite looks to me like a fancy roomba, whereas the karcher device actually has a docking bay that cleans out the dustbin and is fully automatic. Seems like it's worth the $1500 vs the trilobyte.
This is the corporate sectoring preemptively gearing up for when your computer will make your product decisions for you... I mean, please, we all know that computers prefer strange characters in there communications... just look at the wingdings character set.
Of blankness, I know nothing.
My Roomba is already a better robot then it is a vacum cleaner. They should put more effort into improving the cleaning ability then on fancy robotics.
This robot is funny, but it lacks a critical feature : the ability to use it... as a normal vaccum.
AFAIK there is no way to plug a pipe and a brush onto it in order to manually vacuum.
So this robot can vacuum the floor, but nothing else. You need a second vacuum for the rest.
{{.sig}}
Any vacuum will last for 6 years if you only use it once a year.
Create a little humanoid body for it, slap some cat ears and an apron on it, and this thing will sell like hotcakes in Japan!
Super powers sold separately.
It has better features than the roomba or the trilobite. Like a base station which empties the dustbin. The unit keeps cleaning until it's covered your entire house and finds its way back to the base station every hour to empty itself and recharge before continuing where it left off.
robocleaner CTV review of the robocleanerThe 1.0 came out in 2001, in Northern Europe at least. We've had one for years and we love it - it's kinda cool to live with a robotic household member.
At this rate, 3.0 might be available in 2007.
J
It's a different market. How much does it cost to employ cleaners to vacuum the floors of an office?
Though for 1000 I'd want wireless with it reporting it's progress and building a map of the areas it's vacuumed back to a server as well.
Deleted
To do an entire house, from top to bottom, including stairwells (as long as all bedroom doors are open) would be _REALLY_ nice.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
New!! Low cost alternative: Teaches you to appreciate and even enjoy dirty floors.
If you're in Stockholm and interested in the construction of the this robot check out the Swedish Technical Museum (No English web page). 6 months ago it had a room sized display with English description showing how the vacuum cleaner was designed and built. There was also a very cool display on robots in general with dozens of different working robots and hundreds of toys. A fun museum for geeks.
---
It's wrong that an intellectual property creator should not be rewarded for their work.
It's equally wrong that an IP creator should be rewarded too many times for the one piece of work, for exactly the same reasons.
Reform IP law and stop the M$/RIAA abuse.
Nothing sucks like an Electrolux. :)
---- I'll take you in a Hunt deathmatch any day.
I really hope you're joking.
There was a guy that my wife heard about from her instructor when she was in medical training that ended up losing his family jewels just because he did that.
To make a long story short, he got stuck, and couldn't shout for help loud enough... (it was a private pool in his backyard). By the time someone had heard him yelling for help and a medical team arrived, his uhmm... equipment was irreparably damaged, and he paid the penultimate price for his stupidity.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
I received this email at 1725 PST:
Short summary: The device is fairly intelligent, does not get stuck frequently, does indeed learn the extents of the room and work with them, and gets the vacuuming done pretty well. Its only shortcomings are that it sometimes will miss a patch (surprise surprise) and that it does not do a very good job of getting the dust/dirt 2cm from walls.
And now, unrelated to the linked article: From what I understand the Roomba is pretty dumb, not as dumb as I made it out to be but not very bright nonetheless. But, maybe I've been misled along those lines?
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I wonder if this robot will pack up and move to Mexico to save a few bucks a year...
"You're getting brutal, Sark. Brutal and needlessly sadistic."
"Thank you, Master Control"
-Sark and the MCP
Elecrotux seems more appropriate :)
3.243F6A8885A308D313
If it is going to suck up all my money and keys...
At least you'll know where to find them.
3.243F6A8885A308D313
Ok
And so, this is for passing thru the lameness lame filter.
... The line from the press release: The Trilobite 2.0 is programmable. Just as a VCR can be set to start up at a specific time on a certain day .. would be the giveaway. Instead, it just tells me that the return rate on these things will be high.
Maybe the cost difference is that the Electrolux Trilobite 2.0 can actually clean a carpet beneath the surface. I've seen the roomba in action in stores, and it only cleans the top of the carpet -- who cares! This doesn't mean you have a clean carpet. I will only spend the money on one of these things if it does the following: i. Contains on or two brushes that LIFT the carpet similar to how *most uprights do. ii. Provide similar cleaning/sucking power as a 12amp Hoover. What I saw from the Roomba is nothing but a Dust Buster - it cleans the surface, but nothing more!
The Roomba gets entangled in wires, strings, cables, and tassles, and it doesn't work well on soft carpeting. I think that makes it useless in most homes. Electrolux claims not to have those problems; if it does, it may be worth the price relative to the Roomba (provided that you need a robotic vacuum cleaner at all).
but as for iRobot, the majority of the research robots in our lab (aside from the ones we built) were made by iRobot. The roomba is a curious toy from them, but most of their work is in much more advanced machines.
And I dont think electrolux has done anything particularly *new* with the trilobite, aside from giving it near-consumer level pricing. Its still using sonars and has the capabilities research robots saw 10-12 years ago. Still though, the equipment to do that used to be outrageously expensive and is now merely, expensive. That is noteworthy in and of itself.
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