In an attempt to get back to a semblance of normality,and maybe “take my mind off of things”, I decided to go internet surfing today, and look what I found…
HAL-5 exoskeleton by CyberdyneStarting with the HAL-5 exoskeleton available for a paltry $42-59,000. This particular system seems a lot smaller than previous versions I’ve seen around the net. To me, this new HAL version seems much more likely to get military attention. Its conceivable that a unit as small as this could be helpful to US soldiers and allow them to carry around heavier body-armor, which is currently a major concern as armor that is thick enough to withstand most common munitions is too heavy to carry around. The developer expects to build about 20 in 2007 and ramp up to several hundred in 2008. The creepy part? The manufacturer is Cyberdyne (think back to The Terminator) and the model is called the HAL-5 (think of the HAL-9000 in 2001: A Space Odyssey).
Then we go to the slightly more foolish…
“Look what I can do!”This guy decided in 2004 to build his own mech in his backyard in Alaska. Umm, two years later, still nothing. There is a video clip if you follow the links that you can see it “stretching its legs” which consists of barely twitching a foot while encased in scaffolding that prevents it from falling over.
The Land Walker robot looks remarkably like ED-209 from Robocop (below) 
And of course this one looks real promising in the picture. Very reminiscent of the bad robot in the original Robocop movie. Checking out the cannons on the side of the cockpit, you might think this behemoth could be a valuable part of your “home-defense” arsenal in case of burglars, encyclopedia salesmen, Mormons, or the zombie hordes attempting to invade your property. But if you check out the youtube video of it in action, you will be sorely disappointed. Speed is limited to 1.5km/h as it more shuffles than walks and those cannons actually shoot squishy balls. And for a pricetag of $300,000 I think I’ll just build my own robot instead…