PONGBOT OMNI S PRO Robot Review

[Jslick89]

@Jslick89

I am going to get to use the Omni at a friend's place soon. Pretty sure they don't have any custom drills programmed.

Is there any way to program drills on the app before I go to my friend's?
Do you know of any videos or tips to program (in like 15-30 minutes) a few basic drills like the Falkenburg, 2 FH - 2 BH, 1middle- 1 random, etc.?

Hey unfortunately I don’t think there is a way to program the drills beforehand. You actually have to have the robot on and connected to the Bluetooth before you can program a drill.

When are you going to your friends house? I will be home soon and I can send you some screen shots of my 2 FH- 2BH drill. Also the under spin to forehand short then deep underspin to backhand (one of my favorite drills!)

Not sure if I mentioned it, but in custom drills there is unfortunately not a way to program a random location. There is a mode, at least on road where you can program a random ball short middle or long but I haven’t tried that yet…

Let me know!

 

[plunder]

You actually have to have the robot on and connected to the Bluetooth before you can program a drill.

➕ AND you have to have a live internet connection (either thru Mobile Internet or thru WiFi/WLAN-signal) 🖨️ on your phone for the app to work

 

[Jslick89]

@Jslick89

I am going to get to use the Omni at a friend's place soon. Pretty sure they don't have any custom drills programmed.

Is there any way to program drills on the app before I go to my friend's?
Do you know of any videos or tips to program (in like 15-30 minutes) a few basic drills like the Falkenburg, 2 FH - 2 BH, 1middle- 1 random, etc.?

Use this for forehand, then for ball 2, switch the location to -5.

 

[Jslick89]

This is one of my other favorite drills. You might have to adjust the ball height depending on the bounce of your table….

 

[Jslick89]

Use this for forehand, then for ball 2, switch the location to -5.

You can use this similar setting to set up the balls for your faulkenberg drill! Just change the location for each ball!

 

[Jslick89]

Short tomohawk serve…

 

[schrodingerskoalabear]

@Jslick89

Love the drills! Thanks so much! Going in a couple of days so excited to try these out!

 

[thegr812k]

View attachment 34210Short tomohawk serve…

thanks for sharing these, i thnk if you can upload drills to the cloud within the app on your custom page. I am still in the process of getting my head around the app. Would you be able to try and see if thats possible?

Perhaps change the drill name to your username + drill name so it can be found easily by others

 

[Jslick89]

thanks for sharing these, i thnk if you can upload drills to the cloud within the app on your custom page. I am still in the process of getting my head around the app. Would you be able to try and see if thats possible?

Perhaps change the drill name to your username + drill name so it can be found easily by others

Hello Sir- i will try to upload as soon as I can! I'm pretty busy this week might not be able to get on the bot until friday. Maybe i could help you troubleshoot some of your questions now?

I think once you learn what is the "sweet" spot for short balls and the same for long balls, you can make such a wide range of useful drills. for me, the part i needed to learn was the "ball height" "spin" and "speed". Once you get a hang of those, its pretty easy to make the drills.

Also, even if i uploaded my drills, you would still most likely need your own modification depending on your table. For example, the drills i posted here were using my old table. Now I have a nice ITTF table...the balls bounce higher than before. I had to adjust the "ball height" setting on most of my drills for the short balls so that the ball stayed low over the net.

 

[plunder]

A matter of word definition. TI long posted a presentation video of his omni marketing unit released by Shanghai Future Mind, the company of the pongbot brand:

The video content is similar but not as good as his nova vid imho and certainly does not reveal any new or unobvious info to the shopper. It hardly qualifies as a demo vid let alone actual review but is good for popularizing the product since his channel gets many views. The observant viewer will notice right away how hilariously high the Push and the Flick balls bounce off the table, making the pre-programmed drills very easy balls (apart from the Frequency). On the nova the 3 difficulty levels and actually all(!) pre-programmed drills use the same identical head height of "50" wth. Am not sure if the omni features the same too, apart from the service\serve.

 

[Jslick89]

TI long posted a presentation video of his omni marketing unit:

The video content is similar but not as good as his nova vid imho and certainly does not reveal any new or unobvious info to the shopper. It hardly qualifies as a demo let alone actual review but is good for popularizing the product since his channel gets many views. The observant viewer will notice right away how hilariously high the Push and the Flick balls bounce off the table, making the pre-programmed drills very easy balls (apart from the Frequency). On the nova the 3 difficulty levels and actually all(!) pre-programmed drills use the same identical head height of "50" wth. Am not sure if the omni features the same too.

Yea... i tried those pre-programmed drills once and never again. went straight to custom drills and never looked back. If i could edit those bills in the pre-programmed drills, that would be awesome.

 

[yys_tt]

I recently purchased an omni robot and it has been great so far.

I have a question about the software. Is there an ability for custom drills in the app to include sequence and random at the same time, essentially a decision tree? This would be an extremely relevant feature to simulate match play. Currently I am only aware of sequence or random functions.

Example below:

 

[dingyibvs]

I recently purchased an omni robot and it has been great so far.

I have a question about the software. Is there an ability for custom drills in the app to include sequence and random at the same time, essentially a decision tree? This would be an extremely relevant feature to simulate match play. Currently I am only aware of sequence or random functions.

Example below:
View attachment 36568

Nope. I was really hoping their robots would have more advanced software features, but it's actually pretty rudimentary, even more so than Butterfly's. They do update their software more often, but so far the new features have been fairly useless. The physical capabilities of the robot are great, I just wish they spent a bit more effort on the software.

Personally I think they're really missing the boat there with software. That's where's the money is for everyone. Especially now with the tariff environment, they could really use more of a SaaS model for a steady stream of income, tariff free to boot.

 

[Jslick89]

I purchased PongBot Omni Pro for $1300. This little robot was incredibly customizable and easy to use, until it stopped working after only 8 months of normal use. Then I discovered that the company doesn’t have proper after-sales support. They have no office locations in the U.S., and all communication has to go through someone oversea. That means you ask a question and get a reply a day later (if you’re lucky). If you ask a follow-up question, you wait yet another day. The process is ridiculously long and inefficient.

Although they claim the product has a 1-year warranty, they asked me to sent them numerous video clips showing that the robot doesn’t work properly, and I followed every troubleshooting step they asked of me. In the end, they wanted me to fix it myself by shipping me a part. The part arrived after 2 weeks, it is clearly a used part they disassembled from another robot. Right after it arrived, my husband and I spent hours trying our best to do the repair followed their crappy instructions, but no luck. The robot reacted the same way. Nothing is working.

They finally agreed that I would have to pack the robot myself and ship it to their overseas location, but they have been extremely slow in arranging the shipping. I even paid $65 to have a packing company box it up with padding, and this giant box has been sitting in my living room since mid-September with no instructions on how or where to ship it. It’s now been 6-7 weeks since the robot stopped working, and I don’t know how long it will take to get this process done. All their responses were “we have some issues with our repair warehouse, we will let you know when we confirm”, over and over, not helpful at all.

This has been a such frustrating experience. I regret getting this $1300 robot in the first place.

I suggest you really need to think through before you purchase it.

thats really frustrating figmatcha.

How often were you using your robot? would you say your playing area is kept free of dirt and debris? not sure if these things would even effect anything but i'm just trying to get an understanding. especially since my robot is still working fine after 10 months of regular use.

My only suggestion at this point would be to try and reach out to the Pongbot rep here on the forums. Maybe they could help you faster? Either way, not the best look for their customer service.

 

[Megamoyboy]

Hey so I just measured the robot. From the edge of my table to the back of the robot, including the ball catching net, it goes back approx 17.5 inches, but to be safe, I would say 18 inches. The part that extends back the further is the pole that is part of the net.

 

[The_mfk_Dude]

Today I tried my new omni s and so far, I am overall satisfied.
Pros:

• good amount of spin in every shot possible
• balls are consistent - more than on my amicus
• speed is plenty and frequenzy is faster than almost every himan can play
• the light indicates which spin is coming and also how much spin. for example (as I remember) orange is medium spin, and the redder the colour the more spin is in the ball
• massive, I mean massive sidespin is possible
• absolutely no ball jams so far

neutral

• the pad/tablet is quick and easy to use, but very big. a little key-like remote would be nice
• I don_t really know how thick my table is but I could just install the robot by detach the rubber knots. otherwise it would not fit on my table
• the preview for the ball landing spot is often not correct. I know this from my amicus and think it is no big deal
• more clearance behind the table is needed. With my amicus I need about 10-15 centimeters less space, because the depth of the amicus is smaller
• the robot is quite noisy. but during the excercise that is no problem
• the ball recycling system/rescue net is not complete fabric as on the amicus, but there are two big "wings" made from hard plastic; I feared that the balls would bounce back on the table from them but they do that not more often than on the amicus

Cons

• unfortunately a lot of features you would like, are either only available on the tablet, the app or are missing completely; for example you can randomize the placement of a shot for each ball on the tablet (on the smart drill category) where you can only randomize it for the whole drill on the app. But than you can do, for example only long serves with underspin in this section ( called "smart drills" or something)
• on the tablet there is no wait time before the drills starts. on the app there is
• on the app there is no possibility to use "sets" for a given length of training; only time (one minute is the shortest time possible)
• you can edit and delete your custom drills, but you can not change the order in which they appear in the app

Please ask your questions and I will try answer all if I can.

 

[plunder]

• good amount of spin in every shot possible

Congrats to the new acquisition and thanks for the impressions overview!
Does your Omni produce high-quality short pushes? (= a low flying ball with heavy underspin, bouncing twice on the table half)
And does it also produce high-quality slow spinny loops? (= a highish, short-landing topspin shot, carrying an extreme amount of topspin)

(((as we all know from my reviews, the Nova cannot produce these two balls because HIGH SPIN equals SUPERFAST rotating wheels, and with SUPERFAST rotating wheels the Nova's primitive ejection mechanism cannot eject a slow/short ball! the balls are then automatically fast/long 🤷‍♀️)))

 

[The_mfk_Dude]

Congrats to the new acquisition and thanks for the impressions overview!
Does your Omni produce high-quality short pushes? (= a low flying ball with heavy underspin, bouncing twice on the table half)
And does it also produce high-quality slow spinny loops? (= a highish, short-landing topspin shot, carrying an extreme amount of topspin)

(((as we all know from my reviews, the Nova cannot produce these two balls because HIGH SPIN equals SUPERFAST rotating wheels, and with SUPERFAST rotating wheels the Nova's primitive ejection mechanism cannot eject a slow/short ball! the balls are then automatically fast/long 🤷‍♀️)))

So far I only tested short underspin serves. And they are good - means decent spin, realistic height and short.

For topspin: I recognized that more speed is also more spin. But at spin-setting "11", there was plenty spin also with not so fast balls.
If it could really mimic a slow, rather high topspin, I can not say yet.
But for the most drills I think you get what you need.

As for the most robots: a really low and fast topspin serve is not possible. But If you mix the placement of a "rather" fast topsin serve, the training is not that bad because the randomness makes it harder to return.

 

[The_mfk_Dude]

So far I only tested short underspin serves. And they are good - means decent spin, realistic height and short.

For topspin: I recognized that more speed is also more spin. But at spin-setting "11", there was plenty spin also with not so fast balls.
If it could really mimic a slow, rather high topspin, I can not say yet.
But for the most drills I think you get what you need.

As for the most robots: a really low and fast topspin serve is not possible. But If you mix the placement of a "rather" fast topsin serve, the training is not that bad because the randomness makes it harder to return.

@plunder : Today I tested a rather slow and spinny topspin. With the following settings the ball had good quality. Maybe a very good player could do better, but I am satisfied.

 

[plunder]

Thanks for your efforts! And never mind.

My claim was that the ... cannot produce a ball which lands short (why/how come "short"? because the ball comes in a "high trajectory" AND was ejected at low speed, as if you were feeding ducks in a pond) AND carries tremendous spin. I haven't tried your balls settings yet (on a Nova unit) .. but the visual trajectory seems to land long, the Ball Height is very low, AND the speed is high with "5.5". Nothing about it screams slow spinny loop fwiw imho.

Without testing, this balls looks like a normal (challenging heighted at BH=34), fastish, long topspin with yes extreme topspin. And i can create such a ball quality easily on my nova with the a sextuple t35a t35b t35c. And none of these t35-balls are a slow spinny loop.

Ah, as i said, never mind. (i know exactly what the Nova cannot do ... and i still doubt that the Omni can do it so much better, if it has the same ball ejection mechanism)