LEGO · Educational · 1998
The brick that launched LEGO Mindstorms in September 1998 and effectively created the mass-market home-robotics kit. The RCX (Robotic Command eXplorer) grew out of a long LEGO / MIT Media Lab collaboration inspired by Seymour Papert's 'Mindstorms', and shipped as the heart of the Robotics Invention System (RIS 1.0, $199). The yellow programmable brick runs a Renesas H8/300 microcontroller (16 MHz) with 32 KB ROM and 32 KB RAM, exposing three sensor input ports and three 9V motor output ports plus an LCD. Programs are written on a PC (visual RCX Code, or community languages like NQC and leJOS Java) and beamed over infrared; two bricks can even talk to each other via IR. It anchored the first FIRST LEGO League season and built a huge hacker/education community before the line ended in 2022.
Price level: ★★★★☆
View full interactive profile, comparisons & videos → Check price on Amazon →| Category | Educational |
| Sub-type | Programmable Robotics Brick (STEM kit) |
| Status | Discontinued |
| Year | 1998 |
| Origin | Denmark |
| Use cases | STEM / robotics education, FIRST LEGO League, Hobbyist robotics |
| Made in | Denmark |