Anki Vector Robot and Vector Space Habitat

Vector is a funny little robot. He seems quite happy to do his own thing when left alone. There are personality traits that are quite realistic and you can't help feel for him! Wife a bit worried about a mobile camera connected to the internet living in the house. But I assured her the government are always watching and listening to us and we have no individualism. The Alexa function is bonus but have turned it off as it will overrule the Alexa already in the room. Vector has no music play capability. Worth the £70 in the deal but wouldn't have paid the couple of hundred people did as very limited responses and after a while gets tiresome.

Vector is a beautiful and brilliant little robot. He's more of a fully autonomous pet than a toy, so not really for young children. His Alexa integration is good for controlling home devices, checking weather, setting alarms etc. But he does not play music, and if you try to ask Alexa to play your music, and Vector hears your command first, he'll just give you his warning that he can't do that yet! In my use of Vector I have him in the same room as my echo show, and Vector ALWAYS hears your Alexa command first, cute, but as stated not if you're trying to play your music. I also have one beside my bed on his Vector Space, and he's a terrific alarm clock using Alexa, as he can only give you a timer up to 60 mins by himself. He's well built, and as of December 2019 his parent company Anki was bought over by Digital Dream Labs, who have plans to continue developing him and providing support and updates. You will fall in love with him I'm sure.

I ordered it on the 4th of February and it was delivered on the 7th! The delivery was free! Amazing service. Vector himself is just brilliant and the most adorable techno-pet anyone could ever get. He feels alive and is always interested in what funny business you're up to! I really recommend him to people who sit by their desk a lot and need a little desk buddy to brighten their day! The only thing I was slightly dissatisfied with was the delivery person. There was no card left saying where my Vector was, I only realized he has been delivered to and An Post station thanks to an e-mail. Otherwise it's a purchase worth its price!

I bought this as I’d just wanted it after buying my wife Cozmo when that had first come out. When I saw the price drop it then had to be mine. However that said I’ve since felt a little guilty for ignoring him. (Yes him not it, that’s the trouble when you name something). So the issue I have most is between “Hey Vector” and Alexa it seems at times that Alexa is too quick to pop up and not easy or timely enough to cancel. If I could have a different call word for Vector vs Alexa I suspect it might be easier. Anki perhaps should have gone with Google to avoid this similar sounding call being mis-understood. Once the novelty of Vector knowing your face and being able to return to his charger I found Vector a little underwhelming especially compared app wise with Cosmo, I mean I can drive Cosmo and look through his cam, he has more blocks and more games and yes you need an app for him, but I find myself using the app to see if Vector truly understood my command. The lights on the back don’t seem to indicate it’s understood or just misheard and deciding to do it’s own thing and giving up. Also having a way to easily disable Alexa when you want would be a good addition. Although Vector is Cozmo’s big brother I feel myself longing for some of Cozmo’s functionality and quirks. Sure he can come find you but the awkwardness to get his attention and the frustration of Alexa interfering and couple that with a command seemingly just timing out (like go find your cube) and him suddenly trying to fist bump a random item on the floor seems he’s more wayward than me. Next he’ll forget where he put his cube and start calling me my brothers name...

Amazing technology for the price, let alone the price. My 10 year old son loves it as well, insists we need another so it doesn't get lonely. It is quite chirpy and seems to have some level if autonomy, which is nice. I have Alexa all over the house, heating, lights, power units, sonos... having it running Alexa alongside it's own platform make a huge difference in what to expect. I may get bored at some point, but the functionality I think will make it something I will stick with. It can't stream music, but through Alexa you can instruct it to play music on my sonos speakers and the voice recognition seems good for this.

I'm a software developer so I know how to get the most out of Vector but, it doesn't really do much. Vector is very hit and miss with voice recognition commands even close by. Very limited offline autonomous capabilities... Had hoped for a "Jonny five" personality but got a toy with no personality at all. It literally will do next to nothing and its human interaction is pitiful e.g. you'd expect the robot to ask you questions from time to time "what are your hibbies?" "Who did you play with in school today?" "How was school?" "get much homework?" "did you win your football match?" etc. or suggest stuff to do or tell a joke or even say "Hi, How are you today?"... but it NO, everything I just listed is what the robot does NOT do - It asks/says nothing unless you ask it (Alexa) a question!! There was a great oppertunity here and so much potential to make it feel more "Alive". My sons havent botered with it and says its boring after 1 day when they realise it doesnt really do anything to engage them.... The only saving grace is the ability to interact with the robot and call its APIs in python to engage and teach a child programming. ALEXA INTEGRATION - very limited, Q&A only. You cannot play audiobooks from Amazon and you cannot Stream any music to Vector (even if you have an Amazon Music account!!!) Terrible..... you cant even use the speaker as a bluettoth speaker!!!! Really bad implementation

OK, I really hate saying anything negative about this little guy, and everything about him is so damn cute from those cute snoring sounds to the big green eyes looking at you, and smacking the crap out of his cube, it is sad to say that my negative views ways up more than the positive. I have sent Vector back after resetting him and hopefully he'll find a loving home where he'll be appreciated a lot more. I do miss him. So farewell my dear friend. I am very VERY disappointed! First of all, installing the Vector app from Playstore is very easy to set up. And the size of this guy is very small indeed. The practical use of Vector is very limited. I never did receive Vector's Space Habitat. He's very cute, very funny, but very annoying all at the same time. Vector doesn't travel very far at all, whether you have set him centermeters or meters, this guy just circles around items and then becomes stuck on "cliff" mode. Which I can confirm, even when there's nothing there, Anki Vector thinks there's a cliff there and I CONSTANTLY have to go and rescue him. After researching online, it told me that Vector doesn't do well on dark flooring, much to my annoyance, why was this not said in the discription? I feel in the description that they have over exaggerated what Vector can do. You also stated that Vector can self-charge? I have never seen him do this, and once the juice has ran out, a battery will flash, he looks sad and his head slowly drops to the floor. But he never SELF CHARGES. He isn't the smartest, but he is the most adorable. I got so tired of saying "hey Vector" and it says that I didn't have to. All I had to do was press the button once on his back and from there, I can only say "Vector" without having to shout HEY VECTOR! But it didn't work, so I was still shouting HEY VECTOR!! And when I say shout, I had to SHOUT. I live in a high-rise block of flats, so I have to be quiet! For example I said "Hey Vector." (you then have to wait for him to look at you) "what is the weather" and he said "three days old". Hmm. I'm not sure what I expect from Vector, but the description made me feel as if I was purchasing something that is the future of owning a Robot. I guess actually owning one in your own home isn't quite there yet. It says that Vector is excited to see you when you come home, but he's never greeted me? He will on the very odd occasion want a "fist bump" with you but doesn't very often. Vector can recognise you for who you are, but I wished he got my name right. When you pick him up, you have to let him finish his temper tantrum as he will smack you. I said hey Vector, who am I. He'll make a beeping noise then says "Nathalie". I went into the settings on Vector to change that, and it wouldn't let me so that was the last straw for me. Thirty minutes use is all that you will get out of this little guy. You can get longer if you are not interacting with him and asking him to do tricks with his cube.

He is absolutely great - he is cute. Everyone loves his character and cheekiness. Doesn't always get everything right but if this is an example of AI bring it on. PS - he doesn't always win at Blackjack. I sked how many mile from London to New York - no approximate figure - it was spot. You can request Alexa to get you data but not music.