The Roomba Experience

[cam2s]

So I was at a work conference here last week and I was entered into a raffle. Now, I have never won anything in my life, so I was quite surprised to get my name called, and not only that I won the prize that I really wanted which was the Roomba! And then for even more sugar on top, the prize was a Roomba and a Braava Jet. The only down side was having to spend $80 to FedEx them home, but anyways I have received them and put them to work. This is the top of line model, which is suppose to learn your rooms over time. They both were pretty methodical, covered a majority of the places they needed to go, and didn’t get stuck on anything. Definitely looking forward to playing with these two more!

 

[cam2s]

Roomba

This unit has automatic dirt removal, so when the bin in the Roomba gets full it will return to its base and the base will suck the dirt out. There is a bag in the top of the base.

 

[cam2s]

Braava Jet

It seemed to fairly economical with the solution. I had it do the bathroom and the kitchen and it only used about a quarter tank. You put a few ounces of solution in the tank and then fill the rest up with water. It also has two different kinds of pads, a dry mop similar to a swiffer pad, and the wet mop. Both are washable. The wet mop picked up quite a bit of soil and the floor had that nice clean feeling underneath.

 

[cam2s]

And of course being a 21st century gadget there’s an app. There are buttons on it, so you wouldn’t necessarily have to use the app but it does enhance the experience. Will post more as I use it more.

 

[mieles5380leo]

Congratulations what a nice win! That’s over $1k in value you got there. I always found it so interesting that as much as people seem to hate bags and bagless is a big deal that they use bags in robot vacuum bases. Robot vacuums of all vacuum types would be the ones I’d think would always be bagless. I know though that it’s just a marketing ploy to get them more money because people don’t ever buy filters or brush rolls to keep their vacuum maintained but they’ll have to buy bags in order for it to pick anything up so they get money from continual bag purchases after. I know from working in the vacuum business that people only care about one thing with their vacuum: the suction and that it picks up dirt. If it picks up dirt they don’t care if the filters are dirty or the brush is worn down or belt is stretched, but as soon as the suction drops and it’s not picking up dirt that’s when they have a problem. People won’t just replace filters or belts and brush rolls on time intervals when you’re supposed to they always wait until it’s completely beyond terrible and not functioning it’s like, you’re supposed to do preventative maintenance not wait until it falls apart to do something about it. That’s another tangent for another day though.

 

[human]

My house is way too cluttered for a robot vacuum to be practical but I've often thought it would be fun to see how my cats would react to one. It would probably scare them to death.

 

[cam2s]

Cats and the Roomba

If nothing else they will expensive cat toys. The Roomba especially, the spinning brush was an attractive target for them.

 

[luxlife]

It’s an automated dustbuster…

At least that’s how I see my Neato D7. Neato was the first brand that had a straight side for the brush roll and it does make a difference in terms of cleaning corners and close to walls. I don’t rely on mine too much but I just let it run daily between scheduled vacuumings and I suppose that every little bit helps.

 

[jo]

How’s the noise level?

My sister has a genuine roomba vacuum and it is terribly noisy. Really annoying to have it going in the kitchen while trying to watch tv in the next room. My Brother bought some other brand (not sure of the brand) on a Black Friday sale a few years ago and it is very smooth sounding and pleasant…much like an Electrolux xxx!

Jon

 

[cam2s]

I think the noise level is quite reasonable. The Braava jet doesn’t hardly make any noise at all. The Roomba has variable suction, so on bare floor it’s fairly quiet too. I haven’t put it on carpet but it’s suppose to go into a deep cleaning mode on carpet, which I assume would be noisier. The loudest part is when the base sucks the dirt out of the Roomba. That’s about the same volume as a regular vacuum. However it only last about 5 seconds. I think the idea is that you are suppose to run it when you are away at work or at night, so it’s out of the way.