Thank you Jk for the explanation. How much learning curve is there to get the Prime to do the drills when you first begin? Is it really as easy as the YouTube videos showing you where you can touch different parameters on each ball and it will serve like that? Also for beginner players can the balls be delayed for like 15 to 20 seconds in between? I want to make sure my son who is just learning can keep up with the serves.
There isn't much of a learning curve, it's like the YouTube videos show. I think the minimum balls per minute is 4 or 6, so 10-15 second delay max.
I've had it for almost 5 months now, and it's helped me a lot. Here's a rough pros and cons list:
Pros:
1) Easy to set up, easy to use.
2) 3 spin wheels capable of a wide variety of spins and insane spin quality.
3) Fairly programmable, able to generate fairly complex drills.
4) Deflector mechanism to change ball directions (also a con) which makes knowing where the next ball is going much harder, more like a real game in this regard.
5) Capable of very fast pace, 120 balls/min. Even pros doing multiball only train at a max of a little over 100/min.
Cons (longer list, but keep in mind that most other robots will be longer):
1) Limited in speed, though that's an issue with almost all robots since wheels can't generate as much speed as a paddle can.
2) Limited in service origination location, though this is an issue with all robots that are attached to the end of the table. You'd need a table-top robot to overcome this.
3) Deflector mechanism to change ball directions (also a pro) which gives all balls that are not straight a sidespin which can be difficult to overcome when a ball is served to the corner.
4) Can't tell the spin if you randomize it, but that goes with all robots since you can't use the opponent's racket action to judge spin.
5) Random limitations for no reason: e.g. maximum 10 different serves per drill, I sometimes want more variations per drill; minimum 10 serves per drill before it autostops, sometimes I just want it to serve a single ball and then stop e.g. when I'm doing return board training; maximum of 8 drills per drill set, haven't needed to use more but I don't see why there's a limit; 5 backspin and 7 topspin levels, sometimes I want a spin in between (especially between +5 and +6 topspins) and I don't see why we're limited to 12 discrete steps of spin, etc. etc.
6) Gunk build up on the deflector, which would affect the ball trajectory. I think this is an issue with all robots, so get used to cleaning them.
7) Not the most reliable software. There are little bugs all over the place, like sometimes a drill's name won't save after you change it, or the bluetooth controller can no longer start a drill until you exit it and re-enter it. Mostly minor annoyances, but Butterfly hasn't updated the software in like 2 years so they're clearly not interested in fixing them.
Due to the last con, I'd recommend getting the Powerpong robot instead. It's the same hardware, but they're actually interested in customer support and update their software. It's also slightly cheaper. I went with the Amicus Prime because of the Butterfly name, but if I had to do it again I would've bought the Powerpong Omega instead. Butterfly is a big corporation of which its robot is just a small part, I'd go with a company that cares about its robot products instead.
