EEVblog 1523 - Dumpster Samsung Cleaning Robot TEARDOWN

[@cody5495]

Our robot vacuum runs every single day and it's absolutely amazing.. One of the best investments for my house. It forces you to keep the floor picked up and organized so it doesn't get stuck. There is one drawback.. it phone's home to China every 5 seconds and I'm pretty sure it's uploading naked photos of me

[@hillppari]

thats why i cut the link and it runs on my home server instead of calling back to china. sadly newer models are harder to hack like that.

[@MattyEngland]

Israel have a firmware update that can make it circumcise a man while he sleeps! Sweet dreams 🙂👍

[@russellhltn1396]

@@hillppari It sends naked pictures back to China? Quick! Let's weaponize that! Put one of these in every home with a Larry the Cable Guy look-alike!

[@jj74qformerlyjailbreak3]

It phones home double that rate DL and applies proper pronouns for them to identify the pics.

[@theriddick]

They become useless if you have someone who doesn't give two F's and drops large things on the floor constantly. :)

[@electrosoundaust]

I found five of these (Shark brand I think). No where near as well built as this unit. I got the students in my electronics class to tear them down. They were fascinated. We then built two rover type robots from them. A good semesters work!

[@BGTech1]

That’s so cool. My high school offers no classes for us kids into electronics. I’ve always just done everything on my own

[@andymouse]

Great Idea, well done Sir !

[@kmkessler]

Thanks for making more of us.

[@fabimre]

Hi Dave, I've got one if those. It needs IR "light houses" to mark of forbidden zones and a remote control. The eye at the underside us for it to not fall of the stairs, which has also a major disadvantage. I have a small piece of carpet on a mainly wooden floor. That carpet is black with a pattern of light colored circles. The robot gets completely bonkers on that carpet as he thinks that's an abyss (stairwell) and refuses to go on, but only goes in narrow circles, not even back! Poor thing!

[@kevinmartin7760]

It is interesting to compare this to my old Roomba. Overall very similar but I saw some differences: 1 - On the Roomba the suction is from a fan within the removable dust collector, so the fan has clean air running through it. 2 - The Roomba monitors the front idler wheel for motion. The wheel is half black and half white and an optical sensor can detect it rotating. I can always tell this wheel is clogged with lint as the vacuum will move a few feet, turn, move a few feet, turn, and so on rather than trying to go in long runs. 3 - The Roomba has a sort of mechanical torque detector on the motor that runs the main brushes, I assume to detect that they are getting too clogged. I'm not sure why they don't just monitor the current draw... 4 - The Roomba only has one edging brush. I assume it only follows walls in one direction. The main drawback for is is that some members of our household have long hair and it is frequently necessary to open up the brush cage and remove the hair wrapped around the brush.

[@soroushma]

The IR receivers all around are to detect the dock (base station) and are used to approach it to charge and also avoid running into it during cleaning The IR pairs all around are to detect obstacles early and slow down or avoid bumping into them The hall effect sensor in the front is used to detect magnetic strips; the unit likely came with magnetic strips that you could place on the floor around the your house and act as "walls" to block the robot from going into areas you don't want it to; the robot would detect those and not go past them The camera is used for the SLAM (simultaneous localization and mapping) system so the robot can create a map and keep track of its location; it effectively uses features on the ceiling to determine how the robot is moving; from experience these V(isual)SLAM systems perform pretty poorly; even iRobot which pioneered it (for robot vacuum cleaners) still had to use an optical tracking sensor on the bottom (think computer mouse) to provide additional input and now in their latest top of the line products are also using solid state lidars as well (with limited FoV) Most products use rotating lidars with 360 FoV which work much better with the downside that the lidar module sticks out the top of the robot and increases its height and is more expensive Fun fact: the cliff sensors on most products can't distinguish between a cliff and a dark surface so good luck if you have a black rug; I think it'll be a while till they can take over Great video! I work in the industry and this was a very different construction than what I've seen; definitely intrigued by the touch button solution!

[@nrdesign1991]

It's incredible how unaware Dave was of these things (or at least pretended to be)

[@elitecol69]

@@nrdesign1991 was banging my head on the desk when he didn't know what the strip was behind the rubber bumpers.. common sense even tells you it's contact buttons.

[@savage101.]

I've got a Roomba i7 that's been running every single day for the past 2.5 years. Basic maintenance is all I've needed to do. It's a life saver with 3 dogs.

[@RGChandler]

A friend of mine had one of these. It worked great right up until it spent a day spreading cat crap all over the living room carpet. He must have done something to upset it.

[@wf2v]

Yucky Chucky!

[@JanCiger]

Dave, those IR pairs on the sides are distance sensors so that it knows when it is approaching wall or furniture and slow down. The IR receivers are most likely for detecting the base station and any of the IR "walls" to restrict where it can go. This is very similar to the old versions of the iRobot's (now Amazon) Roomba. The camera pointing upwards is likely for position tracking - essentially a giant optical mouse upside down. It tracks the ceiling/room so that it knows where in the room it is (together with the IMU). Old Roombas don't have this feature, they only wander semi-randomly through the room. The Kalman filter is a bog standard way of doing sensor fusion (gyroscope/magnetometer/accelerometer) so that you get a drift-free robust orientation. It doesn't do the camera fusion or anything with position in space - that's the main processor doing the SLAM stuff/navigation. These IMUs cost a few bucks these days, you have them in all phones or game consoles, etc.

[@JerryBiehler]

My Samsung robot does have IR remotes. You can drive them around with it and you need them for Wi-Fi setup.

[@ptek1185]

The hall effect sensor is used to detect a magnetic strip tape that can be placed on the floor as a "do not cross" line

[@dack42]

The Kalman filter is used here for sensor fusion - combining the gyro and accelerometer data. Kalman filters can estimate the state of a system using multiple different noisy measurements. They are very commonly used with IMU sensors.

[@user93237]

According to the block diagram it also seems to fuse data from the error correction filter?

[@componenx]

I have fleet of 6 Roombas I've picked up for free over the years, with at least two functional at any given time. They work great, but get a workout from all the cat and dog hair, and need a partial tear-down about once a month due the matts of debris that get trapped on the inside.

[@davidmenasce6614]

It's running windows CE. We're safe from the apocalypse 😂

[@lemmonlightaz1]

I miss tear down Tuesday so bad. You should bring them back

[@mkkd85]

I have almost the same model. Bought it used, took it completely apart, cleaned everything and lubricated the gears and motors. Works like a charm.

[@jimmy21584]

Kalman filters do a great job of sensor fusion: throw the accelerometer, magnetometer, and gyro readings at them, and get a more accurate estimate of pose than any of them separately. It could also incorporate the motor encoders for an even better estimate, but that needs fancier maths than what that module is probably doing.

[@karlharvymarx2650]

The one thing that should be said in huge flashing red letters accompanied by air raid sirens, is be super careful if you have a dog that might poop on the floor. You absolutely positively do not want a bot to try sweeping that up unless you need industrial strength help purging. Otherwise they work pretty well, at least on hardwood floors (guess why no rugs anymore). You may need to make some accommodations to make it happy though, like rearranging furniture slightly, removing those low friction slider things that may make the couch exactly the right height for to bot to get itself wedged into, making sure the charging station beacon is in a place easy for it to spot, and putting the dog down the garbage disposal.

[@JerryBiehler]

I have two older Samsung robots. One upstairs and one down and the run every day at noon. Im constantly amazed at how much they find even after running for months.The one downstairs covers the lab and picks up wire strippings and aluminum chips I track in from the garage. I picked these up used from a friend and had to do a couple minor repairs but they work great. I cant recommend one enough.

[@tubastuff]

I live on a multi-level home; there are 4 distinct levels connected by short (2 steps) stairways. How many of these things would I need?

[@JerryBiehler]

@@tubastuff then can’t get down or up stairs so you will need one for each level you want to clean. In the case of my house it is a split level type with daylight basement. So the entryway is between the two floors. So I still have to vacuum that area and the stairs manually.

[@JFirn86Q]

Kalman filters are more commonly thought of in positioning applications, using data from sensors. The case you are thinking of is a more recent use of it, in computer vision with self driving cars. In this Samsung product, it has nothing to do with object detection or tracking, but rather taking the data from accelerometers, gyroscopes, motor speed, etc and trying to determine position. Kalman filters can be used for many different things though... the most common and simple case is the phase-locked loop in electronics.

[@0Mervin0]

Hi Dave, nice teardown would love a follow-up on that cruizcore thingy since it says it's even used in UAV's ; i think i saw the datasheet list UART parameters and spi.

[@michaelpiotrowicz6100]

Your deep distrust of this robot is a crackup. Would be good to see some SMD capacitor rework skills on display.

[@rvoisey]

In this context the Kalman filter is used for sensor fusion to reduce positional drift.

[@jeffcard3623]

I totally dig your sense of humor, Dave!

[@rtechlab6254]

My partner owns/runs a pub. At night frankenroomba prowls the empty bar. In seriousness it saves a lot of time. Its called Frankenroomba because it's made of about three other units. The regulars treat it as some odd sort of pet if it comes out early

[@Farm_fab]

Back in the day, I worked across the street from a vintage (now) competitor to IBM in a town where they were active, and I got a lot of motors, power supplies, and the like. I had a Meccano at the time, and built many things with those parts from the dumpster. Now I'm building tractors, and the like.

[@eliotmansfield]

Keep those wheels - would be great to make a diy vacuum with 😂

[@BGTech1]

The Telechips TCC8300 is a soc with ARM926EJ-S core with other integrated functions

[@TornTech1]

Wish you covered some stuff around the CPU. Would love to get my hands on a copy of that Flash and see how they had Windows CE configured and some of the secret sauce they had running for camera processing and stuff.

[@BenHeckHacks]

"I've seen spills you people wouldn't believe. Cat hairs glistening by the front door gate. All these memories will be lost. Like tears in rain. Time to die"

[@H4zuZazu]

Dave, there is actually a Company called Cyberdyne (no joke) they make Exoskeletons they based in Japan, their first Exo was called HAL. They are some serious people ;) (like a self full filling prophecy)

[@pcuimac]

Just tells me they are idiots who have watched the same stupid entertafilms I have, but either took them for predictions or use them as a basis for scams. Most likely both.

[@peterh1386]

Arnie: *I need your clothes, your boots, and your vacuum cleaner...*

[@Vidicon31]

Nice video timing, I bought 32 defective units about 2 weeks ago (€400), it has been a lot of fun repairing them. It's clearly visible that this is an older device. Newer models have a lot less passive components, If anyone is interested: so far I have been able to repair: 2x Neato d3 1x Neato d5 1x Neato d7 2x Roborock S6 maxv (one still missing some parts) 1x Mi Robot Vacuum Mop.

[@jaro6985]

What were the problems, all mechanical?

[@Vidicon31]

@@jaro6985 The problems with the defective units were mostly related to electronics, including water damaged pcbs on the Roborocks and defective switches on some Neato models. Additionally, some Neato units had issues with the main PCB, such as broken resistors in the i2c bus. The Xiaomi Mi was the most challenging to repair, as someone had drilled a hole through the PCB (warranty scam?) It required reconnecting about 12 tiny traces on a 4-layer board.

[@jaro6985]

@@Vidicon31 interesting, thanks.

[@davidliddelow5704]

I use one of these. Ironically you have to keep your home pretty tidy for it to work. I recommend getting one with a self emptying bin.

[@paulstubbs7678]

Wow, I just tore one of these down myself. Mine was a kerbside special/road kill from some renters dumping their junk and doing a runner. It came with a dust exaction/charging station that I left behind. Mine didn't have the USB port, just 4 solder pads for one. I was kind of interested to see if you would have found the hidden screws, but no, brutalized like mine. I was most surprised to see a camera - the things spying on us was my first thought - remember all the carry on with the Samsung TV camera's - not good. I powered up the main vacuum motor, it squealed quite badly from lack of lubrication, probably why it got dumped. So I added some oil, but boy is that a weak air pump, the exact opposite of many 240V mains vacuum's that have a one kilowatt or more motor, and pump out insane levels of heat in the process. It kind of made me wonder how this thing ever worked with suck a low powered pump. Sure it cannot be that powerful as it is battery powered, however I thought it was a bit of a joke.

[@perspectivex]

This was many years ago and I can't remember where I read it now but I read, with some surprise, that the main cleaning action from robot vacuums is not the vacuum suction but almost entirely the mechanical brushing action. This might have changed in the meantime.

You still can buy some without cloud control but even the cloud controlled units have at least 2 buttons for clean and return. I use a second generation robot vacuum (no camera) for years now and it is on it's 2nd battery pack (and 3rd wheel motor XD). Newer ones get more and more resistant to remove from skynet. ;)

[@fantielefant]

You can get root access on many current robot models (e.g. roborock or dreame) and run them without the cloud.

[@AndyMcBlane]

I've got 3 blueair filters + a robot vacuum going around every day and the dust is still incredible in the apartment (in sydney). Apartment is only about 35m2 as well! They are expensive though

[@mickeyfilmer5551]

It's amazing the amount of kit you can obtain these days from alsorts of machines -I see now why those robovacs have such a hefty price tag.

[@TechGuyCharlie]

Oh Dave is at it again with the Chat GPT generated thumbnail 😁

[@blockbertus]

Maybe that script was also ChatGPT'ed?! Very hard to watch...

[@TheCod3r]

Keep 'em coming Dave! Good stuff 👏

[@campkohler9131]

No.don't tear apart the Cruzcore. Try to make something with it. That would be more instructive. Also see if you can find a source for the modern version, so we can "play along at home."

[@joncoop2873]

@EEVblog - I fly racing quadcopters and I know that the Kalman filter is used for PID control in certain firmware

[@KeritechElectronics]

No, it ain't no Cyberdyne - it's all bloody Weyland-Yutani! Ha. Nice and hilarious teardown. Reuse that sensor :)

[@codebeat4192]

Recently I found a Medion Robotic Lawn Mower MD19727/Supoman SPM19A in a container, very interesting stuff. If you want/need powerful stepper motors, you are able to find such things in a robotic lawn mower.

[@ethzero]

I, for one, mourn one of our potential robot overlords 🤖

[@hreiver6797]

awaiting further instructions, stand by

[@FluxLabsProjects]

I think it's fair to say the NXP jobbie isn't the processor, if it's running Windows CE it'll be that Telechips SOC. The NXP is probably working with those IR receivers on the front at a guess.

[@jaro6985]

Yeah. Probably motors, IR, etc. LPC2926fbd144

[@harryshector]

That machine doesn’t look like it had a lot of hours on it when it was dumped. The insides of these things get nasty as they work. I have to deep-clean our Roomba about every other month…

[@RabidBadger_]

The one in our house uses lidar rather than a camera. The biggest thing that makes is a useful device rather than a novelty is self-emptying. In a house with two dogs and three cats all I have to do is clean the filters and empty the canister in the base every couple weeks.

[@robertomartin8731]

I picked up a complete system back in 2018(remote , charge base) it still works to this day.

[@KimArvidsson]

My floor has never before been this clean since I bought my RoidMi vacuume cleaner. Great help around my apartment. It runs every Friday at 10 when I am at work.

[@brick6347]

I've got kids and pets. My roomba and the dishwasher are what I'll miss the most when the world ends. You can take my phone, PC, heck even my car I like walking, I'm a hiker. Just leave those!

[@Fluxkompressor]

That samsung one is rather serviceable. I like that! If you ever get the chance to take apart an Vorwerk Kobold VR100 (or one of their siblings): That thing is linke Voyager 2 in therms of serviceability. Cant get it open without breaking every stupid plastic clip. And if you're in you'd be greeted by a nice "Neato robotics" on the boards silkscreen. I have a Neato robot vacuum and can say: Vorwerk took an existing design, made it 5 times worse and sold it for 10 times more

[@GregoreeZee]

Very cool Dave. Thanks, from Canada, eh?

[@3ffrige]

It’s pretty amazing how far these devices has come. I have a cheapie Amarey robot vacuum with a similar camera. It’s used for the VSLAM (visual simultaneous localization and mapping) system, which initially maps out obstacles and walls and plots it’s linear back and fourth path around detected obstacles. I tore that apart, and it pretty much had two PCB’s; the CPU module including WiFi device and the power supply and IO (for sensory input and motor driven outputs). Does it work well? Not really. But definitely entertaining to watch. Although it doesn’t clean as well as a 25 lb Kirby and takes forever to clean a single room, it’s advantageous in the sense that it will free you up to do other things. I’m always pro-automation over efficacy.

[@negvorsa]

Thanks ... Learned a lot ... More video like this!!

[@williamgottlieb8723]

Before I start watching this, I did find and open up a cleaning robot about a year ago. I don't recall the brand but do remember it was absolutely disgusting! There was dirt and hairs stuffed in just about every space available. I wound up taking out every motor, the power jack and switch, a couple rectangular weights, and every spring and screw save for one which was inside a clear plastic water tank and not worth the trouble.

[@albanana683]

I found that the camera sending naked pictures of me back to the mother ship stopped communicating after a couple of days. I think "no thank you, please no more" was its last message.

[@ovalteen4404]

I was going to guess that those strips under the rubber bumpers was to detect when it actually did bump something.

[@robertj9511]

2:03 "Sarah Connor's getting pretty old these days ..."😂

[@montenegro3167]

more teardown videos are needed! :)

[@fortheregm1249]

I think the strip in front is resistive strip for collision detection

[@fatcamp907]

I clicked on the video without reading anything about it. Imagine my surprise when everyone's favorite Canadian UBF started speaking with an Australian accent.

[@ikocheratcr]

I wouldn't worry about them raising up, the guindos CE license might prevent it. The update will not comply and will just not boot and become a brick.

[@Valenorious]

The spycam is for ceiling-corner-following.

[@satyabratasenapati7376]

It's a good explanation.

[@777anarchist]

A gyroscope is just an angular accelerometer. Combined with a Cartesian accelerometer it forms a 6-axis system suited for all you like.

[@ableite]

Some robots has these hall sensors to block the robot from accessing a room by glueing a magnet strip on the floor.

[@ericg7044]

A video on that CruizCore chip would be awesome.

[@hempbear]

LOL it even comes with upskirt cam

[@georgewaller7080]

Hey Dave, you should totally do some Soviet tech tear downs to checkout how their tech differed over the years, I think that would be super interesting with your insight into western tech.

[@Birdman_in_CLE]

Based on what I have seen on KZbin cats, and at least one chicken, are assisting the floor dwelling robots in the takeover.

[@MrJef06]

One can re-use the parts to build cool stuff like... a cleaning robot perhaps? ;-)

[@johncoops6897]

Easier just to get married 😏😏 Beware that there can be major complications when you need to update to the newer models.

[@fanplant]

Dave you missed the soldered on coin cell near the telechips chip

[@Graham_Langley]

If this is like other Samsung domestic kit, every piece will have a description as well as a part number on it.

[@ashleynery8092]

darn it, i thought you was going to repair it

[@blaked7532]

I'm jealous of your hammer from AvE. I want one.

[@Spongman]

i bought a roborock 5a max at the start of covid since we were going to be working from home and we stopped getting cleaning services. it has a mop & lidar. i haven't used our old vacuum since.

[@Spector_NS5_RD]

Yes, battery and CruizCore teardown!

[@McTroyd]

What a world we live in. Not only do we have robot assistants, they can be found in the dumpster! 😅 My mother uses her Shark to manage dog hair on a wood floor. Seems to be about the best use case for these things. Edit: Having now watched the video, I'm impressed at how many reusable off-the-shelf parts there are. I guess that's how we know the bean counters haven't reached peak efficacy in that industry yet. 🙄👍

[@BradKwfc]

Sad to see how many good components are put in the trash. We really need to design some kind of automated reflow oven that would remove, identify, and organize all those components for reuse. But price of the components is so low its probably not possible to recoup the money needed to even run the machine. Crazy

[@McTroyd]

@@BradKwfc I'm increasingly convinced they won't stay that cheap, unless the robots completely take over all the industry. Having seen how spectacularly international logistics can break down, and knowing the upcoming generation does not seem to tolerate worker exploitation, suggests to me that such a salvage machine might be viable in our lifetimes.

[@BradKwfc]

@@McTroyd I hope so. The amount of electronics we trash is bad. I saw a video showing alot of it goes to the third world where they burn it out in the open to get the metals out.

[@vadimbellous8313]

@@BradKwfc yeah, with literal rivers of mercury around those fields.

[@EmperorGoodwin]

Those yellow sensor strips underneath the rubber bumpers look like touch sensors, used to sense running into an obstacle. How did it connect to the motherboard/sensor fusion system?

[@johncoops6897]

Much easier to watch the video BEFORE commenting and asking silly questions.

[@MrDoneboy]

I am sitting on my sofa with a loaded 45, trying to decide if my smart tv, the Alexa, or the robot vacuum are going to betray me! P. S. I am not paranoid!

[@NoLandMandi]

@Dave, you are putting yourself on the wrong side of "roko's basilisk"! mate, I warned you 🤣

[@NerdyMeathead]

Would love to see a Cyberbot fight tournament from modded robot vacuums only

[@tommiller1315]

Give your "MacGyver Project" some autonomy with the "CruiseCore" and scare the bejesus out of everyone! 😂

[@joeyjustin6895]

The Weight Is To Offset The Battery And The Reason is to Keep The Vacuum Opening Level.

[@funnlivinit]

It was just waiting for some unwitting Human to disassemble it so it could be reused, once it becomes self-aware.

[@AtAGlimpse_UB]

Its got a USB port in there for skynet update HAHAHHAHAHHAHA I lost my shit

[@johnellison3030]

The Terminator's real name is "Alby"... "Alby Beck". 😂

[@oraz.]

Beautiful robot

[@BrettCooper4702]

That cruziCore would make a nice drone controller

[@cambridgemart2075]

Were you aiming for a 'This old Tony' style video? ;-) The jumpcuts are a little distracting!

[@piratk]

Sounds like you've almost got the beginnings of a 3d-printer there, doesn't it?

[@easyBob100]

Your thumbnail didn't have enough red arrows pointing at random parts of it.

[@rks515skr]

I almost never clean my dumpsters, so you can just keep that bot.

[@dw1444]

remember to keep it on its back to avoid walkabout so theres less chance of finding a mate

[@sonixthatsme]

I love my RoboSucker 4000™, called him Robert.

[@ovoremek]

What is the big square chip over there? It must be some CPU/SoC.

[@normswan5806]

I was thinking more about why they trashed it. Evidence elimination?

[@W4BIN]

Next week he might run into the charging station. We have a Bissell crosswave equivalent and it tends to screw up a lot, but it goes around most table and sofa legs. The bump sensors contact chair legs. (movable) Ours is monitored and controlled via WiFi from my cellphone. Ron W4BIN

[@hillppari]

removable battery seems cool

[@chrisnowacki5663]

Dave! Why is this a question?! De-lid! De-lid! You know you want to see the workings! :)

[@PhilippTV1000]

At least it doesn't run on Windows Vista! Maybe there's still some hope left in humanity.