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Robot Vacumns

I have a roomba I got years ago.

Plusses...
Works by itself
Fun to watch
Has a "personality"

Minuses...
Doesn't work that great. Has to be used constantly to keep up with dust
Tassels on throw rugs stop it dead
Batteries need replacing
Doesn't hold a lot of dirt before it needs to be emptied

I haven't used mine in awhile, but I did have fun with it when I did. They're neat things, but not a replacement for the old ways of cleaning.
 
I had a Roomba, but tossed it when the battery died on it. It was pretty much useless, as it would constantly get stuck on things like extension cords or cat toys that were on the floor.

It also have a bad habit of going over the same area multiple times, while completely missing an area right next to it. The AI on these things is completely brain dead.
 
I picked up the low-end Neato last year. Our "Rosie the Robot" works pretty damned well.

No, it's not "The best damned vacuum I've ever seen," but it does a very good job.

We have two exploding furballs, little rat dogs who shed constantly, and the thing does a good job keeping the collections of furballs picked up.

It runs for about an hour, goes back to recharge, (I have to empty the small dust bin every time) goes back out for an hour, (empty dust bin) and goes back out a 3rd time, then back to recharge.

I run it M, W, F, and with the dog fur every-fucking-where, I still have to empty the small dust bin between each time it runs.

Does it replace a regular vacuum for regular cleaning? Nope...but it helps keep things looking nicer between the regular cleanings.
 
I see the appeal but am not interested. Think I'm going carpet free in the future and just going to Swiffer pad everything. I have a Dyson but it's a pain in the ass to plug in, haul around, then put back in storage -- plus clean out once every year or two.
 
I have a roomba, it can't replace good ole vacuum cleaning, simply because it's not a vacuum cleaner.

Personally I wouldn't bother as I'm not a person that minds dust/fur balls accumulating a bit between vacuumings. And it's yucker to pluck them out of the roomba than look at them anyway.
 
It's crossed my mind to get one, would be neat so it would keep up with cat hair between actual vacuumings.

Problem is my cat pukes a lot. The last thing I want is this thing running over puke and smearing it all over the place and clogging itself with it. Would be pretty nasty to deal with.

Now days I just have a cleaning lady anyway. I hate cleaning, worth it.
 
TeeJay1952 said:
Dog chases, fills too quick. barking??????????? inquiring minds
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we had one. fills VERY quick and really only does a mediocre job compared to a real vaccuum. But the worst is that the dog hair clogs up the sweeper axle and eventually either burns out the motor or rounds off the axle heads. Or both. So you have to keep the thing super clean, which means it takes time. And as a time saving device doesn't exactly make sense.

I suppose dog could chase. Ours was afraid of the thing. No barking.
 
Recently bought one (ebay even new is cheaper) and am only moderately impressed. It's more for in-between real vacuuming, which I can still live with since we have a lot of carpet across 2 floors. Comparing the dust I used to collect every week in the bagless (canister) with the Roomba, it didn't even fill up in the Roomba the first time so I know it's not getting too deep a cleaning. We have allergies so I will keep it going and manually vacuum once in a while. I'll do that after a Roomba cleaning once and see how much dust I get.

If these newer off-brands can do what the Roomba is doing, get one. I don't think they're worth much more than $300. Anker makes them now too, good brand name.
 
Good enough on hard floors that we rarely bust out the real vacuum for the first floor anymore. Biggest hassle is "prepping" before each run (move cords, scoot in chairs, pick up all the dumb scrap we left everywhere).
 
Wife just got the Roomba 880 as a gift which I guess is a pretty high end model for these. That thing is retarded. It takes a good hour to clean a small area.

I will say it appears to pick most of the stuff up, but I think the effort it requires to make sure it wont get stuck, follow up on it if it DOES get stuck and the battery dies, etc... Outside of getting it for free I don't think an investment is worth it. At least not that model.

Wife likes it though I suppose.
 
Tweak155 said:
Wife just got the Roomba 880 as a gift which I guess is a pretty high end model for these. That thing is retarded. It takes a good hour to clean a small area.

I will say it appears to pick most of the stuff up, but I think the effort it requires to make sure it wont get stuck, follow up on it if it DOES get stuck and the battery dies, etc... Outside of getting it for free I don't think an investment is worth it. At least not that model.

Wife likes it though I suppose.
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Yeah...a lot of people don't realize that they make cordless vacuums, which are pretty lightweight, and you charge them up & use them to easily vacuum an entirely room in under 2 minutes. They have good ones for under $70 on Amazon:

https://www.amazon.com/Navigator-Freestyle-Cordless-Vacuum-SV1106/dp/B00C351GBC/

Versus yeah, 45 minutes or more for a $$$ Roomba to do the same job. Roombas are cool, but you can save money & only have to shell out a little bit of time to do the same thing with a decent lightweight cordless vac.
 
After a lot of research, I got a Neato D80.

The new Roomba 980 is wicked smart but is twice the price as the dumber Neato and doesn't clean as well. We decided to get the Neato and just use it while we're home. We'll put up the chairs and make sure trouble spots are blocked off from it. Then we set it loose while we clean counter tops and do other chores.

Here's an example of my neato getting stuck:

(Note: My GF is using our Dyson to clean furniture off-screen)


My dog doesn't give a care about the Neato, which is a bigger problem than you'd think. He'll block the neato from getting down the hall, so a whole section of our house won't get cleaned. 😡

 
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I've been looking at getting one for a couple of months now. I've a couple of cats and a dog that drop fur too much. I figured it might be worth getting one to help keep the floors not so dirty between normal cleanings. I just have a hard time sorting out if the price is worth it. I've major concerns on stuff like cat/dog toys (some days I feel like there's a toddler living here) and cords causing the vacuum to either get stuck because it tried to suck one up, or just thinking the room is only a foot wide because of the toys. I've also concerns that it won't really get the pet hair up very well and I'll have a disk that drives around scaring the cats for no real gain.. outside of the cats stalking it. Having said that, I would buy one in a minute if I could get one of the cats to ride it towards the dog while playing "Ride of the Valkyries"
 
We got the Neato for the fur and dirt from my dog. So far it's been doing a great job keeping things to a tolerable level. Some Robot Vacs are just autonomous carpet sweepers, but once you cross into the $350+ range they actually start to provide decent suction. You will need to get in the habit of picking up your home if you plan on letting the robot run around, though I argue picking up clutter is a great habit to develop for everyone. 😀

As far as the cats liking it, that's a gamble. You can try and see if a friend has a robo vac you can borrow for a couple days to see how they get on with it.
 
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