SONY "Q.Taro"
(Quansi-stable
Traveling
Action
RObot)
So what is the SONY
"Q-Taro"?
One of the most not talked about SONY products
that has been made is the "Q-Taro". Sown
for the first time back at the Robodex 2002 exhibition of robots in
Japan, SONY demonstrated some of these robot prototypes
of what would be a spherical 'healing creature'; the SONY "Q-Taro".
The robot, named 'Q-Taro',
witch, like AIBO's name, is an abbreviation for “Quansi-stable
Travelling Action Robot”.
It's around 6.7 inches in diameter and weighs just over 2 pounds.
It consists of a spherical transparent plastic outer shell within
which is a coloured ball, where Q-Taro's main body
is. When Q-Taro moves, only the other shell will
rotate, thus leaving the inner 'body' of Q-Taro always
upright. SONY had made many different coloured Q-Taro's,
as seen on the pictures on here. Q-Taro's body has
several different areas that light up and glow, with varying intensities
of colours. Q-Taro also had audio and infrared sensors.
SONY
said the robot was developed to foster an emotional connection between
humans and robot technology. Q-Taro is not the type
of robot that relies on being operated with remote control, like AIBO,
it is a full autonomous robot which operates with the computer which
is loaded inside Q-Taro. Q-Taro
has four temperature sensors that can detect the presence of a person
and bring the Q-Taro to life while audio sensors
enable it to roll around the floor in time to music. The glowing lights
can help it show "emotions", like AIBO
does in the same way. With its infrared sensors it can sense the presence
of objects and people to avoid running into them. Q-Taro
also had speech recognition and could understand and react to up to
10 different spoken words. Q-Taro, like AIBO
once again could also self-charge himself which he would automatically
return himself to his charging station. The battery life of Q-Taro
was around 3 hours long. In addition, you could turn off
the human body temperature function thus saving battery and he could
last even longer.
Champaign gold and Cyber Blue Q-Taro.
Q-Taro
was originally developed by the SONY’s personal
audio division, the same people who make the Walkman,
and not SONY's Entertainment Robot division. Q-Taro
was made to cheer you up and bring a smile to your face, he would
just roll on the floor of your home, playing music and being well,
really cute. Sadly SONY made no schedule of the merchandising
the Q-Taro. When you compare him to AIBO,
the technology operational part of Q-Taro is more
simple. Q-Taro was another lovely development from
SONY. R.I.P Q-Taro.
~ Shanie.
