introduction:

Unconsciously, robots have not only existed in science fiction films, but have begun to enter every corner of modern life. From industrial production to home life, robots have begun to appear. Although most of them are not as intelligent as in the film, or only complete one of the functions, they have brought great changes to life. Recently Gangzi was lucky to get the trial qualification of pudding robot in the "recruitment of wonderful trial plan" of "Lei Feng's trial". He just came to experience the little pudding called "home care robot" in an all-round way to see what surprises it can bring us.

Trial preparation:

First, let's announce my application reason: I applied for the pudding robot trial, and I decided to test the basic functions of the product first, and then break the robot into pieces. See if DIY can be equipped with a base with wheels, so that the pudding robot can walk around the room and play with girls through remote control. It's wonderful to write a report on the process of dissection and assembly! After receiving the trial notice, I started to prepare the materials at the first time, because I needed a base with wheels on the DIY. According to the size of the pudding, I finally chose a set of three wheeled trolleys. I have the CPU core board in my hand, and it is OK to buy it for assembly and programming. Keep a sense of mystery first, and announce the car after the main character pudding appears.

Unpacking:

Don't misunderstand, the little snowman beside is just a prop, and the blue box is the packing box of pudding. The barreled carton package is printed with the English logo of pudding on the top front. The label of Lei Feng's trial use is not the product itself, but a standard LOGO memo for Lei Feng's trial use. What are the two big eyes looking out curiously? It is very cute in popular words.

The moment I opened the box, I was totally spoiled by the pudding with two big eyes exposed. If you look at the lower part of the box carefully, you can see different patterns such as heart-shaped spheres. These patterns, together with the elliptical holes in the upper part, can form different lovely eyes. It's really cute.

Take out all the accessories in the box, including pudding host * 1, 1.5m MicroUsb charging cable * 1, power adapter * 1, motion detection sensor * 2, manual * 1, warranty card * 1, and have a family photo.

When the pudding leaves the factory, it has two big eyes. Except for the cute ones, it has no other function. Considering that continuing to paste will affect the facial expression of pudding, it can not be used at ordinary times. Let the pudding turn around and give you a full picture. Careful friends may have seen that there is a common IMEI code behind the pudding. Does the pudding still have the function of phone call? Don't worry, let's analyze it step by step.

On the base at the bottom of the back is the interface for pudding, including a MicroUsb (charging port) and two USB ports. At present, it seems that the two USB ports can only be used as power output, and no other functions have been seen. I wonder if they will be developed later.

Go to the bottom of the pudding, you can see the pudding model, input power and other information. The lower label supports WCDMA network, that is, Unicom 3G network. The QR code in the middle is very important, and it is needed when the device is initialized and bound.

It is consistent with the input power requirements of pudding, and the output of the power adapter attached with the machine is 5V 2A, with wide voltage input.

Zigbee communication mode is used between the wireless sensor and the host. All friends who know Zigbee know that it is characterized by very low power consumption, automatic networking, and no complex configuration. In order to prevent power consumption when the sensor module leaves the factory, a plastic sticker is added on the battery for insulation, which needs to be removed during use. The sensor can be installed on the door and window. After the pudding is set as the defense mode, once these sensors move, the pudding will automatically face the direction of the sensor and snap pictures.

Function trial:
Since pudding is designed to be placed in a fixed way, only 500mA battery is built in, which has a small capacity and can only be used in case of temporary power failure. It needs to be plugged in regularly during normal use. After the power is connected for the first time, the pudding will enter the network setting state. Use your mobile phone to scan the QR code at the bottom, follow the prompts to download and install the pudding APP, and register and log in after the installation is completed.

After registration, enter the pudding networking step, where you need to scan the QR code at the bottom again, enter the WIFI password to be connected, and then you can connect the pudding to the network.

It is worth mentioning that the APP guidance of pudding is very detailed, even if it is Gangzi's first time to use Xiaobai, he can quickly master the use method, and he doesn't need to read the instructions. It is really ready to use.

The functions of pudding robot mainly include life service, entertainment and safety monitoring. You can query weather and other information through it. It also supports voice song ordering and programs. If you say "children's songs" to pudding, pudding will automatically search for and play songs. Cross talk, opera and other programs are also available. When playing songs, you can't use dialogue to remotely control. At this time, you must use the built-in gravity acceleration sensor of the pudding robot. By tapping the top of the robot, you can set custom functions such as song cutting and mute, and stop music playing by tilting 90 degrees.

During remote monitoring, you can use your fingers to slide the screen to rotate the head of the pudding and observe the monitoring situation in all directions.

Disassembly:

After trying the basic functions of pudding, do you feel curious about how this little thing can be so many? Gangzi can't help but sharpen his knife to pudding. First, take off his sunglasses and see what they look like inside. 85 LED bulbs are arranged in 5 rows and 17 columns to form LED grating, which is used to display the working state of pudding.

Remove the silver earrings and the white cover plate, and find the black dust cloth, which should be where the speaker is. It turns out that the ears of pudding are not for listening, but for speaking.

At this point, the surface has been removed, and the screw hole has not been found. It seems that we need to find another way. After observation, there is a ring of rubber ring on the base of the pudding. Could it be here? Pry it and have a look. I found it.

Unscrew three screws to remove the base. As can be seen from the figure below, counterweight is added to the base to ensure the balance of pudding and prevent it from being knocked down easily in use.

At this time, we can see the circuit board of pudding. There are not many devices on this side. We can see the hidden battery, stepping motor (Shenzhen Zhengde) and circuit board. The components on the circuit board are also relatively simple. In addition to connectors, the most striking feature is capacitance. As can be seen from the figure, tantalum capacitors are used for electrolytic capacitors, which ensure the life and quality of the circuit.

Take a recent photo. The plug in the center is coated with glue. Because the pudding rotates 360 degrees, this flat cable will be under stress when it rotates, so it has been treated to prevent it from falling off. This shows the designer's care.

Continue to disassemble. After the circuit board is removed, a small blue switch with three contacts is exposed. From the functional point of view, it should be used as a limit switch for trial, because the 360 selection is not arbitrary rotation. When rotating in one direction, the white device in the center will touch the blue part, that is, the limit, telling the pudding that it can't rotate any more, or it will twist the middle flat wire. It is also a truth to switch to another.

On the back of the circuit board, you can see a chip, the model is USX2064-AEZG-TR, and the manual is a 4-port USB2.0 controller with USB power output function. The key components are equipped with shielding covers, and can't be disassembled without air gun.

Then look at the host, remove the battery cover, and see the 3.7V500mAh polymer lithium battery. Because the display of pudding is LED dot matrix, it is very power saving. Even if the power supply is removed, the power supply can be guaranteed for more than 2 hours. The two metal plates on the left should be zigbee antennas.

Continue to disassemble. This time, you can clearly see the driving gear of the stepper motor and the small bearing in the center.

The gear in the figure above and the gear in the figure below form a selection system to jointly complete the rotation task of the pudding robot.

When the top cover is removed, the pudding camera is clearly shown. It uses the smallest wide-angle surveillance camera on the market at present, with a maximum resolution of 1280 * 960, a horizontal angle of 73.6 degrees (360 ° rotation), and a vertical angle of 58.6 degrees. In actual use, there is no comprehensive security function with no dead angle advertised online, because the camera cannot move in the vertical direction, and the tilt angle is upward, so it can only effectively monitor the space in the upward part. If the pudding is too high, the monitoring effect will be affected.

Built in mic and speaker. The speaker doesn't look very high-end, but the sound effect is smart. The dual MIC design can pick up sound in all directions, and can also reduce noise. Would it be better to put four in.

MIC and loudspeaker wiring parts.

Continue to disassemble and find another circuit board. It looks like the motherboard. It's a pity that the two large shielding covers make us unable to see the inside. The only chip that can be seen is EFM32ZG210F32T. According to the layout, it should be used as an LED dot matrix controller.

On the back of the board, you can see the built-in SIM card and 8GBTF card. After inquiry, the SIM card is Unicom 3G card, and the registration information is: Customer name: Shanghai Lechi Technology Co., Ltd; Certificate type: business license; Payment method: call fees in the business hall shall be paid in advance. Product name: 3 yuan package for small flow data card (for mobile phone) Effective time: November 1, 2015 Date of access: November 21, 2015; number type: GSM ordinary; call level: local call; roaming level: domestic roaming; brand: Wo. When you dial the number or dial out from another mobile phone, you will be prompted that the call is restricted, but you can send and receive SMS messages.

This small cover plate is not simple. It integrates wifi antenna and GSM antenna.

Removed top cover. The two black rings are the installation positions of MIC.

Have a family photo of all accessories. After that, install the pudding in reverse order, and the pudding is full of blood again.

Take out the car kit for pudding, and give a family photo as usual. Due to space problems, I don't believe that I will introduce the assembly process.

First put up the frame and let the pudding sit on it. It seems that the effect is good.

After installation, power on to see the effect. Is it ugly?

Make a program to let the little pudding dance with his car.

Summary:

Thanks again for the trial opportunity provided by Lei Feng. This trial was originally intended to do remote control for the base, but after buying materials, I found that the control board with the wifi module was too large to install. I asked the official Zigbee, which is not open at present. For time, I first made a wireless serial communication, which can be controlled by the computer. Let the front ultrasonic module perform obstacle avoidance detection, and you can run around the house with pudding. The child ran along strangely. Although he could not speak yet, he could see that he was very happy.

As an entry-level home care robot, the pudding robot has not yet achieved very powerful functions. The ability of speech recognition will decline a lot when the external voice is loud. There are some suggestions. I hope the pudding robot can be optimized and do better.

1. It is suggested to design more voice menus selected by workers in communication, such as "children's songs". Pudding can ask "which song do you want to listen to?" At this time, you can say the name of the song, and then play it randomly. This will make it more intelligent.

2. In addition, noise reduction needs to be strengthened to improve the speech recognition ability when the external voice is loud.

3. It is recommended to add vertical angle adjustment to the camera for easy use.

4. In terms of monitoring, it is recommended to add functions such as cycle card recording and smiling face capture, strengthen motion recognition, grasp the movement status of the elderly at home in real time, and timely alarm in case of accidents.

5. In terms of music playing, if Bluetooth can be added and connected to a Bluetooth speaker, the sound quality can be improved.

6. The USB port is open, and can be connected to the small NAS function of the hard disk. Remote download of film and television resources and other functions.
   

7. Open some API interfaces or Zigbee protocol interfaces so that enthusiasts can use these interfaces to implement DIY of external devices and enhance playability.