New Butterfly robot Amicus PRO

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I just checked last Butterfly catalogue and found new robot Amicus Pro. It costs 1000 EUR and then it's cheaper than Amicus 3000 PLUS which costs 1900 EUR. Interesting thing is new robot has 3 motor heads! Amicus 3000 has 2 motor heads.

Do you know anything more about this new robot? Or someone tried it?
 
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I don't know much about the robots, but mostly robots are only good for for beginners to intermediate players. Those players that are endorsed to use robots always tell me that they use it primarily for warming up by looping Underspin. The problem with a robot is that it cannot produce a life like ball every time. It feeds pure spin balls which are never the case and because the motors are stationary any variation of spin never has the full arc that a paddle will produce.

The best form of training with the robot is simply learning service and also footwork through the oscillating heads. I wouldn't recommend a robot for learning to become better because a coach will most likely multi ball you for that. The robot is simply the best substitute for a warm up or teaching players how to read certain spins in service.
 
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I know you can programme a sequence of up to 4 different shots to simulate exercises, i.e short push, long push, and two topspin shots one to each side etc. it's pretty advanced in terms of ball machines, I have used one briefly which a friend of mine purchased.
 
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E.g.

What can you say about it? how does it compare with the amicus 3000 plus version? is it better? i am about to buy the 3000+ but now i see this in half price...

Amicus Pro has 3 motors, yes, I think it's the worldwide first robot that has this feature. Means: it can produce any imaginable spin without manually changing the head of the robot. But: the settings of the shots are not programmable, you can only program the positions of the balls, from left to right (total 6 positions). Heard saying, Butterfly will develop a more elaborated programming console later on. Beside this, the balls are not easy to configure, as you can and must change height, speed and spin alltogether.

This robot produces balls that fly in a quite realistic way, once you know how to use it. If you want to develop your skills, you will be satisified. Table tennis experts told me, robots should be used to automatize shots and not to simulate real players...what the 3000+ can better, because of different spins in one programm.

Amicus pro is small and lightweigthed, takes me less than 3 minutes to put it on the table - and it can be carried easily and stored on small space. That was finally the reason I bought the Pro and not the 3000+. I use it for several months now, regularely, never had a problem. Eats all balls, even when they are bit dirty.

One disadvantage is, once your friends know you have such a cool machine, they prefer to play with the robot and not with you anymore:)
 
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Beside this, the balls are not easy to configure, as you can and must change height, speed and spin alltogether.

What do you mean by height, you need to manually change the height?

Other than this, i would probably get use to set my own balls every time i use it as i don't need the programmable feature right now + if butterfly will release a better programmable version of this they would probably offer an upgrade only to the panel like they did with the amicus 1000 to 3000.

Overall from what i've read i think this is probably the best option right now, far away from buying the amicus 3000+ in all specs, 6 programmable balls, automatic side spin and more.

How much did you pay for it? how much was the shipping and did you pay any tax?
And in overall, do you feel working with this robot improved your game, footwork and in overall are you satisfied with it?

I will wait for your answers, the most important for me is the question with the height change.

Thanks!
 
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Here.

And one more question, is the catch net preforming well?

Yes. The length of my playing is only limited by the fact, that lots of balls fall to the ground - and that's not the problem of the robot.

Beside this: The net is mounted and dismounted fast, heard saying, that's not the case with the 3000+ (not sure here).
 
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What do you mean by height, you need to manually change the height?

You can set 5 parameters (forgot one): how fast the balls fly, how much top-/backspin, sidespin, "trajectory" (how high the balls fly > this I meant with "height"), and "Ball/min".

Difficult to set is the sidespin, because several motors are involved here. Deadballs/balls with absolutely no spin are not easy to configure, too. Butterfly tells, they built in some electronic intelligence to cope that. But hey, most other robots aren't able to produce daedballs at all.

How much did you pay for it? how much was the shipping and did you pay any tax? And in overall, do you feel working with this robot improved your game, footwork and in overall are you satisfied with it?
Bought it in Switzerland from gubler.ch, official Butterfly-partner, stepped in there. Was a special introduction price, now it's more expensive.

The robot improves my game, but, it's not the robot alone. I videotape my games and analyze them, and I look at vids of professionals to compare. A robot is maximally as good as your knowledge how to use it. You can also fix mistakes with it.
 
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aurelio Thanks for all the information!
I just found something really strange, you mentioned there's "trajectory" option/button which I can confirm I saw in the manual of the robot. But it doesn't appear in all the pictures of the panel i looked at, check out an example here: is that what you have in your control panel or do you have an extra button of "trajectory"?

big_butterfly-robot-amicus-pro_3.jpg
 
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Strange, yes. Here it is, check the pic. Would ask the dealer. Maybe there are earlier models without this feature.S6301320.jpg
 
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Yea, I also found lot's of mistakes in the user manual. I also hope it's only in earlier models. I'll probably order it this week after the dealer here confirms he can make the order (they don't hold it in stock). I'll report back about my experience after I have this robot.
I really appreciate your help. thanks a lot.
 
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Hi again,
I bought the robot, and now I want to return it...
it looks very cool and eats all balls like you said but i kind of missed what you said about the programmable balls, haven't paid enough tension for that.
You can only set one ball (height,spin,speed,sidespin) and that's it! the only option of the 6 buttons above is to change the direction of that SAME ball 6 times for example that same ball can be to your left, right, middle etc, this is so unacceptable, butterfly really missed on that one, that could of been THE ROBOT if it was programmable.
Now aurelio, i'm probably going to return it because of that, if i only knew butterfly would offer an upgrade to the console for sure, i wouldn't mind keeping it until they do and of course if i knew how much it would cost~ .
Do you have information about it? i would probably take the newgy 2050 :( instead of that because adding extra 1400 euro is too much for me now.
Please let me know as soon as you this
thanks
 
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Hm.

My two cents:

If you take table tennis seriously and if you want to progress, then what a robot should deliver is: balls, that behave like real balls in a real match.

That's the single most important feature. The newgy 2050 does not deliver that (tried the newgy, too, my dealer has this two models). Has only one head. If you turn the balls faster, there will be more spin in the balls. Long balls with few spins aren't possible. Dead balls aren't possible. That's for play around a bit (OK for me, but not what I intend), serious training is not possible.

Yes, the Amicus Pro cannot be programmed to deliver different spins within one programm. May be it will be able later, but: As you cannot see what spin it is (there's no hand of a human being you can observe), it's questionable for a table tennis robot to give different spins within one program anyway - my opinion. I would have to learn by heart the sequence of spins. Not somethin I like.

For an ambitious player, the purpose of a robot is to automatize and enhance specific techniques, that's where the Amicus Pro helps perfectly. The fact, that you can set up to 6 placement points within one program (and a randomising of these placements, so you never know where balls will land - combined with easy or adventurous topspins, backspins, sidespins and spinmixes - and up to 100 balls per minute): that's giving lots of variety. And fun. And heartbeats. I didn't miss the change of spins one minute.

If you want a real match where you face different spins and placements, get a real partner - that's what I have been told and that's what sounds reasonable to me.
 
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My two cents:

If you take table tennis seriously and if you want to progress, then what a robot should deliver is: balls, that behave like real balls in a real match.

I appreciate your sharing the information about the machine. A three head robot should be much superior to a single-wheeled machine in making each shot consistently like the others. Some models have 'ball feed problems', especially when the oscillate to different table placements, and the result can be disappointing when you are trying to drill. More advanced models may have more features (and more cost) than a beginner can need, but even top players DO use them, both for the aerobic nature of some of the programs and to drill their strokes. It's not realistic to expect a robot to simulate a real practice partner, but then the robot never tires of multi-ball or sending loops into your backhand. :)
 
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aurelio,
You are right, the night I wrote my last message I did a deep research about the newgy and all the rest and then I realized I might have something good in my hands. The next morning I decided to give it another chance so I reassembled it and played with it and I had so much fun I really enjoyed of being able to produce any type of ball I want. It really does simulate realistic balls and it's great for multi ball and footwork. Let me clarify, I practice 3 times a week for 9 years and one hour per week with coach (former Europe champion) for more than a year in a half so I have some experience and know how to practice.
I decided to keep the robot and i'm very happy about it.
Btw I contacted my dealer and told him to ask Butterfly if they will offer an upgrade in the future, he should reply me when they get back to him.
And I showed it to some of my friends and now I know what you're talking about :)
Thanks for the help man, all you said was very accurate.
 
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Yes and no.

A three head robot should be much superior to a single-wheeled machine in making each shot consistently like the others.
The Amicus Pro is superior in being able to simulate real-life-balls. As there are three motors and "rolls" involved (which scuff by using the machine), absolute consistency is not given. But, are human beings consistent when playing table tennis? They aren't, so the not-100%-consistency can be looked upon as an advantage. Beside this, the people from TTMatic (german manufacturer of tt-robots I planned to buy earlier) told me, not even the balls are consistently produced, so real consistency of shots is technically impossible anyway.

Some models have 'ball feed problems', especially when the oscillate to different table placements, and the result can be disappointing when you are trying to drill.
Never faced feed problems with the Amicus Pro...
 
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Btw I contacted my dealer and told him to ask Butterfly if they will offer an upgrade in the future, he should reply me when they get back to him.
I talked to the german Butterfly-crew lately (had a question about how to oil the head of the Amicus Pro, something that must be done halfyearly), they told me that maybe a new console will follow end of 2012. Basically, the actual console for the Amicus Pro is just a refined model of the the Amicus 1000' console:

Control Panel Mounted.png
 
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