iRobot Roomba Silver
by iRobot
|
List Price: Our Price: $129.99 You Save: $70.00 (35%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: Home See more product details |
|---|
Tools and Hardware Reviews of iRobot Roomba Silver
Customer Review: Robot Vaccum
Summary: 5 Stars
We have really enjoyed and are very pleased with this product. We would recommend it to others.Customer Review: Roomba
Summary: 5 Stars
i love my roomba Have two of them one for at home and one for our 5th wheelCustomer Review: Very Useful, but with some flaws
Summary: 4 Stars
First, let me say that I love my roomba. It does a tremendous amount of cleaning without a lot of fuss, and I eventually want to get a scooba when I have the money. It's made a believer out of my husband who first thought it was a silly gadget that wouldn't work. But it does. Quite a bit. We've even named it Dobbie after the house-elf in Harry Potter.
What it will do: It's awesome on hard floors and low pile rugs. It keeps the dust down, which is very important because I have allergies. It does an ok job on dog hair, but with my number of dogs (4 Malamutes inside plus a cat), life can get hairy. Literally. I can set it to go and it does a pretty decent job as long as I keep it away from electrical cords and occasionally move it off the stairs (sometimes, despite the cliff sensor, it does get stuck).
Now, onto the negatives. The dust bin is way too small and must be emptied constantly. The air filter and intake is beneath the robot, which means it sucks in the dirt and hair into the filter, which must be dusted out and replaced often. They say that the roomba handles pet hair easily, and while that's true, there's a huge maintenance associated with that. Hair gets twisted around the brushes, wheels and whatnot constantly, and if not cleaned out, will cause undue drag on the motor and shorten the life of the battery and the robot. After each use, I'm in there cleaning the brushes, wheels, and filter.
The battery is a huge negative. I've had to buy a new one because the old one wouldn't hold a charge. The new one seems to be better, so maybe they've gotten the battery issues worked out.
Even with these negatives, the roomba is so handy, I can't imagine not using one. We're running it daily in one of three areas of my house because the dogs drag dirt in all the time. It keeps me from having to do a fair amount of work. This is one robot, in my mind, that is worth dealing with the negatives.
Customer Review: Works well except for a few flaws
Summary: 4 Stars
I just got this Roomba a few days ago and I have found some really good points and a few bad points. For me, the good points outweigh the bad b/c my house really is much cleaner with very little effort. But if you're a perfectionist, this may not be the best thing for you.
Good Points:
1. Super easy to use - just plop it down and off it goes.
2. Cleans well - I have a dog and I hate vacuuming so the Roomba is a huge help. It does better on hard floor than carpet, though.
3. Spot cleans - nifty little feature where you can tell it to just clean a small area and it will spiral around a few times.
Bad Points:
1. Other electronics can interfere with its operation. The Roomba works like a dream in every room except my living room, where it basically acts like it's gone completely haywire! It spins in a circle for 40 minutes, plows right through the virtual walls, and climbs up my TV (and gets stuck) instead of just turning around. I think it's because I have a wireless router in that room.
2. A lot of hair or carpet fuzz can be difficult to clean out of the brush, and you have to keep the brushes clean all the time, but they do give you a special tool to help with this.
3. It can get stuck on wires or oddly shaped furniture/obstacles so if you turn it on and leave, it may get stuck within 5 minutes and never clean the room. I usually turn mine on when I'm puttering around the house with other things.
Customer Review: Little trooper
Summary: 4 Stars
This roomba works best if you run it on max. The battery does wane over six months, and its runs get shorter and shorter. I haven't replaced the battery yet, so don't know how that will go. I think it might last longer if you don't routinely let it run all the way down, but turn it off and plug it back in when it starts to slow or the red light comes on. You do have to think out where it will wander. This means moving furniture, placing chairs on table, and especially getting cords out of danger. The end result is a cleaner house, though, as you would have had to do all that to get the whole floor really clean anyway. The roomba can't be beat for getting underneath tables and beds. It even sucks up that pesky debris that gets under the eaves of the kitchen cabinets. Emptying it is a little more labor intensive than I'd expected, but I'd have to invest some energy in emptying out a traditional vacuum cleaner. For people like me who have multiple animals in the house and have to clean their floors several times a week, this is a good appliance. On balance, its main advantage might be not the time it saves, but the fact that its really gentle on wood floors. No scraping or scarring.