iRobot Roomba 770 Automatic Vacuum Cleaning Robot iRobot Roomba 770 Automatic Vacuum Cleaning Robot

Pros: Cleans better than you ever would, mostly

Cons: A bit noisy--run this only at night or when you are away

Other Thoughts: For me it works out to be the cost of a twice-a-month maid for a couple of months. I am surprised that more people do not own one. Just as you might have to move somethings out of the way for the maid, likewise you should probably pick up cables or papers off the floor that you don't want it to tangle with.

I bought this for my small office, and it really made the carpet look much better, more than I thought possible. I took it home, also, to try on hardwood floors, and it does a great job. It doesn't do inner corners very well, would be the only complaint. I wonder sometimes at its cleaning strategy, as it sometimes seems like it is going around the place randomly, but it eventually hits everything it can. Sometimes it spends too much time under beds or furniture, I think.

I am worried a bit about consumables, like how often I will have to change the brushes or filters, so I will have to see how that goes. I think the brush collects a lot of hair, but that is easier to clean out than a normal vacuum cleaner. Most of the parts seem pretty well designed, like the little black-and-white wheel that it uses to measure where it goes---- sometimes hair will trap around the axel for that, so it's easy to pop out, wipe off, and pop back in. Would be nice if it had a bigger "stomach" for the things it finds. I think the filters look like they COULD be made so that you could insert a paper filter within, but they're not. That is, on my regular vacuum, there is a filter that is made of some sort of tissue-like paper that I take out--- but on the roomba, it's two yellow box things that are made of plastic--- within those there's a bit of paper for the filter, so I think they should just let you swap out that paper but they don't.

I haven't had to use the "lighthouse" things that came with it, though maybe I should, as the roomba may get confused when it turns the corner to go down a hall.

I experimented with putting the roomba in a place where it couldn't find the power supply, and it cleaned the room, and then shut off after a while--- not sure how long it took, but I left it overnight and that was enough. It had enough juice to do it again before recharging. So it's possible, if you want, to buy one roomba, and have it charge and mostly clean one floor level, and then when you need to, take it upstairs or downstairs to the other level to clean without the power supply--- it will just do its duty and then shut off.

I wish it would do more things, like actually vacuum stairs, but that's pretty much impossible. I wish it were a little quieter, but leaving it running when you're not around is probably easy enough.

Pros: Looks nice

Cons: Does not work from the factory sealed box. I call to Roomba customer service they were nice and agreed to send a replacement BUT not a new one. So for the price of new I will get refurbished one. Way to go Roomba.