Tetra the micromouse needs no cheese, completes maze in under five seconds (video)
By Richard Lai 
posted December 12th 2009 8:11AM
posted December 12th 2009 8:11AM
Lab rats beware -- there's a new turbo-charged robotic cousin of yours on the block. This little autonomous fellow, Tetra, has just wowed micromouse hobbyists with a 4.766-second finish time in a maze (which had to be mapped by the micromouse first) in a recent demonstration, beating the previous All Japan Micromouse contest record by a big margin of 1.6 seconds. Sadly, Tetra wasn't the winner of this year's contest as it failed to complete the final Expert Class event -- probably something to do with the lighting conditions which affected its tracking. We can still admire Tetra's awesomeness in the video after the break though, followed by some thoughts from a few micromouse experts.
yay, comments now expand.
@Billy
About time ^_^
@NeoJew
Can we get this technology into a roomba please?
Woa... is that real time?
Holy Shit! Who can out run that?
Christ, That was fast.
@realar that's what she said! :D
@(Unverified) How embarrassing for you.
Eeeeeek!
thats awesome.
so glad i saw that.
Awesome!
Does this mouse actually map the maze faster than normal, or is it just able to retrace its steps faster than normal?
From the other videos it seems to take forever to actually learn the course, even busting itself up in the process.
What I don't get is how it figures out how to get to the goal? Does it already know the layout of the maze?
@kopmis Dude-two sentences in was too far to read?
@TIFXS Hurr I read the whole post but I guess I didn't think
@kopmis
I was reading the comments, saw your avatar and thought: 'I can't remember commenting on this...'
But it was you. Thieving my pictures.
There is also some other berk walking round with my name before I had a chance to register when the switch over happened.
Holy crap, that thing moves fast! A new species of turbocats must be co-evolving as we speak.
It's almost like some kind of.. I don't know... rat... thing.
@Horse
+1 for Snow Crash Reference
Looks like a bottle opener.
Skynet would have killed John with one of these.
Those damn Japanese. They get all the fun.
@kopmis & above
"Chris,
Micromouse is totally autonomous. The maze isn't disclosed until the event begins. The mouse can make five runs. If everything goes well, its first run will be mapping the maze and figuring out the shortest/fastest path. Once it knows the maze, then it makes speed runs trying to get from the start to the finish at the center in the shortest possible time without crashing. You'll find a lot more Micromouse information, event reports, and videos via the MicroMouse category link in the left sidebar."
@Gravity,
If this is your robot then congratulations are in order. If not then thanks anyhow for the explanation. I was a little confused since the other videos all showed robots learning a maze. This mouse seemed to already know the maze. Thanks for clarifying this.
I'll echo realar, Christ, That was fast.
Why isn't anyone commenting on the voice of the guy asking the question that starts at 0:36 into the second video?
His inflection on "fantastic speed" might be the funniest thing I've ever heard on the Internet.
I cannot listen to it without breaking out in laughter.
I knew that pacman-on-micromouse was kinda snore-inducing, but they overdid it with this.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lc0xi_dRZzI
even speedy Gonzales can't run that fast, or can he?
I'd like to thank the editor of the second video for the life affirming instrumental. I'm now ready to face the day! YEAH!
I love the light "Oooooo" of victory at the end lol.
Wow, looks amazing. Also tried to watch the guy talk about it but had to rip my ears off due to the "music." Heading to the hospital now.