Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

This year we're planning to continue refining our competitive analysis system using a web-based platform. Essentially we'll have six people with computers in the stands, each gathering data on an individual team for a given match. That data will be captured using a web front-end and database backend on a server back at our school. The machines in the stands would use hard ethernet connections to a router with a 3G connection to the web (to avoid the FIRST rules against WiFi.) In the pits we'd use another computer with a 3G connection to run reports off this data before each match.

Now the question. We're looking for six very low cost computers with 10 hr. battery life that have hard ethernet connections. There are lots of $299 netbooks that might fit the bill. Does anyone have experience with these to know if they really do last 10 hrs? Are there any other machines out there with hard ethernet connections and 10hr battery life that aren't Windows netbooks at much below this price point? We don't need hard drives or Windows, all these have to do is run a browser.

These computers need full keyboards because these scouting folks will also be taking notes on each team. Solutions like NXT bricks or Wii remotes aren't what we're looking for.

We may end up using an inverter and a bunch of batteries to power normal laptops but that results in a lot of wires running everywhere in the stands. Some of the venues we attend don't allow extension cords in the stands.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

You can squeeze 10 hours out of them, usually not while running 3G and a bright screen backlight though. You can definitely get through half a day though, and charge them at lunch.

Personally I would recommend Wii remotes + a piece of paper for the handwritten notes, but this system saves you some typing time later so if you can afford it there are definitely advantages (it's also tons easier to use)

The inverter + FRC battery trick also works quite well and kept scouting going on all day Friday for my team in Connecticut.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834220681

$299 each, says it has 11+ hours of Battery life, has almost the same specs as other competitors but it has longer battery life

I might suggest installing XP or linux on it though

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

I suggest using zipit messengers with openzipit running

It is a lot of work, but the devices have wi-fi and are only $50 each

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

Battery life will ultimately depend on how much you are asking from the computer. Now the 2 things that will kill battery life is the screen brightness (the brighter, the shorter) and Wifi. Now newer laptops and netbooks are more efficient with wifi, but I would not expect 10 hours out of a battery, mostly because those times are from idling systems. My laptop usually will say 4 hours when I am on battery, surfing the internet and running other small programs, although Dell says it can go up to 8. My point is that maybe for the first few uses, you could squeeze out maybe 10 if you disable anything unnecessary, but don't expect that it will last all day at a comptitetion. I'd recommend you charge them when you can (like at lunch). And for any specific models, I really have nothing that I can recommend, but if you can get something with a decent battery life, and take half of it, and it can still do (like the one above, and if 5.5 is still good, then consider it), but take a look at the specs, they can help.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

we only have 3 laptops which we take to competition and do everything on, one is full time programing, and the other two trade off scouting while the batteries charge. both computers also have solid works and the robot models on.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

We've thought about zipit messengers and the iPod Touch but with the no WiFi in the stands rule many of these fall by the wayside. We're also looking for a full, if small, keyboard to capture subjective notes.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

We have a few Acer Aspire Ones in our family, and one of the 6 cell batteries, it lasts a while. Not ten hours...but scouting doesn't really happen for ten hours. You can charge batteries during lunch break.

Might go shopping for batteries first, maybe whichever sub $300 netbook has inexpensive high capacity batteries available would be a good choice.

We had fun with the DS scouting thing.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

You will not get 10 hours of battery life out of any current netbook i've seen on the market. They advertise up to 10 hours on many of them, but from my experience, this is not a realistic number for actually using the computer in that time. You will get good battery life, I'm guessing ~6 hours worth.

That being said others have suggested charging them at lunch which should get you through the rest of the afternoon. There is always the alternative of buying extra batteries, but your costs may begin to run up at that point.


-Brando

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

If you get 10 productive runtime hours from a netbook running wireless, you should post it here so we can shout it to the world and rejoice.

In all seriousness though, the longevity of the netbooks will degrade over time just like it does with all batteries. This year and next year the netbooks may be great, but in 3-4 years you'll probably be down to 1-2 hours of battery life max. If you can afford 6 netbooks, I'd recommend buying 3 netbooks and some spare batteries and an extra charger or two. It isn't a large leap in expectations to count the beans on two robots instead of one. Like a fine wine, if you put the spare batteries in storage for a couple of years you will reap the rewards when you finally use them, netting you more longevity of scouting with those netbooks rather than purchasing new (or dealing with lack of satisfaction) long-term.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

Since you mentioned that you will be using a web front-end for the scouting input, have you considered using personal devices such as smartphones rather than purchasing dedicated devices such as netbooks? This may also allow you to bypass the ethernet to 3g router setup you described.
While a good Android phone may cost more than a $300 netbook new, you may find that many of your students interested in scouting already have an Android or iPhone. The only upfront cost may be creating a mobi type page in your web front-end to render nicely for the devices if the current one is too cumbersome.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

I would be very wary of battery life. 294 did something like this at champs this year, and even using very fancy laptops people brought from home, we had to recharge most of the computers at least twice a day.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

If we had to recharge the netbooks at lunch that would be fine, of course. I was just hoping to avoid it for the first couple of years until the batteries age. Since we won't be able to use WiFi per the FIRST rules, just hard-wired ethernet, and have minimal hard drive use, maybe we'll get through a day in the beginning. We'll see.

Depending on the game, sharing one netbook between two people might be a dandy idea. Students could capture the objective data on scratch paper and then hand the netbook back and forth to enter that and subjective notes between matches. We're trying for live data here so that by the time the next match is run, we've enetered the previous one.

Certainly some students will have iPhones and the like, it's just I don't want our scouting team to be restricted to only those students. They all have laptops which they can bring (our school requires them) it's just some of their battery times are measured in minutes, not hours.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

At that point just designate a 7th person with a single laptop to punch all the data of the previous match in as the current match is going on. Yes you will be one match behind as far as "live" data goes, but it could be a worthwhile sacrifice.

Just an idea.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

Why are you using so much technology? Is it necessary to provide real-time scouting to the people back home? I don't think anybody will know the competition better than the people in the stands, and matches are spaced out enough that the scouts will always have enough time to put something together for the driveteam. We simply made an Excel spreadsheet to organize our six scouts' data. Then I made a GUI to output data to a text file to copy and paste into the master sheet. The benefits were that it was easy, and even though we didn't have enough laptops, we could use a PDA which had Excel on it to do the same job.

But on topic: We had 5 laptops of various sizes and a PDA, and none of them survived an entire day. We had an extension cord with 3 plugs at the end, and we had to regularly switch which devices got to charge. I would never rely on batteries to last the entire day, no matter what kind of netbook you get, but there is always power to be found in the arena. Bring long extension cords.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

Is it a better idea to just record every match with a single camera, and keep some notes, and use that instead? I think after a few batteries and memory cards, it will be a lot cheaper then a bunch of netbooks, and probably more reliable, as laptops have hard drives, and say if someone drops it, then its gone, but a camera may break, but usually the memory doesn't. And overall, paper written note don't break, although they can be damaged. And again, almost any netbook out there can't last you 10 hours, and I expect more like 5. There are many options out there, just it is really limited to what your spending limit is.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

The notion of all this is to provide information to the drive team about their upcoming qualifying match, not just to be informed durring alliance selection. It's especially handy at the Championships or at our home regional (Oregon) where the pits are a long way from the stands.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

At champs this year we tried the same thing, but instead of sending it back to the pits via 3G(a rather expensive solution), we simply filled out a page about the match and handed it to the drive coach before each match. While I do understand the benefits of so much technology, I just want to warn you of the many pitfalls we encountered. If you are still going along with this method, whether you stick with 3G or not, I would suggests bringing copious amounts of extension cord and getting seats as early as possible in order to find seats near an outlet.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

Now this is what I think was brought up earlier, that depending on the venue, you might not be able to get and extension cords to your seats, even if you get seats that are near an outlet. It ultimately depends on the venue for power in the stands, and FIRST might not allow it.

Lets throw some numbers out to discuss. Usually 8am is is when things start to settle in for regional, then matches starting after 9am. They will last until 12-1pm, so from 8 to 1, that is 5 hours, so at the max, hope for about 5 hours of battery, maybe more realistically around 4ish. Then about a 30 minute charge. Depending on the computer, the power readily available, etc. Hopefully you will be able to get a little more then a half hour charge in, and then for the stretch. Depending on the regional and how things are moving, I'd expect everything to be all over around 5pm. So from 12:30-5pm is 4.5 hours at the max, and if lunch is put off for a bit, maybe 3.5-4 hours. So you need a computer that can go for anywhere from about 7-9 hours (give or take), with a midday charge. Now unfortunately, this is where I have no experience, is in how fast netbooks charge and discharge. I would say, like I did above, that it depends on the computer and the power readily available. My one recommendation is to go for something that has a large battery, and a decent discharge time (about half the posted time in the specs, maybe a bit more if all visual effects are turned down). But again, most of the battery time is going to be determined my the battery, processor, processes, ram, etc.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

Whether they are stretched for 100 feet or 5 feet, extension cords are a tripping hazard if they cross any path where people walk. Particularly if another urgent situtaion has people moving in a hurry, or if many people are moving at the same time.

Don't create hazards.

Install cords correctly and with the permission of the event organizer, or use paper, or only recharge so close the outlet that no hazard is created. The choice is simple and using an extension cord is not the default answer.

Blake

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

Reiterating this with a slightly different message...

Some venues do not allow FIRST teams to use the electrical outlets outside of the pits. It depends on the agreement FIRST has with that particular venue. I imagine charging several hundred laptops and miscellaneous other gadgets can be a bit expensive for the arena.





As for the issue of laptops for scouting, I think thats for each team to decide. I don't think you want a system that relies on several systems to work properly in order for information to pass to the drivers.

In Atlanta this past year we utilized the standard paper scouting sheets along with 1 laptop. The laptop would have the "stats" of the teams added to it as the day went on. When it came time for a match for our team, the scouts would create a pdf which had the stats of each of our opponents/partners in addition to typed in notes regarding the teams. Using a tethered 3G phone, they would email this pdf to my iPhone. I could then open the pdf in the pits and have all the information we needed.

This system worked pretty well and allowed us to operate without runners by just text messaging and emailing back and forth.

-Brando

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

May I suggest one or a couple of these items for your battery concern LINK. I own a few versions which can run laptops for many hours, if you get the larger XPower 1500, one unit can run all the laptops you want and supply power at other events or locations. No cords across lots of steps and convenient.

You could also easily hook an inverter to a robot battery to run 1 or 2 laptops until the robot battery dies, then charge that on lunch in addition to the laptops.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

I can't emphasize enough the absolute ease we have had doing the Nintendo DS scouting. We just did CalGames last weekend and had no problem finding students with these (some just donate them to the team because they've outgrown them). Their batteries usually last most of the day (if not just bring backups and chargers). The first hour before matches start, we collect the match list data and pictures of the robots and load them into the memory cards. Set a scouting schedule where every scout does 10 matches on and then 10 matches off. (requires ~ 12 scouts). Then at the end of the day, it took about 30 minutes to download all the scout data off the memory cards and upload them into our database on a laptop, just in time for alliance selection.

We've toyed around with moving out to a different platform like iTouch, android app, etc.. But we come back to using the DS because of how accessible they are and easy to work with. Plus it gives the non-robot programmers something fun and valuable to do.

Sorry for getting off on a tangent - but I watch other teams scout using laptops and while some are serious about it, others just play video games on them.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

and the DS lite costs $130 at walmart

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

The Acer Aspire One is a reliable netbook for most tasks, and runs around 6 hrs. of battery life.

You could always just buy a spare battery to take with you to the regionals... I'd say that's a whole [robotics] day right there. :]

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

What do mean Wii remotes? What do you use them for?

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

wii scouting

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...ad.php?t=75784

It's an Arizona thing....we seem to dig using gaming systems for scouting.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

We have the same issues and have used paper forms with data entry with the help of inverters in the stands.
But, you may wish to take another look at the Zipit this year. Hak5 has some shows on installing Linux on it. Since it has a SD card slot, you could save data to a card rather than sending over wifi during the matches. The zipit price is dropping fast, some under $10 over the web.
Good suggestions,
Thanks, RayG

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

Something I'm looking into for next year depending on the game is a Scantron sheet. Automatic data entry, plus it's not rocket science to use if you keep a tally during the match and then bubble in the right field.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

The Zipit idea is pretty cool, especially if I can interest some students in writing a dedicated Linux program for it. Because of the no-WiFi in the stands rule, we'd be stuck swapping SD cards around but that's not a deal killer. Great out of the box idea.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

Please note, I just got one of the cheap zipits over the web and now notice it has a mini-sd card slot.
Mini cards are plentiful and cheap to order over the web, but you might want to have one in-hand if you are wanting to start Linux development right away. (or you could use an adapter from micro to mini, as micros are easier to find)

We thought a simple Linux spreadsheet or database application would be good for scouting data input and saving to the mini-SD cards for transfer or collection. You could pop a micro sd into a phone to send the data to someone with a laptop tied to their smartphone.

Possibly, application development can all be on a Linux laptop and port to the zipits for testing. I think we have a couple of students who prefer to use Linux. We are getting to the point we need some students who know LabView, some on C++ and now a few on Linux.

Thanks for suggestions, RayG

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

Whatever happened to the good ol' Paper and Pencil?

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

Paper scouting sheets have the advantage of being simple to use and not running out of power. What they lack is the ability to input data quickly. If I'm in the pit, I have to wait for scouters in the stands to put match data into a database for me to access it.

With an electronic input device you also minimize the risk of misleading data. With paper, you might have someone write a team number where a 2 looks like a 5. If that gets misinterpreted by the person entering the data into the database then your entire database can be compromised.

There's also the issue of using hundreds of sheets of paper, but of course that's completely dependent on how your organize your sheet.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

A well managed paper system will have the paper based data entered into the computer based database within ~2 mins after the match is over (well before the start of the next match). This is certainly sufficient for any scouting team. It also greatly simplifies your hardware requirements.

As for misreading numbers, that is a disadvantage, but you should really have people trained well enough to avoid such issues.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

Adam is right. Paper data should be entered into an electronic system before the start of the next match. Last year we had 6 scouts scouting with paper and then one scout doing data entry. Our data was usually entered by the start of the next match.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

Why not have a public scouting database online? Or is there already such thing? From the looks of it, our team did not actually take scouting seriously.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

Scouting is done at events, so a scouting database online wouldnt be of much use, especially since most venues do not allow wireless Internet or networking.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

Then in the name of Gracious Professionalism, a team can set up a server at the event and the teams can input data into that server's database and that data can be accessed by anyone at the competition. Now that would simplify everything.

Re: Low cost Netbooks for scouting
 

Not exactly.

Who's to say Team X's scouts are accurate?

Who's to say that everyone is counting the same metrics? Some teams last year counted passes, other teams only counted shots and misses.

How can a scout subjectively comment on a team in a public forum?

How would any teams be able to connect to a single wired server?