# Robot Vacuums



## MariaESchneider (Aug 1, 2009)

Anyone out there with an iRobot, an Evolution Mint (sweeper and mop robot, not really a vacuum) or a Neato Vacuum or the P3 (sort of a clone robot vacuum that starts at about 50 dollars.)

I'm looking at various robotic vacuums.  I know they last a couple of years before the battery dies and then it's 35 to 50 to replace the battery.  There's...so darn many iRobots and PARTS to the iRobot (room controls, or whatever they are called) that I'd like to avoid it.  It sounds to me like I'd have to spend x on the vacuum and then a bunch more getting enough room thingies and so on.  BUT it's one of the few brands that says it can do tile AND carpet and has the reviews to back it up (some models.)

Mostly the vacuums seem too high-priced for possibly 2 years use before battery replacement.  So I'm looking for anyone who had/has one and any thoughts.

The Mint is pretty new.  It came out last year and is abut 200 dollars.  Pretty much does kitchen and hardwood.

The Neato is supposedly a way better product than iRobot (more suction, better built) but finding it near 200 isn't that easy (can be done on Ebay I think) but I haven't seen a lot of reviews.

The P3 clone gets both good and bad reviews, but for 50 dollars, it sounds like you get a light vacuum that lasts until it...doesn't.

What say you, oh Kindlers  I need a better vacuum so I have more time to read...


----------



## LauraB (Nov 23, 2008)

i have a roomba that I've had for 4-5 years and it still works great with the origional battery.  I have all tile and wood through our house, no carpet.


----------



## MariaESchneider (Aug 1, 2009)

LauraB said:


> i have a roomba that I've had for 4-5 years and it still works great with the origional battery. I have all tile and wood through our house, no carpet.


Do you know the model and...how many room thingies did you have to buy? If you don't mind my asking. Some of the roombas have really great reviews. Others, not so much!

Your help is appreciated!


----------



## BMathison (Feb 4, 2011)

I've had a few Roombas throughout the years -- we've got hardwood floors also.

We have pets, and it just didn't work well enough -- didn't pick everything up, or got clogged.

If you don't have pets, I'd suggest the Roomba.


----------



## MariaESchneider (Aug 1, 2009)

Thanks--we have cats.  Feral ones, who like to come in covered in dust and leave a trail.  The shedding isn't too bad since they are mostly outdoors, but a cat is a cat.  I think Roomba made a model specific for pets, but there are so many models now I haven't even begun to want to sort through them.  I probably need the "shop vac" of the roomba models...


----------



## LauraB (Nov 23, 2008)

This is the one I have:


We have 2 cats and a dog, and I run it in a different set of rooms each day. So each gets done every third day. It does a good job doing it that way. I am not sure it would work well enough as a once a week vacuum, but it works well for me this way. I have 2 of the door/ledge monitors, that came with it. I'm pleased with it.


----------



## Scheherazade (Apr 11, 2009)

I have a Roomba and don't know what I did without it.  We use it mostly on hardwood floors and tile, but I've run it on carpet and it picks up more than our Dyson tends to.  The nice thing about the Roomba isn't just that you set it and let it do its thing, but it cleans so much better than you could with a broom.  I got mine as a refurb off woot and its worked great for a year or so now.  It has had errors, but all were easily fixed without having to spend any money.

They really made these things with ease of "repair" in mind so all of the parts are easily accessible or designed with trouble shooting in mind.  I know one error we had told me to spin the wheels manually a few times and sure enough it fixed it.  It's important to clean out the brushes and such each use or every other use, but seriously... I'm happy to pull out a few brushes and clean them out over the trash when the other option is cleaning the entire floor myself.  I think that's a pretty fair trade off.

They do have a Roomba specifically for people with pets.  We have dogs, but they're poodles... so I actually shed more than them.  It has no problem with my hair though and it picks up so much that it's almost always surprising to empty the little dust bin.  I think if I were to buy one now I would seriously look at getting a Scooba, but I'd want to do more research first.  Those apparently vacuum, scrub, then squeegee floors which I think would be pretty keen.


----------



## tsrapp (Jan 3, 2011)

Mom just recently got a roomba and *loves* it.  She has a small dog and a cat and says it does a fantastic job keeping up with things.

We'd like one, but have too many cats for it to keep up with.  Roomba + hairball isn't something I want to consider.


----------



## mom133d (aka Liz) (Nov 25, 2008)

Scheherazade said:


> They really made these things with ease of "repair" in mind so all of the parts are easily accessible or designed with trouble shooting in mind. I know one error we had told me to spin the wheels manually a few times and sure enough it fixed it. It's important to clean out the brushes and such each use or every other use, but seriously... I'm happy to pull out a few brushes and clean them out over the trash when the other option is cleaning the entire floor myself. I think that's a pretty fair trade off.


Just wanted to second this. I also got mine off of woot as a refurb about 2 years ago. We use it about once a week, sometimes less. (We're horrible housekeepers.) Our Jack Russell passed last June, so the Roomba has been used with him around, and did a much better job than the Dyson. The first time we used it, we ran it after using the Dyson and were shocked at how much it picked it.

We've replaced the filters every 3 months as recommended, those are about 3 bucks each. And there is a little spin brush that we recently replaced. I think we had a similiar error to Scheherazade's and DH removed the center wheel, because it had gotten clogged with the dog's hair and then put it back and it was good as new.

Next Roomba I get will be one that you can schedule and returns to its "home base" for charging. Ours is the 500? or 510? Its in the 500 series and is one of the lowest ones that isn't cool like that.


----------



## MariaESchneider (Aug 1, 2009)

Wow, thanks for the feedback!  This is just what I needed!

Do you know, I'd forgotten about hairballs  Our cats are indoor/out, and we used to have two indoor only, but that was years ago.  Apparently to some degree the cats must be able to contain them until the want to urp because with the feral adopted cats, I've seen one hairball in 3 years!  Wow.  I don't miss them. 

I'll take a look at those models.  There's so many.  I just got done shopping for a GPS for my mom. EGADS.  There's more models than I own socks!  And such tiny differences between them.  That's pretty much how I felt when I start in with the robot vacuum cleaners so all the input helps.


----------



## Kristan Hoffman (Aug 6, 2009)

We also have a dog, who sheds quite a bit, and we have both a regular vacuum and a Roomba. I use the regular vacuum once every 1-2 weeks, and the Roomba as an "in betweener." Like others have said, it helps me keep up with the hair/fur without having to break my back. Just push and let it do its thing. I already told my boyfriend, from now on ALL furniture we buy MUST have a high enough clearance for the Roomba to pass underneath. (It gets stuck under our sofa sometimes, and it can't go under our coffee table.)

I got it for like $130 off Woot.com, and I definitely think it's worth that money. Had it for a couple years now, no battery issues. (Plus it can "find" its charging dock if they're in the same room, so it can charge itself back up.)

Kristan


----------



## JimC1946 (Aug 6, 2009)

I've seen demos of robot vacuums online, but I had no idea they were actually in commercial production.

This is a cool thread.


----------



## MariaESchneider (Aug 1, 2009)

JimC1946 said:


> I've seen demos of robot vacuums online, but I had no idea they were actually in commercial production.
> 
> This is a cool thread.


Well, Jim, glad you crawled out from under that there ole rock and joined the current century!!!  Not only do they have robot vacuums, sometimes you can even find them on SALE nowadays.  Okay, okay, I'll be nice. Well, yanno. So much as I'm capable.

I am hoping someone has bought the new Neato. I'd like to hear some real-world on that one. It sounds pretty cool. I hadn't heard about the Scooba? Scoobie? I'd kind of like one that can do a light mopping. We have this cat who thinks coming in with wet or muddy feet is part of the deal. Where he got that idea, I have no clue!


----------



## JimC1946 (Aug 6, 2009)

MariaESchneider said:


> Well, Jim, glad you crawled out from under that there ole rock and joined the current century!!!


I resemble that remark.


----------



## Scheherazade (Apr 11, 2009)

They have a new itty bitty Scooba that's designed to fit behind your toilet. It's cute, but a bit of a one-trick pony. Of course they also have Roombas made for use in workshops that can pick up heavy bolts and sawdust, robot pool cleaners... and even a robot gutter cleaner called a Looj which is pretty clever.


----------



## mom133d (aka Liz) (Nov 25, 2008)

MUST HAVE!


----------



## rho (Feb 12, 2009)

How much noise do they make - are they ones that need to run during the day or can you use them at night?  I have looked at them for years.


----------



## Scheherazade (Apr 11, 2009)

Our Roomba, despite how the commercials make them seem, is not quiet.  You can watch television and such while it's running, but you'll have to turn it up and you won't just be able to ignore that the Roomba is going.  I run ours at night all the time, but the person with the room next to the room we run it in says she can hear it... but she hears everything so...  I don't mind the noise, but don't expect quiet.

And for those worried about skittish pets... we have a poodle who runs immediately into the back room when anything out of the ordinary happens.  He did run from the Roomba for a while, but he got comfortable with it -very- almost surprisingly quickly to the point that he's been just sitting there and gotten goosed by it before.  Even then he just got up and glanced at it then walked a bit to the left.


----------



## MariaESchneider (Aug 1, 2009)

One of the reviews I read about the Neato says it is VERY loud compared to the Roomba (something about a jet engine.)    FWIW.  I haven't heard from anyone who actually owns one and those are pretty pricey yet.  They're still going on Ebay for upwards of 200 while I've seen some roombas in the 100 to 150 range.  Supposedly the Neato has a lot more suction than any other vacuums.


----------



## Chad Winters (Oct 28, 2008)

mom133d said:


> Next Roomba I get will be one that you can schedule and returns to its "home base" for charging. Ours is the 500? or 510? Its in the 500 series and is one of the lowest ones that isn't cool like that.


I thought that was a good idea until the dog made a "mess" on the carpet while I was at work and the Roomba went off as scheduled.....it was NOT pretty.....the Roomba was ruined and I had to get a shampooer for the carpet

ugh

until that I loved the Roomba (we actually had 2 one for upstairs and one for downstairs, but I can't bring myself to turn the 2nd on now....I think I have PTSD


----------



## Ciareader (Feb 3, 2011)

Chad Winters (#102) said:


> I thought that was a good idea until the dog made a "mess" on the carpet while I was at work and the Roomba went off as scheduled.....it was NOT pretty.....the Roomba was ruined and I had to get a shampooer for the carpet
> 
> ugh
> 
> until that I loved the Roomba (we actually had 2 one for upstairs and one for downstairs, but I can't bring myself to turn the 2nd on now....I think I have PTSD


oh no!


----------



## Chad Winters (Oct 28, 2008)

yeah... on the other hand it was pretty cool to be able to track the random path of the Roomba throughout the house....


----------



## Scheherazade (Apr 11, 2009)

Chad Winters (#102) said:


> yeah... on the other hand it was pretty cool to be able to track the random path of the Roomba throughout the house....


Or you could have just Googled "Roomba Art" and not had to clean up the random paths ><


----------



## Atunah (Nov 20, 2008)

We got a refurb Roomba a while back for 79 I think. It goes home by itself, unless it gets lost in the hallway to the second bedroom somewhere  . I forgot to put the wall up so it just kept going and going to the other end of the apartment. I can schedule it too. I haven't run it in a while because I been cleaning out closets and such and being in an apartment that limits the area for it to get around. I just got to much stuff on the floors right now basically.

When it does run it picks up all the cat hair, I have 2 cats. Its like a big hair ball in the catcher. 

One of my cats just runs off, the other watches it very very carefully  

What was really fun to watch when I first got is is that you think it isn't going to get to some areas. Like there would be particles on the carpet and it just keeps missing it. But thats not really it, if you don't watch it, eventually those particles are gone as it got everything mapped out. Its smart.   One way or another it will get to every inch.


----------



## mom2karen (Aug 15, 2009)

I was at Target and found the iRobot 530 for $199!  Regular price is $299.  I bought myself one for Valentine's Day.


----------



## Mike D. aka jmiked (Oct 28, 2008)

I got one of these (Model 562) earlier this week. So far, I'm impressed. I can schedule it to clean and it cranks up and spends about 1.5 hours wandering through single living area (living room, kitchen, dining area) and back into the bedroom and two baths and then comes back to the docking bay in the kitchen to recharge.

My cat keeps an eye on it (unless she is napping on the kitchen counter), but otherwise doesn’t get upset.

I did have to make a small wood ramp for the two bathrooms, as the carpet is enough higher than the tile that the Roomba didn’t want to exit the room after cleaning.

I do have to watch for the cat's hairballs, though. That would make a mess if the Roomba went over that.  

It's great for a guy recovering from surgery. 

Mike


----------



## MariaESchneider (Aug 1, 2009)

I finally ended up getting the Mint Automatic Sweeper--it's a sweeper, not a vacuum, which is nice on the tile.  It's quiet.  The mop feature is so-so.  It works, but not efficiently enough to be brag-worthy.

Speaking of cats, I just put a picture of Junior the cat meeting the Mint up on my blog.    He doesn't LOVE it, but both cats tolerate it!

The biggest problem with the Mint is that it isn't a vacuum.  So I'm still having to vacuum the rugs...!


----------



## daveconifer (Oct 20, 2009)

Scheherazade said:


> but he got comfortable with it -very- almost surprisingly quickly to the point that he's been just sitting there and gotten goosed by it before. Even then he just got up and glanced at it then walked a bit to the left.


That's hilarious!

Seriously, do these things work well enough for anal people like me? Does it get "everywhere?"

I know I'm borderline OCD, no need to remind me. I vacuum my house every day and I have to get all the little corners, etc. I can't imagine that I could live with the job that this little thing is doing. Plus, I'm not sure if I could live with the job never being "complete" but always being "in progress."

Wow, I just re-read this and I sound like a complete nut job. I have been wondering about these contraptions, though...

Danger, Will Robinson.


----------



## Kristan Hoffman (Aug 6, 2009)

Funny, I earlier mentioned how much I love mine, but I ran it this morning and it picked up virtually nothing. I mean, dust/lint yes, but I could still see lots of dog hair and miscellaneous bits of dirt on the floor. *sad face* It's at least a year old at this point, so I wonder if the sucking power is starting to... suck.

Kristan


----------



## MariaESchneider (Aug 1, 2009)

As others have said, they don't replace vacuuming or mopping.  They are helpers not doers.  The Mint does a decent enough job keeping up with the dust and cat hair, quite possibly better than a vacuum.  Cat food that the cats dropped out of the bowl?  It just pushes it around.  Mopping?  That part is really quite a joke.  I takes a wet rag and runs it across the floor--there's virtually no solid pressure for it to do more than a quick wipe.  If I run the mop and THEN the dry rag, I actually get up quite a bit of dirt, but their mop feature needs work.  The Mint needs to be able to drag a heavier rag--one that has more water retention ability.  The mopping rag they sent is microfibre so what it really does is leaves a smear of water and picks up minor dirt.  The dry rag done behind it gets more of the actual dirt.

So the mop feature works in a bathroom--where the room is small enough to remain sort of wet and the dry rag can come in and do a second job.  

With just the dry rag though, I think it does a pretty decent job on the kitchen, dining and other tiled areas--it gets the cat hair and dustballs very well.  Large pieces (like leaves that a certain gardener brings in) are likely to get dragged around and then left.  

When we first started using it--we left the floor dirty on purpose.  And if you are trying to collect a lot of dust, you risk having a large dust bunny picked up by the Mint and then end up in a corner...

But for daily in-between me doing it, it works well--well enough for me.


----------



## Pushka (Oct 30, 2009)

I bought one of these, 560, of ebay USA recently for around $400 which included fast shipping (for two) to Australia.  Crazy thing to do?  Nup, in Australia the lower model retails for $800!  We get seriously ripped off here.  I love mine, and we have a ragdoll cat.


----------



## MariaESchneider (Aug 1, 2009)

Pushka said:


> I bought one of these, 560, of ebay USA recently for around $400 which included fast shipping (for two) to Australia. Crazy thing to do? Nup, in Australia the lower model retails for $800! We get seriously ripped off here. I love mine, and we have a ragdoll cat.


I'm still looking around for a vacuum one. I am watching for the Neato brand to go on special/sale or the 530 Roomba to get clearanced (There's a new model out this year.) We'll see. They are expensive, but they work well enough so far that I find I use them all the time and they do keep the place cleaner. At least I've been happy with the Mint so far. I've also found that if I dampen the dry wipe rag slightly it does pick up more of the dirt. It's still not a mop and if I get it too wet the back wheels slip and the whole thing doesn't work well until the rag dries some.


----------



## Mike D. aka jmiked (Oct 28, 2008)

I'm even happier with the Roomba 562 that I bought a few weeks ago than I was when I got it. It's just a wonderful device. I don't use the scheduling feature any more, just push the button to crank it up when I feel like it.

The thing is dumb as a brick, though. I've watched it get confused under a small table and try to get out for two or three minutes and when out, turn around and go right back under it a few seconds later.

It does, however, do a very good job of backing off from power cords and the odd stack of papers that I sometimes have beside my recliner.

I don't mind the noise at all. and it does a fine job of cleaning up the cat food that gets scattered around the food bowl and the litter that gets kicked out of the litter boxes. As well as cleaning under the big bed in the master bedroom. My house is mostly carpeted, and this thing just does a wonderful job of keeping it looking nice.

The only downside is that my carpet is fairly new, and I have to clean out the brush and roller of the Roomba frequently to remove the loose carpet fibers that it picks up.

There are some Youtube videos of cats riding around on Roombas... very funny.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewdbilSWjaM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQ-jv8g1YVI

Mike


----------



## *DrDLN* (dr.s.dhillon) (Jan 19, 2011)

I didn't realize these are that popular. I still vacuum old fashion way; where I have the control to go in every corner.


----------



## Mike D. aka jmiked (Oct 28, 2008)

The Roomba gets to every corner.... eventually. It's got a little brush off to one side that gets corners, and does a surprisingly good job of it.

It doesn’t entirely replace my upright HEPA cleaner, though.

Mike


----------



## Pushka (Oct 30, 2009)

When I was in my thirties, we were going on a family holiday so I did one of those HUGE vacuums.  I had a sore back previously, but in the afternoon after the big clean up, I picked up my 5 month old off the floor and felt excruciating pain go all the way down to my toe.  I was in agony but managed to put my son down and remember going into a corner and crying.  Taken to the Doctors and a Cat scan revealed I had ruptured a disc in my back and the disc fragment had fallen down the canal and was compressing my spinal cord.  It had actually broken off.  I immediately lost all sensation in my right leg, and could not walk.  Immediate surgery and after 6 months rehab I could walk again.  Twenty years later, I still limp in that leg, but everything else is ok.  I then heard of someone else having the same thing and they ended up in a wheelchair.  

These days, the only thing that triggers pain in my back, is vacumming.  I recently won a Dyson, and I must say, that is much better for me than any other cleaner I have had.  Except, now the roomba.  You can probably understand why I love it.  I simply could not vacuum as well as it does because after 15 minutes of normal vacuum, I had enough and would do it as quickly as I could just to get it done.  I hear it whizzing away and know that I wont be doing the vacuuming for a while.


----------



## Harris Channing (Nov 23, 2010)

I sweep every day...dogs, cats, kids and a husband who thinks the kitchen floor was put there to catch his crumbs...might be a good buy for me!


----------



## Elizabeth Black (Apr 8, 2011)

I don't have a Roomba myself, but I understand cats love it.


----------



## Pushka (Oct 30, 2009)

T.L. Haddix said:


> It would be one less thing to have to worry about. I love the idea of just letting it go wherever, have it clean and then it 'feeds' itself.
> 
> I'm really surprised that you all say it does better than the Dyson. I have a Dyson and it rocks! If it would just use itself.


OK, probably to put this in context. The roomba requires some maintenance, ie it picks up stuff and needs more of a clean than the dyson, and the brushes need more attention each time. But to me this is a small chore compared with the act of vacuuming. And seeing all the stuff it pulls up is rather satisfying anyway.

it is autumn here right now and these tiny Chinese elm leaves drive me crazy, they get inside everywhere, especially the front hallway. but roomba ate them up with glee yesterday. Of course, there are more today but all I need to do is press the button.


----------



## mom2karen (Aug 15, 2009)

I've had my Roomba for about 3 months and I like it for doing a pick up of crumbs, but it does a horrible job on getting dog hair off our throw rugs.  I still have to pull out the real vacuum to get them clean.  I'm training dd on how to clean the brushes and bin so she can be in charge of vacuuming the house and I'll do the throw rugs/stairs.  Nice deal for me!


----------



## Pushka (Oct 30, 2009)

Mine is buzzing around my feet as I type.  My carpets have never been so clean, as they get a vacuum every couple of days (I shut him up in three rooms each day) rather than in the past, waiting until all the carpets really need a vacuum, and then I am forced to drag out the manual vacuum.  My dyson feels very unloved.

We should tell of the funny things they have done.

On his first outing, he got lost.  He ended in a corner where I never venture with the vacuum cleaner, under a sofa that it too heavy to move so underneath it must be very fluffy.  Not now, roomba got stuck under there vacuuming until his battery gave out!  Lots of brush cleaning required that day!


----------



## mom133d (aka Liz) (Nov 25, 2008)

I had the boys get me the 560 for Mother's Day. Its currently charging. 
I may give the old 500 to my Dad, a roomba would be useful in a 3 story house.


----------



## Mike D. aka jmiked (Oct 28, 2008)

T.L. Haddix said:


> Cats don't think it's so great. I, however, deeply enjoyed watching them watch it. And puff up on it. And run from it.


My cat pretty much ignores the Roomba. If it comes within about 1 to 1 1/2 feet of her and is headed directly for her, she will get up and move, but otherwise, nothing.

Mike


----------



## Tripp (May 28, 2009)

another use for a Roomba, protection:






Cats need to hide, though


----------



## Annalog (Dec 28, 2008)

T.L. Haddix said:


> Anna, you just *had* to mention the Roomba, didn't you? Sigh. That reminded me that I need to run ours today, which means I get off my lazy rear and pick up the stuff in the floor so Roomie can do his job. Sigh.


Sorry! Replying on the Robot Vacuums thread instead since I doubt I will be buying a pressure cooker anytime soon and we still need a Roomba.  I am not sure if our cats will love or hate it. (Probably one of each.  )


----------

