Robot Vacuum - Pros and Cons
 

I’m considering purchasing a robot vacuum. Would like to hear from other TOTV folks who have purchased. What do you like, what do you not like? What brand/model did you purchase, and are you happy with your model purchase? I’m considering roborock Qrevo S Robot Vacuum and Mop. As always, I appreciate those that take time to respond.

The wife loves it. We just purchased a new bed. When they removed the old one there were absolutely no dust bunnies anywhere. We have no carpet anywhere in the house so I think it’s a perfect solution for us. If there are any drawbacks I would say sometimes it tries to climb some of the round chair bases we have. And once in awhile it just gets lost.
One thing we did find out is that it will set off the motion sensors of an alarm system. Not a great thing to find out when you’re in the middle of the Atlantic on a cruise ship-lol. One other thing, a few times it has gone into a room and closed the door locking itself in until the battery died. At least that room was clean.
We have a Shark. Not sure of the model but it’s three years old and still going strong.

I did that once to my x-wife.

We got an iRobot J+ & happy with it on the hard manufacturer floors. Too late for us but Costco has an identical iRobot for the same price but has a larger battery and has more spare filters and bags. I don't recommend a mop in the same unit but that is up to you.

PS
You heard the expression, jack of all trades but master of none. That is why I don't recommend a vacuum and a mop in one unit.

We have the iRobot J7. Works pretty well. Also have the standalone mop unit. I would not buy a combo unit. The J7 works well on our tile floors. We use a regular vacuum on our rugs. The regular vacuum gets a lot more dirt out of the rugs.

You don't have a dog do you?

https://i.imgur.com/RQxy1lLl.png

The iRobot J7+ advoid animal waste and wires.

We have an EcoVac Deebot 900 series. We bought a robot vacuum because of a shedding Lab. This brand was highly rated by Consumer Reports for picking up dog hair. The Lab is gone, but we still have the Deebot. It did a good job of daily cleaning of the dog hair and now does a good job of daily cleaning. We have a vacuum only model. Like others have mentioned, it will occasionally get stuck. There is nothing like hearing at 4:30 in the morning “I am stuck and shutting down”! EcoVacs are a bit on the pricey side. I don’t think I will get the same brand when the current vacuum conks out, but will definitely get another robot vacuum.

We have two dogs that shed, I vacuumed daily and sometime twice a day, I am amazed how great a job this thing does, under the beds and under the couch, chair and love seat, no issue with the area rugs also, it does a better job vacuuming than I did, the washing the floor works well also. this is the model I bought at Target. Shark Matrix Plus 2in1 Robot Vacuum & Mop with Sonic Mopping, Matrix Clean, HEPA Bagless Self Empty - RV2610WA
Shark Matrix Plus 2in1 Robot Vacuum & Mop with Sonic Mopping, Matrix Clean, HEPA Bagless Self Empty - RV2610WA

Shark Mop/Vac 2in1.

Maps entire house, send to do one room, multiple , or all. Comes home when full, auto empty and return to complete task.
Give you est time to complete and will recharge then return to complete task.

Mop have to change front unit to mop head. Mops from rear, while vacuum in the front. It will tell you when fluids are low and when to add. I will send out to mop couple areas, remove mop pad, RINCE CLEAN, THEN SEND BACK OUT.

I have hand mopped room, then sent out R2D2 (yes named, pool robot is C-3PO)
I can’t believe how much the mop pad comes back dirty.

One drawback you have to manually empty vacuum when mopping.

That said I have had two iRobot one just vacuum, one mop/ vac.

Shark did a better job after iRobot cleaned, because clean path is better on shark.

Note if you have a pet, don’t run robot while you are gone. Our pets challenge it, treat it like a toy.
If no pets send it out when you are leaving, clean floor when you return.

I gave our oldest iRobot vac, he has trained his dog to hit the button on command “Esme clean your room” to start cleaning.

iRobot mop/vac is up north and our granddaughters cat rides on it while it runs.

Best investment ever. Entertainment for pets and clean floors

How lazy can you get?
For the elderly, vacuum cleaning is one of the best forms of exercise.

Yea, but how do you get up off the floor after vacuuming under the bed, LOL

911

I was walking by the clearance aisle at Walmart and they had their cheap-o brand on sale for $30. I bought three. My daughter loves hers. She has mostly carpet. Ours does fine on tile and carpet, but it gets confused in some rooms. We have one for tile/hardwood waiting to come down to TV. I expect it will do well. They may not be perfect, but for $30, I'm not complaining.

Of course you are aware of this being a significant cause of heart attacks right?

I have the same model. LOVE it. The old vac-only went into the Master Bedroom; just close the door; no more Strips set delineate areas. I can sit here and vacuum at the same time ! I checked the mopping by following up with old steam mop. Nary a thing there after doing LR and K. I have Robbie and Baby Rob.

For some of us, we have a disability that prevents us from doing the vacuuming! Laziness has nothing to do with it!
Love my Roomba.

I let my dear wife do under the beds.
I supervise.:)

I absolutely hated mine and sold it. Not even sure where to begin……I spent so much time putting all my chairs up on counter tops or tables it was ridiculous. The robot could only clean around the legs not under them so I had to still do that manually or flip up all the bar stools and chairs.

It could not clean behind the sofa or chairs because of the cords running from my power reclining furniture, so I still had to clean back there.

It got stuck under the bed in my guest room EVERY TIME and I had to go retrieve it!

It doesn’t have enough suction to deep clean, so you still have to use a manual vacuum every once in awhile to really get any carpeted areas clean.

Ours was a pretty expensive iRoomba brand, I don’t remember the model, and it had a self-emptying feature which I thought would be great for our shedding dogs.

It was more work for me than just a regular vacuum.

What model did you have that didn’t work? That would be great info.

Our Shark will not run over cords, stops, and goes along the length, then continues until it finds the open non corded area then continues to clean. Plus I can actually draw a line avoid 6” in the program to avoid cords, rugs, or anything.

Haven’t ever had to pick up chairs Shark will clean under and around chairs and bar stools.

The iRobot didn’t do as well under chairs

Not lazy, but mopping/vac 3000sf of tile multiple times by hand has nothing to do with laziness, just time management.

I start mine as I am going out the door to swim 4 miles or run 3 miles, or bike 6 miles,
If i return and R2D2 is still running I either improved my time, or didn’t stop at Starbucks :clap2:

If vacuuming by hand could improve better health, trainers would charge big bucks for that class:a040:

I have the same one and agree it works well. It has the mapping feature so the robot is not just bouncing around randomly. I love the mop attachment and disagree from others who say don’t get one that mops. It vacuums and mops at the same time when the mop attachment is attached. It is not for mopping up messes but you would be surprised how much dirt is on the pad when done mopping. If you have tile the vaccine that mops is not much more than the one that only mops c

Robot Vacuum
 

We have the Rooma i7+ and the Braava Mopping devices. They were terrific until we moved into a different home. When the wood floors were done by previous owner the "transitional" tile to wood floor divider is too high. "Transitional" divider is the wooden piece that separates the tile from the wooden flooring. Ours is too tall -- the Roomba i7 struggles to get over the hump but our Braava Mop just can't make it. I loved my devices until we moved.

Robot Vacuum Experience
 

I bought one a year ago and was able to return it for a traditional vacuum.

I have single level all wood floors so the Robot was able to go everywhere (ideal conditions).

First of all it requires technical competency. My kids love their app download for the Robot and use their"s often. I just want to vacuum. If you want to do just one room. You must either close off that room or navigate the app to select the space. I find it faster just to use my conventional vacuum.

It does a good job, but misses stuff that I would get with my conventional vacuum.

If you move furniture around, it must remap and it can get confused. I did this in my Florida room and it couldn't find it's way out.

Also you must make sure all cords are off the floors and move any furniture you want to get around.

I am very happy with my new conventional vacuum and relieved to have gotten rid of it. I can clean the house 4 times or more faster and better.

I don't mind getting a little more exercise and oh, by the way, try vacuuming your car with the robot.

All of these posts have been helpful. Thanks everyone for your input!

Your experience was identical to mine. I spent more time moving kitchen chairs or getting the Roomba unstuck that I stopped using mine. I will say that if you have rooms where it can get under the furniture and there are no cords, or other obstacles, that will it will get hung up on it would be great to have one. My Roomba did not do a good job on plush carpets but did a nice job on hard surface floors.

I have a Roborock 7 max with wet/dry cleaning capabilities. I have asthma and pets so wet cleaning is good at times. I usually use the robot for dry vac. Protect cords, no tassels or fringes on rugs, remove shag area rugs unless you want a show. Training the vac took a bit, but soon you will have a housekeeper in the middle of the night. If the vac gets stuck or in trouble, you will see the location on a map created when you train the unit. I assume your unit empties itself, recharges, and goes back for more. If not, I would recommend the add-on. You will have no dust and fewer critters.

Is that what it looks like that has been smeared around? Yikes!

We're on our third vac. First was a Neato, 2nd Ecovacs, current and best is Roborock Q5. One major requirement is the ability to draw virtual boundaries, rather than having to move things or manually block areas. The other is for it to return to the dock when the battery is low, and resume and finish automatically. This is needed for a larger floor plan. We had one that also mopped but it barely cleaned, not worth it. You also want it to connect to Alexa or a Google assistant, as well as an app on your phone. The one we now have is a keeper.

We bought an iRobot last year, returned it 2 days later. Reason: it took so long to do the house. Back and forth for hours, us having to keep stepping around it, and worst the noise it made, couldn't watch tv or listen to music.Went back to manual method.

Most robotic vacs are great, especially if you don't have wall to wall carpeting. I have a Robovac and an Eufy.

I love it. It keeps our house clean and works every day so I don’t have to. We have an Ecovac Deebot XI Omni. It also mops and you can tell it what to do verbally with standard commands like “Go back to base.” Now that I have had one for 3 years I would never go back to manually vacuuming. We have carpet and tile. Our version also has the pet poo interface that you can turn on if you have pets that have accidents in the house on occasion. It recognizes it and steers around it.

I’ve had two roborocks for five years…two houses. Both have performed flawlessly.
My model is pre-mopping. After the first few runs you know where it will get hung up. I just drop a throw pillow in that spot and Timmy bounces off the pillow and moves on.
Now I’m looking for a robot to change sheets and clean windows.

Now we know who the lazy one is in your house. LOL

We have had a EUFY for years. Love that it cleans under the beds and along the edges.

We’ve had a Roomba for about 10 years, still going strong.

You wouldn't say that if you knew how hard it is to supervise my wife.
It's easier herding cats!

Our friends' EUFY flat out quit on them after two years of daily use. Ours didn't even make it that long, not daily use and not being here 6 months of the year.
It constantly got hung up in wires, stuck among chair legs under the dining room table and bar stools. I had to block the elderly dog off because he wasn't afraid of it, and it would vacuum all around him and eat his tail. His hair got caught in parts of it, requiring lots of disassembly. Making a 14-year-old 85-lb arthritic dog move from room to room was more than I was willing to do to him. So I had to stack things around him, which was more work for me.

I got tired of having to get all the chairs and stools up off of the floor and untangling the thing from wires, freeing it from all the places it got caught.
It also vacuumed randomly, which I didn't like, but possibly I could have corrected that online had I ever been able to get it to connect to our wifi. (And I'm not tech-challenged.)

When it quit on me I went back to our trusty cordless Dyson Animal Stick.

Make sure you get the one that has a memory so that it memorizes your floor plan. It must be programmable for that. We have one that isn't and so it constantly goes around with no rhyme or reason and duplicates where it goes. It also gets hung up on areas easily such as where the sliding glass door lower frames are located. Goes behind chairs and cannot find it's way back out. Things like that are annoying.

I wonder...how many guys here have said that to their wife?

:D