For $5, I picked up a WowWee Rovio WiFi Cam Bot from a place that sometimes clearances returns for other retailers. I was looking for something else, but the scuffed and broken box of this thing caught my eye, as did the price. I fully expected to just bust it up for parts, figuring it would have a nice motor or two, some interesting electronics, and maybe even a functional WiFi board, well worth the $5.. After a minor fix, I'm only short a rechargable battery for it, which I can find a suitable replacement for.. and it's fully functional. The second photo is a self-potrait I took using the Rovio, using the Web-based interface hosted directly on the bot itself, over the WiFi connection. In the first shot, you can see Internet Explorer showing the Rovio's hosted page, which includes streaming video and audio from the camera as well as facilities to change the device settings and drive it about it's environment.
This is a mobile streaming video camera with audio, and it hosts it's own web interface via WiFi.. no external PC. The camera can be set to three different elevations/angles, and has some type of IR LIDAR system and navigation. It's a damn nice device that retails for something like $150... merry xmas to me.
In any case, this thing HAS to be eminently hackable.
Yup.. Five Dollars. A chain of stores in the area called "Building 19". Basically, they buy out damaged goods warehouses and that kind of thing, and sell whatever it is off cheap. I got a Futon Couch which served as my bed for two years from them, for $30.. it had been hundreds, but the frame had been water damaged. I got a can black laquer and it looked better than new in less than a day. They sometimes buy pallets of returns from stores and just sell it off. Even for them, this was a ridiculous price. It was just another return-item beaten-up-box junk item they could get a few dollars for.
There was a minor problem (battery connector), which might have made it not work for the user, so they returned it as broken.. it ends up on a pallet of returns. I've gotten more than a few items from Building 19 over the years, including furnishing a couple of apartments from there back when I couldn't afford to buy much better
Going to have to dig around for a decent battery for this.. I have a nice gel cell, but it's fairly heavy.. maybe twice the weight of the "factory" battery I'm guessing. I think I might be able to rework a couple of cordless-phone batteries into something usable. Worst case, it's doable with a couple of NiCd AA's. It's only looking for 6v with a capacity of 3000mAH.. not that huge a demand.
I'll get her online and have the crew here drive it around the living room over the next few days.. happily, I'm gonna be pretty busy with a couple of gigs- even though I got this nice little toy by luck (mine!!!!), a bit of cash to spend on Mrs Focalist and the Focali will be useful....
Wow you got a steal of a deal! I paid $100 on WOOT and I thought I was doing good!
Just FYI...if the homebase LED starts flashing you need a new wallwart. Mine crapped out after about a month and in researching sounds like a fairly common problem.
