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New York has ended its trial of a 400-pound security robot in the Times Square subway station
New Yorkers can say goodbye — for now — to the robot the New York Police Department (NYPD) used to patrol the Times Square subway station.
Man arrested after knocking over a 300-pound security robot
Sure, the K5 isn't the cutest robot making its first steps into human society, but that doesn't mean drunks get to knock it over. One of the five-foot droids took a tumble last week in Mountain View, when a drunk man took umbrage to its whistlin', patrolling ways. (Knocking it over is a bit of feat in itself: The thing weighs 300 pounds.) It's not the first robot to suffer either. Softbank's (more adorable) Pepper has felt the cruelty of mankind while working in a phone store, while Hitchbot lasted just two weeks when it tried to cross America. It suffered a vandal attack in Philadelphia that cut its journey short.
Autonomous, human-sized security robots are almost here
You might not see quite so many security guards on the beat in the future. After roughly a year of work, Knightscope is almost ready to deploy the K5, a human-sized (5 feet tall) autonomous robot that's designed to take care of the more mundane parts of security patrols. The machine only needs a bit of initial instruction (plus GPS and laser rangefinding) to get a feel for its surroundings. After that, it keeps watch on its own using a mix of four cameras, microphones, radar and environmental sensors that can detect fires and gas leaks. The K5 uses either cellular data or WiFi to both share its findings and let its overseers speak, and it'll set off an alarm if you try to immobilize it.
Pentax K-5 review roundup: solid but pricey upgrade from the K-7
Pentax's K-5 DSLR has been around for a little while now, but it's only just recently received enough reviews to establish something of a critical consensus. The short of it is that the camera largely addresses most of the criticisms leveled at the K-7 it's replacing -- namely, lackluster image quality and poor high ISO performance in particular -- but those improvements come at a fairly hefty cost. The K-7 costs about $300 more than the Nikon D7000, which Digital Photography Review notes has a similar sensor but a "significantly more versatile AF system." Photography Blog also came to some similar conclusions, but notes that the "headline-grabbing top-speed of 512000 is frankly unusable," and suggests that Pentax should have simply followed Nikon's lead and capped things at 25600. Despite that high price and some minor issues, however, DP Review says the camera is a "no-brainer" upgrade for current Pentax users, but obviously still something of a tough sell for Canon or Nikon users. Hit up the links below for some additional takes on the camera. Read - Digital Photography Review Read - Photography Blog Read - Imaging Resource Read - Pocket-lint
Samsung offers up DS200 speaker dock for YP-K3
Just days after Samsung's uber-slim YP-K3 DAP got all official on us, here comes news of a docking speaker attachment to give it the built-in sound projection capabilities that the YP-K5 already has. Although Samsung has also announced that the K3 will be landing in lime green and red flavors here shortly, the DS200 apparently only comes in black, and while it's admittedly less sexy that the integrated speaker on its larger sibling, it'll still get the job done when push comes to shove. We wouldn't expect this here horn to deliver anything awe-inspiring, but the battery-powered DS200 should provide your ears with a little rest when you're tired of wearing those earbuds. Reportedly, the speaker adornment should hit shelves sometime in March, but since it'll run you right around $50, it's probably a bit much for an impulse buy.
Video: Hands-on with Samsung's K3
The K5 looked great and everything, but for those not digging the external speaker or people looking for a potential Nano competitor, the K3 looks like it could do the job. For the full specs, check out our earlier coverage, but in the meantime, check the video above or the download below for a first look at Sammy's slim portable media player.[MP4] Download the video
