I, for one, welcome our new robotic cheetah overlords

[pokerfan]

DARPA Cheetah Sets Speed Record for Legged Robots

This video shows a demonstration of the "Cheetah" robot galloping at speeds of up to 18 mph, setting a new land speed record for legged robots.

Listen, and understand. That terminator is out there. It can't be bargained with. It can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are dead.

[TheWraith]

1. Okay, cool, but definitely not a cheetah.

18 miles per hour? That's barely faster than a well trained human being can run.

[pokerfan]

3. Baby steps so to speak

Reasonable to assume subsequent models will be faster.

[TlalocW]

2. They're creating Ravage from Transformers

Soon it will be able to transform into an ultra-modern audio or video cassette.

TlalocW

[damyank913]

4. Looks like he's stuck in reverse...damn...

...I knew I shoulda bought the extended warranty.

[DetlefK]

5. Years ago I read a story about how a research group tested the strength of their robots:

arm-wrestling with a girl.

Of course it was always the same female scientist, so the measurements could be compared.

To those afraid of the Terminator: According to the article she always won.

(And to those afraid of the terminator: turn on the light.)

[Phoonzang]

6. Swarms of tiny drones picking you apart from the air...

these things chasing you down in the streets. There will be no place to hide, humans...NO PLACE.

[txlibdem]

9. Flashback to Halo

[AtheistCrusader]

7. I wonder how many times it has tripped and completely destroyed itself?

Pretty sure the pully system is for trying to save some or most of it.

[DetlefK]

12. It's not a trivial task to keep your robot from tripping! (Robot, meet banana peel.)

The simple circular motion of hip-joints, knees and ankles is transformed into a system of connected differential equations which has to be solved. And it only gets worse when a perturbation (e.g. a banana peel or a pebble) comes along.

A solution to this has already succesfully been implemented into multi-legged robots: a numerical solution of the system of DEs.
The problem: it still takes some fractions of second to calculate a "near-perfect" step and the leg/foot needs some kind of touching sensor to feel the attributes of the ground.

[txlibdem]

8. Like the robot from Red Planet

It was a movie from a decade ago or so starring Val Kilmer.

[benld74]

10. I was just going to post that! Only way off the planet,,,,

he lured the robot in, to disable it so he could use its power source for one last chance at rescue.

[txlibdem]

13. Sorry to steal your thunder like that

But the robot from that movie was one seriously bad-a$$ robot. It was just kinda silly to send a military robot to Mars, IMHO, with a bunch of lily livered scientists (except Val of course) but it made for an interesting sub-plot so I'm ok with it.

[marble falls]

11. One more reason ......

to keep batteries heavy. VERY heavy.