[M_Six]

Any recommendations or warnings to keep away? We have cats and hardwood floors. I've avoided buying a robo vac in the past because of the issue with hairballs and other cat gaks, but I understand some of the newer vacs have a way to avoid these. We also have cat beds and cat toy and other clutter on the floor. How well do these things deal with "busy" floors?

Ideally I'd like one that I could tie into HomeKit, but it's not a deal breaker if it won't.

[ryan stewart]

I have two of the Neato vacs. I had a Roomba first but when it finally died I gave Neato a shot because they had good reviews and were cheaper for the features. I liked it so much I bought a second one for the second floor.

Ive had zero issues with pet hair on the new brush designs. Ive honestly had zero issues with them. The old Roomba would try and force itself under my bed and get wedged but the Neato doesnt do that (although to be safe I did create a virtual no-go zone anyway).

I let the downstairs run every other day and the upstairs (where the bedrooms are) Ill fire off when I leave the house, etc. Doing this every couple of days has a DRAMATIC impact on the overall dust and pet hair in the house. You still have to do a real cleaning to get anything not on the ground (and corners and areas they cant reach) but getting dirt/hair/dander off the floor means less to get kicked up nad landing on tables, etc.

Things to keep in mind? Keep stuff of the floor? That is really it. If something is on the floor the vac has to deal with that, and if its got strings like laces the vac will try and eat them. Also make sure doors are open/closed in a way the vac can open/close them on itself. I actually got magnetic door stoppers to hold doors fully open because of this (well that and I open the house a lot and doors would blow shut, etc).

Also, make sure your animal doesn't shit in the house. My exs fucking cat took a shit in the corner of my office and the vac hit it, thankfully I was home and caught it early else it would have just dragged it all over the damned house. Breaking up with her was half to get rid of that fucking cat.

I dont know about homekit, I know neato does google/amazon. I love being able to say "vacuum the house" when I leave for dinner and it runs both floors.

[Alfisti]

LOL on the cat shit. God imagine that.

[M_Six]

Cat poop is not an issue. Barf is, though. That's a big reason we have hardwood instead of carpeting. I have seen some vacs that now supposedly recognize "pet waste' and avoid it, but I'm not sure how well that works. And I probably wouldn't run it if I wasn't here anyway. I mainly want it for the two big rooms in our house; the main living room and the library downstairs. Both are fairly open floors but with lots of furniture.

[ryan stewart]

Yeah if you cant be certain Id only run it when here. Thankfully the only time my dog has had an issue it was my fault (being gone too long without a backup, etc) and she sleeps in my room so I know the downstairs is safe every night.

Now the only issue with her and it is she has gotten so used to it and its the lidar ones (so instead of just ramming shit it knows whats around it) she will just ignore it. Ill come home to my bedroom carpet looking like its been professionally mowed (long straight carpet lines) except for a giant chalk outline of a dog right in the middle because the vac had to go around a dog that could give zero fucks.

[ryan stewart]

It does great with furniture but make sure you get one of the smarter ones that has a "gentle" mode if you are worried about furniture legs. My first roomba eventually scarred up the bottoms of the legs of a couple of chairs that were veneer from constantly bumping it. The new Neatos dont do that, they like hover within a half-inch of everything and only occasionally bump things. You can actually see rings in the rug where it will go around a chair leg in a perfect circle.

[DETRoadster]

We have a Roomba that we love. its the higher end 800 series model but from maybe 6 years ago so I'm sure they have gotten better. Agreed with Ryan though, this utopian idea that the little robot servant will pop out of its charger and clean your home while you are away is BS. At least for us. We have to take a few minutes to "prep" the room before unleashing the vacuum. Once we do, we commonly then leave to go grocery shop or get coffee. But that initial prep is critical. Otherwise it will always get caught on something. We dont have kids or any real clutter. its just dumb stuff like the bath mat that it will roll up and get stuck on. Or a door that is 1/2 open it will slide past and into the room, then push the door closed and trap itself. Purse strps if my wife leaves hers on the floor. Oh, it also gets caught between the legs of our diningroom table chairs so we have to put those up. Its maybe 3 minutes of prep, but it's critical for our particular vac. Again, they may have gotten better.

Bottom line, if our dies we will 100000% get another.

[Lady Jane]

[ryan stewart]

Originally Posted by DETRoadster

We have a Roomba that we love. its the higher end 800 series model but from maybe 6 years ago so I'm sure they have gotten better. Agreed with Ryan though, this utopian idea that the little robot servant will pop out of its charger and clean your home while you are away is BS. At least for us. We have to take a few minutes to "prep" the room before unleashing the vacuum. Once we do, we commonly then leave to go grocery shop or get coffee. But that initial prep is critical. Otherwise it will always get caught on something. We dont have kids or any real clutter. its just dumb stuff like the bath mat that it will roll up and get stuck on. Or a door that is 1/2 open it will slide past and into the room, then push the door closed and trap itself. Purse strps if my wife leaves hers on the floor. Oh, it also gets caught between the legs of our diningroom table chairs so we have to put those up. Its maybe 3 minutes of prep, but it's critical for our particular vac. Again, they may have gotten better.

Bottom line, if our dies we will 100000% get another.

Thankfully mine doesnt take that much work. It does seem to not have an issue figuring out the dining room table. It would get itself "stuck" (not really but it would think it was stuck) under my office table but some sort of software update a few months ago stopped that.

Rugs I suspect YMMV. Mine has no issue with any of mine. Including those gel mats and the thick jute rug the motorcycle is on. My shower mat is like microfiber over memory foam and it has no issue with that but I do suspect if I let it in the toilet room it would probably roll up the super thick shag rug under the shitter. But really the only time its had an issue is when a rug wasnt flat, like sometimes my dog likes to lay next to one and she pushes her feet under it, rolling it under itself.

I think if its a tight-pile rug it can probably handle it but yeah those more shaggy style weaves might give it issues. Its funny because you can hear it turning the brush off and on going between the wood and rugs.

For the doors I am a fan of something like this: https://www.rejuvenation.com/catalog...EaAtBUEALw_wcB

If the door isnt closed its all the way open, against the wall, no longer have the vac locking itself in the guest bath.

[Dino GT]

We've had the iRobot Roomba for about 4 years now and it works great. We use it on the top floor only, that is all hardwood and approx. 1400 sq. ft. twice a week.
We don't have much clutter upstairs, and no pets, but it seems to detect the clutter pretty good. It gets all the dust pretty good.
The only downfall is that sometimes it gets stuck under the furniture for long periods of time and the battery will die before it makes it to it's home base.
They do have some that are designed for pet hair.
Bottom line is that the wife loves it, she says it helps her a lot.

[oVeRdOsE.]

iRobot are the iphone of vac; work fine, but overpriced.

I own a Deebot Ozmo 920 since 2.5 years, flawless I must say. Ozmo line up has been updated for better since then , I think they are called T8. Paid 620$ cad.

I had a Neato 1st gen, was good for the time, but no app, super loud , get stock.

Now with the Ozmo, I can watch TV, super silent.
I have black wood floor, and the mop DOES the job ! I ve upgrade the mop pad with better microfiber one, and damn it works.

App has it all : no go zone, no mop zone, 3 floors save, custom cleaning, no disturbing hours, schedule, alexa/google command.

3 step filter : mesh, foam, hepa.

Replacement parts are available for cheap (filters, brush, motos, mops, tanks, etc)

Nothing bad to say , even VacuumsWars put it in his 1st picks back when it was new.

You need to shop with this channel : https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCva...Td4wLwi9yKCtew

[infinitekidM2C]

I might get one of those things once i change my tile to hardwood downstairs. I bet it helps to keep the floors from getting all dusty. If i got one now, i bet it'd get all caught upon on the grout lines.

[2000cs]

We used to have a Samsung as recommended by a friend with shedding doggo, like we have. It got lost a lot, so we really didn’t use it until we emptied the house and put it up for sale. It was great for keeping the floor clean for potential showings while we lived away. Sold the Samsung after selling the house.

Here we have tile floors throughout and some area rugs. We use our old Miele canister mostly. The robots are no quieter and too much of a PITA with all the furniture and doorways.

If I had money to spend on bots right now, it would be a lawn mowing bot. But they have to come way down in price to justify on our wee little lawn. I did see a poop scooping bot the other day and that seemed promising, except for the part about cleaning it out. I wonder if we could take that on a walk with us and our doggie?

[ryan stewart]

Originally Posted by infinitekidM2C

I might get one of those things once i change my tile to hardwood downstairs. I bet it helps to keep the floors from getting all dusty. If i got one now, i bet it'd get all caught upon on the grout lines.

Mine has zero issue with the tile in my bathroom, and its the wide grout porous tile setup (aka rustic).

[infinitekidM2C]

Originally Posted by 2000cs

We used to have a Samsung as recommended by a friend with shedding doggo, like we have. It got lost a lot, so we really didn’t use it until we emptied the house and put it up for sale. It was great for keeping the floor clean for potential showings while we lived away. Sold the Samsung after selling the house.

Here we have tile floors throughout and some area rugs. We use our old Miele canister mostly. The robots are no quieter and too much of a PITA with all the furniture and doorways.

If I had money to spend on bots right now, it would be a lawn morning bot. But they have to come way down in price to justify on our wee little lawn. I did see a poop scooping bot the other day and that seemed promising, except for the part about cleaning it out. I wonder if we could take that on a walk with us and our doggie?

you your dog and your shitbot 2000

[///d]

Find something with room mapping and row-by-row cleaning. Lidar I think it's called is the laser mapping they use that can detect objects and such.

Whatever you do, stay away from Shark. I'm about to use mine for target practice. The software is full of bugs, the app is garbage, and their tech support is non-existent. When it does work it works well, but thats far and few between. Completely ignores no-go zones, get s confused and goes in a circle for 10 minutes, skips entire areas but does 4 passes through other areas, brushes are too short and don't reach edges. Unfortunately I bought it on a black friday sale through Amazon, but didn't get home until end of January so I was outside the 90 day return window by the time I was able to use it and find out it was garbage.

[M_Six]

I ended up getting a Roomba i3. We had a bunch of points on Amazon, so it ran me $150 out of pocket. Running it for the first time now. Once it develops a map, I take it it'll be a little more efficient? Seems to cover a lot of the same area now. Maybe it's just learning or creating a detailed map? It handled some transitions well and didn't get stuck under the sofa, so that's all good. Cats are interested in it but not terrified like they are with the regular vac. Another plus.

[oVeRdOsE.]

Originally Posted by M_Six

I ended up getting a Roomba i3. We had a bunch of points on Amazon, so it ran me $150 out of pocket. Running it for the first time now. Once it develops a map, I take it it'll be a little more efficient? Seems to cover a lot of the same area now. Maybe it's just learning or creating a detailed map? It handled some transitions well and didn't get stuck under the sofa, so that's all good. Cats are interested in it but not terrified like they are with the regular vac. Another plus.

imo, the value of a robot VS hand vacuum is the smart capability and no go zone.,

i3 is a dumb-ish robot, depends on your needs,
If you have a plain house, not much obstacle, then yes, good value.

[G35POPPEDMYCHERRY]

they SUCK

[M_Six]

It isn't that dumb. The latest update allows it to map rooms. If I can get it to just clean the living room and hallways, I'll be a happy camper. Seems to find its home base ok even though I had to relocate it. I wasn't about to spend $600-$900 on a super smart robo vac until this one proves (or disproves) the viability of a robo vac in our house.