Robe:Do makes affordable robots for fun and games

The market of affordable robots for hobbyists has definitely flourished in the last few years as electronics components and open source software have made such creations possible. Robe:Do Robotics is a small mom and pop operation out of Colorado that builds and sells a small range of such small and affordable robots that look like a lot of fun.

The company is owned by William and Esmaa Self who hand build every robot they ship to customers. For now, they sell 3 robots called the Coppa, Silvio and Three. The first two have 4 wheels and are designed for carrying large payloads while the last one which is also their latest offering is designed more for speed than heavy lifting. Three can carry a laptop up to 6 pounds heavy. Robe:Do suggests that the $439 robot be paired with an equally cheap netbook computer for many days of fun activities. The company provides high-level libraries for controlling the robots making it easy to get one running around avoiding obstacles with just a few lines of code.

In case you are wondering what can one really do with robots of such modest specifications, take a look at the below video of a Coppa robot receiving a command from an iPod Touch and then preparing and carrying popcorn just in time for the movie.