so this isn't exactly The Cutting Edge latest technology I mean the first
Roomba was introduced in 2002 and it's
now 2015 meaning I'm about 13 years late
to the party but I'm not convinced that everyone who is interested in a Roomba
already has one so this video is for people like me who put off trying one
for years because they saw the price of
what on the surface frankly looks like a silly Gadget compared to similar priced
Central Vac or portable vacuum cleaning systems from known Brands like Hoover
and Electrolux and just didn't have the stomach for it until now welcome to my
thoughts on owning the iroot Roomba 595 pet Edition now that I've had it for a
few months and if cleaning supplies aren't interesting to you don't worry I
think we've got something that is who makes the best PC stock cooler Intel or
AMD we'll find out but first this
so you can save on Intel 730 series ssds with instant rebates during president's
week February 22nd to March 1st 2015 click on my face to learn more now most
roombas have pretty similar features give or take some Advanced doodads here
or there so while the actual model that I got was a fairly obscure Costco
exclusive one here in Canada anyway most of what I'm saying will apply to all
modern fourth generation roombas in general except with like some extra bits
here and there so in the Box you get the Roomba itself a base station with an AC
power cord two virtual wallo dads um
this little red cleaning tool thing for the brushes and another one a couple
extras each of the side brushes filters bristle brushes and beater brushes the
last one just in case you can't find a broom in the big quidditch match is
coming up next Saturday anyway bad jokes aside the accessory package is actually
overall outstanding and even though Roomba is definitely going to bleed you
dry on overpriced Replacements through their store in the long run at least
they have the decency to keep you up and running for a reasonable period of time
before that becomes necessary and they offer some pretty tangible upgrade
options as well if you're looking to get a bit more performance or battery life
out of your device and of course third party options are out there if you want
to save a few bucks all right so let's do a quick tour of the device itself
these have come a long way since even the demos that I saw in my first year
attending CES back in the late 2000s on
the top is all the controls that you'll need buttons to set up scheduling that's
a cool feature of this particular pet friendly Model A spot button for when
you don't need to clean a whole room but you just want to do a deep clean in a
particular isolated spot a dock button to tell it to go dock itself to its
charging station a clean button which should be pretty self-explanatory it
sprays water out the top of the unit Beday style and you kind of squat over
it to no that's not what happens it starts a cleaning cycle for the Roomba
to go around the I mean did you really believe that man I should come up with some other nonsense to tell you how
about this one the dirt detect light illuminates to tell you the Roomba
detected dirt wait that that's actually what that does it cleans a little
heavier when it detects dirt or something hitting some kind of sensor
cool also on the top is the big red button to access the replace filter and
to dump out the dirt canister there are speaker holes for the tones that the
Roomba uses along with the error code display to tell you stuff like hey I'm
done hey I'm getting started hey charge the bloom and Battery you fart lad uh
much more politely than that of course at the front we find the infrared sensor
for the virtual wall units that sends out beams telling the Ruma not to cross
them though frankly my wife found it was less work to close doors or find some
random boxes to put in its way than to use these as as well as a physical
bumper that tells the Roomba when it's hit a wall or other solid object then if
we flip it over there are four infrared sensors for Edge detection to keep your
fancy Gadget from flinging itself over a cliff like the rest of the Lemmings and
while we're down here there are the charging contacts a Caster wheel the
little brush that is needed to grab debris away from the edges around walls
and Corners thanks to the roomba's round shape a couple super grippy Drive wheels
and the beater and brush spinning pieces that are actually responsible for
removing hair and dirt from the floor to be sucked up but that's all fine and
good in theory how well does the darn thing work great question in some
respects really well in spite of all the drop offs in my house the Roomba has
never fallen down for me and it does anywhere from an 80 to 90% job of
cleaning most of the hallways and rooms in my house it's actually a very
impressive little piece of technology but there are some drawbacks to the
experience as well the preparation for rooming is a bit more involved than just
kind of grabbing a hose and then like going to town going under things and all
that kind of stuff you got to set up your barricades position it then come
back to it when it's ready for the next task that and the roomba's approach to
room cleaning especially if your rooms contain a lot of furniture and other
obstacles feels a touch on the random side and even though it actually
eventually seems to get pretty good coverage it takes a really long time
much longer than it would take you to do it yourself manually but lonus I think
you're missing the point you don't have to be actively vacuuming so that's where
the time savings comes in and yeah it is but there are some other things that
weigh into it for me I mean for one thing the noise of the room it makes is kind of annoying not as bad as a as a
standalone vacuum cleaner but having it running for extended periods of time
does bother especially my cats and for another the darn thing gets stuck on or
fails to clean enough things in my house like this black bordered rug that it
refuses to go onto but won't stay inside
if I start on top of it that I have to check on the Roomba periodically and so
while I can do other things while it's cleaning I can't go too far away or
it'll often end up sitting there doing nothing it also requires some things
that my central vacuum system doesn't more upkeep as far as replacement parts
is concerned very frequent emptying of the Dust chamber about once per room
charging so it can be used only for about one or two rooms per charge before
you either have to pick up your base station and put it in the roomat
cleaning so that it can dock to it when it's done something that's a bit of a pain since the cord for it is so bulky
and actually kind of gets in the way of cleaning near the station or pick the
Roomba up and take it back to the base station but I guess the bottom line is
this am I going to keep it I paid for it am I going to keep it and continue to
use it or not and the answer is that while the price tag for what is
effectively a cleaning accessory that does not replace a normal vacuum is um
pretty high and I'm not actually the ideal customer for the Roomba folks with
smaller single story dwellings with fewer obstacles or this Baby's
wheelhouse since it can't clean things like uh a sunken living room or stairs
um and it's just kind of set and forget um I still plan to continue to use it
and I do plan to keep it I mean if the whole house needs to be cleaned it is
still more efficient to just grab a vacuum and do it properly uh it'll be
more thorough and you know it that needs to be done periodically anyway just to
get under things like tables that the Roomba can't access but the thing about
the Roomba is that if you make it part of your daily habit it definitely does a
great job of dramatically decreasing the
required frequency of proper cleanings as long as you're willing to accept a
few plant casualties along the way
speaking of plant casualties xplit that live streaming software that we use for
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