VOXL 2 Flight Deck vs. VOXL CAM w Flight Controller

Canuck

Good day,

we are in the early stages of evaluating COTS solutions for vision/autonomy/GPS-denied navigation for an existing large autonomous robotics system that operates outside.

For our evaluation stage, the specific form factor for what we buy is not a large consideration for our work, however minimizing our ramp up time with our evaluations is valuable to us.

In terms of a starting point for getting started with the ModalAI ecosystem we have been looking at:

VOXL CAM "Core Dev Kit w/ Flight Controller"
VOXL 2 Flight Deck

Initially we considered the VOXL CAM to be a great starting point, however given that the VOXL 2 Flight Deck includes the upgrade VOLX 2 as well a pre-mounted sensors and ROS2 support, we are now leaning towards procuring the VOXL 2 Flight Deck for our evaluation.

Would you be able to comment on our understanding that the VOLX 2 Flight Deck could be considered as an upgraded VOXL CAM w/ Flight Controller?

Thank you.

Vinny

Hi @Canuck
Your brief assessment is pretty much spot on.
VOXL Cam is a concept where you do minimal expansion or upgrades, as it was designed as a "fully built perception engine" that you can mount to any platform (such as our Seeker platform), and adding or changing sensors is not recommended.
Also, VOXL CAM, includes VOXL, which is our first gen platform.

VOXL 2 Flight Deck is for all intents and purposes the brains behind our Sentinel Drone:
https://www.modalai.com/collections/development-drones
and yes it includes our second gen Flagship VOXL 2. It offers much more customization and flexibility to tailor it towards your specific application(s) but suited specifically for drones (whereas VOXL Cam can mount to the front of ground robots easier than a flight deck, hence our naming conventions of "Flight Deck").

I encourage you to browse the VOXL Bootcamp site to get a feel for the user differences between VOXL and VOXL 2:
https://docs.modalai.com/voxl-developer-bootcamp/
and then you can confirm your understanding between the two designs here: https://docs.modalai.com/voxl-computers/
Both platforms are highly capable.

Currently however, we are having a few delays on VOXL 2, with new orders taking some time (up to a couple months) to fulfill. VOXL based products are in-stock, so please be aware.
Many customers have successfully made a transition from VOXL based systems to VOXL 2 based systems, so the bulk of the learning you obtain on VOXL will not go to waste if you later on decide you want to upgrade to VOXL 2 when availability has improved.

Hope this helps!!

Canuck

@Vinny Thank you very much for the reply, it is quite helpful. We will review the doc links again and take the lead times into account when making an order. We look forward to our evaluation of these systems.