Help me find motherboard & CPU for my robot :)

[CVMichael]

I want to make robot with a computer as the "brains". I am looking for a low power, integrated video, integrated WiFi, and a low power CPU (low TDP).

I found a motherboard that fits what I am looking for, but I was hoping maybe you guys can give me an even better option.

The motherboard I found is ASUS P8H67-I DELUXE. Looking through the CPU Support List, I found only one CPU that is low power i7-3770T that has a 45W TDP. Of course I'm gonna max out the RAM to 16 GB.
I plan to have the OS on a SSD drive (for low power)

So... can anyone give me a better option?

By the way... if you are gonna say "why not a laptop?" then my answer is: Can a laptop performance (and price) match the above?

[Nightwalker83]

Wow! What are you planning to do with the robot, send it to mars?

[CVMichael]

LOL...

No... but it will have several sensors, like Ultrasonic Range Finder, and a LASER distance finder (LIDAR), (for a start), and I will probably add more than one LIDAR. It depends on how fast the LIDAR collects information, if it's slow, then I will add like 4 to 8 LIDARs and combine all the info into one data stream.
It will collect this information, and have the robot map the environment in 3D. Using the 3D map, I will tell it where to go. When I plan to take the robot outside, I will also add a GPS to it...

Later on (probably next year) I will add an arm to the robot. Then I want to make it so that it will recognize objects (I am not sure how am I gonna do that yet, I have one idea so far), and hopefully tell it to pick up objects and move them around.

But first I need to finish the hardware, I don't want to raise my hopes too much

Does the mars rover do this? from what I know all the rovers follow a predefined track, and the guys at NASA send daily updates to the rover so it knows where to go.

Anyways... once the robot has a 3D map of the environment, I don't think it's too hard for the robot to figure out (using recursive algorithms) where to go once it knows the destination location in it's 3D map.

[stanav]

With all of those capabilities that you plan to add to your robot, I don't think a single i7-3770 cpu can keep up with the tasks. Probably you'll end up using multiple cpu's where each one handles specific some specific set of tasks. Anyway, it sounds like a very interesting project. Good luck and if you don't mind, keep us updated with how the project goes every once in a while...

[CVMichael]

Well, in between the motors and sensors, and the computer I will use microcontrollers (PIC18 and PIC32), so they will do some of the processing also... similar to a human, our conscious mind makes a decision (wants to do something), and other parts of the brain tell the muscles what to do, or other parts of the brain connected to sensors tells the conscious what is around us. In my case the computer CPU is the conscious, and the microcontrollers are the unconscious that do the work.

This of course is put in a very philosophical way...

Talking about keeping you updated; this is my first (and only) robot so far: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3Dpe1v6G-w (I made it in about a week).

The robot I want to do now is MUCH more complex

[akhileshbc]

Cool..

How about using Kinect Sensor on it ? I think, it would help you.

[ahmedkhairy]

If you look at used laptops..you might find something close to what you require with cost efficiency

[CVMichael]

I never used the Kinect Sensor before, and I don't have time to learn how to use it. I will make the robot with sensors that I already used before. This way I will make it quicker.

About laptop... well, a laptop does not have the performance that I'm looking for. If you look at my first post, with the motherboard I plan to use, I can add up to 16GB of RAM.

[CVMichael]

The very beginning of my robot:

Tomorrow I will go to an electronics store to find something for making the front wheels turn.
My first attempt will be to use a belt system to turn both left and right motors. A stepper motor will turn the belt.

Took me about a week to do what you see in the pics. Not many hours left after work, especially because my building has strict rules not to make noise (cutting, drilling, etc.) after 8PM

There is still a lot to do...



Batteries are 12V 8Ah each (So 16 amps in total)

[akhileshbc]

cool