3D printing and robots are both huge revolutions in technology right now and now they’ll be coming together with a brand new Intel project.

3D printing is facing a huge surge of popularity right now off of the back of it’s two main benefits – it allows production of things to become cheaper and quicker than ever before. Too, robots offer a similar host of benefits, having been found in manufacturers’ production lines (controversially replacing human workers in many cases) due to the ease of use that their automation offers. So what happens if you put the two together? You get Intel’s brand new project which looks to let consumers build their very own robots via the means of 3D printing technology, which is a very intriguing pairing of two very hi-tech technologies.

Intel’s own example of their project is Jimmy. A 3D-printed robots, Jimmy is a walking, talking, dancing and tweeting robot companion who Intel say they built using the aforementioned crafting technology. To put together Jimmy and other 3D-printed robots like him, Intel are offering a $1,600 kit that provides consumers with the important stuff: a motor, batteries, a processor and wires, while the info you’ll need to 3D-print the rest of the parts will be posted online by Intel. While the cheaper kit will offer Intel Edison (the chipset that is also marketed as Intel’s ‘computer on a chip’ technology) meanwhile, the more expensive $16,000 research version with pack in Intel’s Core i5 processor.

What’s also important to note is that as the technology is open source, almost any sort of modification of the software can be downloaded, edited and shared. Has someone online found a way to make their robot dance in time to the music? If they’ll provide the files to you, you’ll be able to take that technology and perhaps you’ll be able to modify it and see your robot dance and then tweet about which song it is that they’re boogying too. The project will reportedly be available later this year so we’ll keep you posted once we know more.

Source: re/code

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