WowWee’s Roboscooper picks up the stuff too big for your Roomba

WowWee’s robots may be fun , lovable companions , but they aren’t always exactly the most useful things to have around. That’s not the case with the company’s new Roboscooper, however, which will gladly pick up stuff off your floor until its six AAA batteries run out. Of course, it will only pick up small, one ounce objects, and its storage capacity is a tad limited — but hey, every little contribution helps

Chinese manufacturer sticks IP webcam on robot vacuum, calls it a day

WiFi-controlled sentry robots have been our playthings for a few years now, but sure as Sunday morning, they don’t help us get much work done. Why would you, when you can discreetly spy on your house, kids and neighbors from the convenience of a web browser

Samsung’s Navibot robot vacuum charting European living rooms in April

Roomba has ruled the roost when it comes to domestic chores for a long time — too long.

Screen Grabs: DJ Roomba mixes business with pleasure on Parks and Recreation

Screen Grabs chronicles the uses (and misuses) of real-world gadgets in today’s movies and TV.

Roomba saves child from deadly Viper, challenges Tango to a fight

We’ve always known that the Roomba was something of a bad-ass — iRobot, after all, has quite a reputation within the defense industry — so we weren’t surprised when one of the autonomous vacuum cleaners took down a certain Vipera palaestinae (a venomous snake found in the Middle East). Considered a leading cause of snakebites within its geographic range, the snake was found mangled ’round one of the robot’s rotating brushes when Eli and Efi Frida returned to their home in Galilee, which they share with their two children, aged four and seven (as well as several cats and dogs). “We were very lucky,” said Eli, “If the snake would have hid in the house and bitten one of the children it could have ended badly.” Roomba saves child from deadly Viper, challenges Tango to a fight originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 27 Nov 2009 10:30:00 EST

Autonomous Roombas do Pac-Man right (video)

We’ve seen mixtures of Roomba and Pac-Man before, but nothing like this. A team of developers have hacked five floor-cleaning bots to create a sort of OCD version of the game, with the Pac-Man bot sucking up little white rectangles whilst being chased by robot incarnations of Inky, Pinky, Blinky, and Clyde

iRobot’s new Roomba patent could clean those hard to reach areas, get stuck there

When most kids our age were cutting class to play Mike Tyson’s Punch Out, the latch key kids over at Robot Stock News were taking apart their step father’s vacuum. And as we grew up, all the while developing relationships with cellphone tipsters and eventually becoming successful tech bloggers in our own right, the Robot Stock News kids were also able to take their obsessive geek tendencies and make a name for themselves — combing the interwebs, paying off high priced vacuum ninjas, and scouring the US Patent database for any and all news featuring many of our country’s leading autonomous vacuum cleaners

Roomba mod allows it to pick things up, hand them to you

Sure, we’ve seen some wild Roomba mods , but overall it’s pretty much a low-to-the-ground affair — unless you get the cats involved , of course. That’s apparently changing, though — check out this robotic grasping system, which can pick up foreign objects and deliver them to you at about waist height. The system was 95 percent effective in picking up objects of all sizes and shapes during trials, and it was apparently quite simple to build and code

Roomba’s journey shown to be endless, beautiful

We’ve always suspected our Roomba was actually performing a complex dance loaded with hidden meaning and bewitching charm instead of just bouncing around, and now we’ve got proof — check out this long-exposure shot of a Roomba’s path over 30 minutes. You can see the initial spiral path in the center, but after that it’s a free-for-all that somehow manages to cover the entire room.

Engadget’s recession antidote: win an iRobot Roomba Pet 562!

This whole global economic crisis, and its resulting massive loss of jobs got us thinking. We here at Engadget didn’t want to stand helplessly by, announcing every new round of misery without giving anything back — so we decided to take the opportunity to spread a little positivity. We’ll be handing out a new gadget every day (except for weekends) to lucky readers until we run out of stuff / companies stop sending things

WorldTechMag Latest

• Ask Engadget: Best e-reader for school use / PDF viewing?
• Australian researchers trap tiny particles in tiny tractor beam
• LG does the IPS dance with IPS2062T, IPS226V, IPS236V and IPS231P monitors
• ASUS Windows Phone 7 proto shows up on video
• Qualcomm’s CEO confesses: tablets killed the smartbook star
• Olympus E-5 leaks point to September 15th launch, familiar design
• HDR video accomplished using dual 5D Mark IIs, is exactly what it sounds like
• Intel CEO reveals Google TV launch is this month, explains McAfee purchase
• Google Walking Navigation beta and Street View now available for Android
• Debunk: Bing not replacing Google on all Verizon Android devices
• HTC Desire HD rendered, looks pretty legit to us — oh, except for that WinMo UI
• FanVision handheld makes NFL nosebleeds far more bearable
• Acer Liquid Metal wraps Android 2.2 in aluminum
• Samsung i8700 for Windows Phone 7 leaks, puts developer prototype to shame
• ECTunes adds sound to silent EVs, but only where and when you need it (video)
• Sony’s PSP Go post-mortem continues, Kaz Hirai concedes ‘pricing is perhaps an issue’
• iOS 4.1: any problems for you?