As much as I tried to ignore this thread, I kept returning to it. End result... I just ordered myself the Roomba i7+. We'll see what the cats think of this.
Well, I’m on day 2 of my new iRobot Roomba. I named it Hazel. She is a i7+ model.
I must say that I’m quite impressed and very happy. Yesterday, for the first pass, Hazel mapped out the house while cleaning. However, she “completed” the job without fully going down a hall and finding 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms. I was a little concerned. However, today, I ran her again and she re-did what she found yesterday plus got brave and ventured down the hall into the other rooms.
I’m quite happy with the cleaning quality. I’m not one who regularly vacuumed prior to this. Maybe once a month if I was lucky. So, during this first pass, Hazel had to work pretty hard. I also have 2 cats, so there was hair to be found.
I did prep the house a little to remove shoes, cat toys, electric wires, etc. But nothing outrageous.
I think I’ll have her clean part of the house every couple days. A couple of my rooms are low traffic areas and I have a couple obvious high traffic areas. So I think I’ll use the phone app to create some custom areas in the map to focus on as needed most.
The cats are apprehensive, but didn’t freak out. Hazel is not as loud as I expected when cleaning. When she empties the dirt into the base, she is as loud as my old vacuum for a few seconds. So not bad.
I spent much of the running time watching the job this first time to better understand how Hazel works. Being a former computer guy at my job, I’m quite fascinated by the algorithm she follows to get the job done. She’s quite geometrical based and somewhat predictable after studying how she works. Very cool.
Hazel is currently resting (and recharging). She has about 15 minutes more to finish the house.
I don’t currently have any regrets with the $625 purchase.
