OT: Technology and Geek Stuff Thread

[LionsFanInJapan]

Sorry, you left yourself open by not saying what kind of robot, so I looked up "creepy robots" on google. That one seemed the creepiest, although there was a weird baby one with crazy eyes....

[dpatnod]

My first Robot:

[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7iUjX8AxVQ"]CatGenie Self Washing Self Flushing Cat Box - YouTube[/ame]

[dpatnod]

It is actually a pretty amazing machine. After 9 months I guess it is safe to say that. I wasn't sure about it when I got it.

I just want to make it... a little better.

[dpatnod]

Always up for a good hack.

Geeze, I want to control the cpu in my friggin cat litter box.

Good grief. Too much?

[LionsFanInJapan]

Needs more power!

[dpatnod]

Needs more power!

Yeah. HA.

More than that it needs to be free to accept alternative (maybe less expensive) magic cleaning chemicals. Or to not become a brick when a cartidge "decides" it is empty (Like - cant even be made to drain. Hope you have a spare cartidge.... I have never seen them in a brick and mortar store).

[LionsFanInJapan]

I'm guessing that's probably on purpose. More profit for them.

[dpatnod]

Yeah. It's my only beef. Great machine.

But I am always opposed to being "locked in".

My rebellious nature I guess.

Like printer companies. The money is in the ink cartidges. You can't refill them though, right?

[LionsFanInJapan]

I would assume there has to be a way to mod it.

[dpatnod]

There is an open source group.

I know that each cartidge has an rfid chip. It "decides" it is empty by counting how many times it has run through a cycle - not wether or not it is really empty of fluid.

I am just debating....

building a PICT programmer..... risk my warranty.......

No. I would never mess with the electronic brains of a piece of machinery that I own........ It really belongs to the company that made it.

Thought over.

I would also never watch a burned copy of a dvd!

[unknown lions fan]

I have one of those dpatnod. I bought it in about 2009, but one of my two cats refused to use it. Right now it's sitting in storage.

It was a pretty cool unit. I had mine in a basement utility room and was able to tap the drain hose directly to the waste water port in the floor. It was a nice setup, but alas Hobbes screwed up my plans to be done with scooping.

There are a lot of cool hacks for it, including alternatives to the expensive pellets.

You're probably familiar with litterboxcentral.com, the forums there have a lot of ideas for it.

[dpatnod]

Yeah. I just have not done anything to mine yet.

I have a cabinet in the laundry room with a little "doggy door".. kitty door in this case. Inside the cabinet is a motion-triggered light.

When it runs into the cleaning cycle.... I have a surge protector that senses the extra power draw, and runs an exhaust fan with a damper hacked into a dryer hose on the head of the unit for 15 minutes. The fan connects to a dryer vent that goes directly outside by flexible tubing, and runs while it is running.

So it is completely out of sight, hooked to the plumbing both in and out, lights up for the kitties and blows out the smell after they leave.

Cool.

I am kind of running into what you did ULF. One cat took to it like the greastest thing ever. The (at a few weeks old encountered in the woods) one my daughter made me take in, not so much.

[dpatnod]

Yeah, I might have different pellets in mine.

I havent't yet... but I think I might JTAG my cat litter box.

http://code.google.com/p/catgenius/

What cracks me up is..... The code for the machine is called "Litter Language".

[Sharkbait]

Creepy Dancing Stripper Robot Video - YouTube

Sharky the DJ queues up, "In the Year 2525."


.....You won't find a thing to do, some machine's doing it for you.....

[unknown lions fan]

When it runs into the cleaning cycle.... I have a surge protector that senses the extra power draw, and runs an exhaust fan ...

I was wondering about this, but now I see that the newer models have the cat sensor to kick off the cleaning process as an option.

Mine is a 1st gen unit, and it only activated on time intervals based on setting. Good to see they changed that.

I think I'm going to try using it again. I think as hobbes gets older, he's less finicky about which box he uses.