I was given one of these last holiday season to review. At the time, I was pretty impressed that TOMY was able to offer such a sophisticated mini-humanoid for the price (which was then around $250 street). Now, sadly, after a year, TOMY has decided to discontinue the product. But that means we can offer them in the Maker Shed for $106!. That's a very attractive price for a very hackable little robot, making it the perfect gift for any techno-tinkerer on your list. This 6 1/2"-tall humanoid uses 17 servomotors to somersault, stand on one leg, do push-ups, perform martial arts. It has 180 pre-programmed movements, responds to verbal commands, and performs up to 240 movements in sequence, allowing you to design countless routines, such as programming the device to say "hello," introduce himself, play an air guitar, bow to his audience, and say "good night." Using the included action chart as a guide, you simply enter the alphanumeric codes into the remote control and i-SOBOT reacts in earnest with acrobatics, verbal phrases, and greetings, or you can control his movements manually using the dual joysticks and trigger buttons on the remote. In voice recognition mode, the robot moves in response to ten verbal prompts, such as "Go forward" or "Back up," and acknowledges questions like "How are you?" with appropriate retorts. Ages 10+.Price: $105.95.Robots-Dreams.com has some links to i-SOBOT hacking-related resources here.
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