Who Has a Roomba?

[j44ke]

Our house will be all concrete floors with no thresholds between rooms. I am the vacuum pro, but it occurs to me that our house might be tailor-made for a Roomba to do the bulk of the work. We'll have one rug in the living room. That's it. I'd like it to just take off and go to work on a daily basis. If I have to do a comprehensive vacuum every couple weeks, that's okay. But this house sits right at dirt level and we're going to be outside a lot so expect floor level mayhem.

Who has one? Does it work? Will it work for me?

[Tom]

The newer ones are less maintenance. We have an old one. It's great. Climbs over anything. Now and then it gets over enthusiastic and gets trapped wedged under the couch. After some complaints we pull it out and send it on its way.

[Mabouya]

Go for it!

[sk_tle]

I used to have one, the early model. It just didn't fit our lifestyle because ;

- we had an old cat who was frightened by it. I've seen people having pet + roomba, I guess it doesn't matter if the roomba is bought when the pets are young.
- we had small kids always let something on the floor, be it a toy, some lego pieces, a sock. It got stuck so often it wasn't fun.
- mine wasn't programmable. If I want something that clean my house, I want it to do it when I am not around.

Now that my daughters are old at times I'm considering a newer, "smarter one" but on the other hand he floor is really the easiest part when cleaning the house so with that budget I could hire someone for a few months. Wouldn't that be a better option?

[j44ke]

One thing - the roomba doesn’t get COVID-19.

[SlowPokePete]

One thing - the roomba doesn’t get COVID-19.

nor will it give it to you...

SPP

[ides1056]

just turn off whatever internet enabled part lets the cloud know what the layout of your house is

[j44ke]

just turn off whatever internet enabled part lets the cloud know what the layout of your house is

Yes, definitely.

Alright, one Roomba on the list.

[kdawg]

nor will it give it to you...

SPP

But eventually it will murder you in your sleep...

[Matthew Strongin]

I went through a couple early ones when I was single and had two dogs. There was no way I could keep up with the vacuuming with the pups shedding everywhere and the Roombas worked fantastically until they didn't. After the second one died I gave up and just bought a better regular vacuum, but this was a while ago so they've hopefully become more durable. And without pets I'm sure they'd have lasted longer.

[cny rider]

We have one and it’s a love/hate relationship.
As in my wife loves it and I hate it.
She loves it because it’s the only way to keep up with the golden retriever hair.
I hate it because I love silence and it’s another source of white noise I’d rather not have.
And it’s very cat like in its behavior: I swear it knows that I don’t like it and so it seems to follow me around wherever I go......

[j44ke]

This Roborock S4 was just recommended to us by our neighbor who has one in Florida "because of the sand." I realize now I didn't consider that there might be other robot vacuum companies.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07TXGQS3H...v_ov_lig_dp_it

[rec head]

I always thought Roombas were a bit expensive but we have one anyway. It works. One of my dogs is a little freaked out by it and the other doesn't care if it is banging into his bed. I don't think you have pets to worry about so I say go for it. Set it to a schedule so you won't be around when it does it's thing and you will love your clean floors.

[j44ke]

I got a Roborock on the rec of my sister who had replaced her Roomba with one. Seems tailor-made for our concrete floor home surrounded by 81 acres of dirt. I love it, my wife hates it, but she hates vacuuming and I do all the vacuuming. So I think the Roborock and I have some simpatico going on. It is a vacuum, I do vacuuming. The only issue is that it doesn't know what to do with chairs that have crossed wire legs. But I just tap its "nose" when it heads over to one, and it creates its own no-fly zone around the chair. It is kind of amazing. We have a thin legged dining table with 8 thin legged chairs, and it threads through the whole mess of spindles without any problem. It does weird things too. I was watching it zip repeatedly past a small white shard of something in the living room until it disappeared into the bedrooms, did the hall, did the bathrooms, and then came wheeling around the corner back into the living room, snagged the small white shard and headed for its dock. We don't have WIFI and I don't intend to connect it once we do, but feels a bit like there is a 12 year old video game kid driving it.



My mind is totally gone. Our neighbors recommended the Roborock as above, and then my sister recommended it too and it was like completely new info. I get up in the morning and look at my todo list, walk outside and my brain is as empty as a ... I forget what. Hope I get my brain back once this house is finished.

[bking]

Buyer beware: Roomba Dog Poop Story Goes Viral, Causes Hilarious Pooptastrophe

[cny rider]

I got a Roborock on the rec of my sister who had replaced her Roomba with one. Seems tailor-made for our concrete floor home surrounded by 81 acres of dirt. I love it, my wife hates it, but she hates vacuuming and I do all the vacuuming. So I think the Roborock and I have some simpatico going on. It is a vacuum, I do vacuuming. The only issue is that it doesn't know what to do with chairs that have crossed wire legs. But I just tap its "nose" when it heads over to one, and it creates its own no-fly zone around the chair. It is kind of amazing. We have a thin legged dining table with 8 thin legged chairs, and it threads through the whole mess of spindles without any problem. It does weird things too. I was watching it zip repeatedly past a small white shard of something in the living room until it disappeared into the bedrooms, did the hall, did the bathrooms, and then came wheeling around the corner back into the living room, snagged the small white shard and headed for its dock. We don't have WIFI and I don't intend to connect it once we do, but feels a bit like there is a 12 year old video game kid driving it.



My mind is totally gone. Our neighbors recommended the Roborock as above, and then my sister recommended it too and it was like completely new info. I get up in the morning and look at my todo list, walk outside and my brain is as empty as a ... I forget what. Hope I get my brain back once this house is finished.

We have an i-Robot, and like your wife, I hate it.
Yesterday my wife had it running upstairs. Usually she locks it in our room, but I got home from my bike ride and started up the stairs and saw it headed directly for the top of the stairs.
I was so excited thinking she forgot to shut the bedroom door and it was about to take a suicidal plunge down the stairs.
But no, of course not.
It's too smart for that.

[bigbill]

Mine is called "The Toddler" on my wifi. It got that name because; when you can't hear it, you need to go find out why. Mine will occassionally go into a room, get behind the door, shut the door, and trap itself in the room.

[caleb]

Does the Roborock actually have suction? My experience with our Roomba is that it's more of a broom than an actual vacuum.

The best thing about the Roomba is that it forces us to keep crap off the floor. Its success at docking itself is about 50%, which is obnoxious. Ours is about two years old, so they may have gotten better.

[zachateseverything]

my Roomba will lock itself into a room at least once a week

[j44ke]

This one does have good suction. However cement floors are not a good test. We have some industrial carpets down (black heavy duty rubber-backed “wool”) to manage the periodic trades finish punch list items. Doesn’t manage that too well. Maybe 75%? Ours seems able to find the dock easily. Kind of fun to see it spin around and disappear.