Comment by dvcrn | Hacker News Reader

Comment by dvcrn | Hacker News Reader

I was in the market for a robot vacuum and went with iRobot over Xiamoi/Roborock or Neato, to a big part because of their stance to privacy, but also because of things like they stopping military robots to focus on the consumer markets, embracing 'hackers' with the create robots and their patented dual rubber brush design that's in most of their robots.

The product that I use right now, the i7+ (bought a 960 first and returned it) has been pretty fantastic. It feels like an actual smart automatic cleaning system that takes care of my place and cleans itself with the station that came with it.

Tech wise - other products use Lidar so they can run in the dark and create the map much faster and more accurately than vSlam that my Roomba uses, so that'd be a nice thing to have but I don't really run it in the dark anyway.

The Roomba exceeded my expectations so much that I went and bought their cheapest dumb mopping robot, the Braava 240 and even though it doesn't have smart navigation or maps, it's great. Just fill it up, put it in the corner, press start and it'll mop everywhere.

In total I spent a lot more money than I wanted to spend but my place has never been cleaner. No more cat hair or dust bunnies flying around, no crumbs in my carpet, I sneeze much less, everything gets mopped regularly, and for the roomba all I have to do is change the dust bag in the station once in a while (besides occasional cleaning of parts). If either of them breaks I would without hesitation re-buy them.

I'm excited to see what they'll come up with next, but I also hope they won't get left behind with innovation and tech. The others (esp Roborock) iterate much faster, cost less and pack more features that often get rolled out to their older robots as well (no-go zones for example. iRobot didn't add them to their older camera-based robots like the 960 and kept them for i7 and higher)

I have a similar combination, the i7 with a 240, and I also think they're great. I can't even remember life before daily automatic floor cleanings. I think you're right about iRobot's competition iterating more quickly, and I'm also concerned that they might get left behind. Another concern is their pricing. They're clearing trying to establish their robots as the premium models in the market space—ones that "just work"—but the price tags are astronomical. Their two flagship models, which were advertised as working best in tandem, cost nearly $2,000 together when they were first released.

Yes -- pricing. Just for reference, the i7+ costs 140.000 yen here in Japan, that's $1300 USD, while the competition costs the same as everywhere else. In the US the same product costs $700 and often has some discounts available. (I just imported mine because I ain't gonna pay that much). It's also currently 'sold out' on their JP online store.

> I went and bought their cheapest dumb mopping robot, the Braava 240 and even though it doesn't have smart navigation or maps

IIRC that one is based on the Mint floor cleaner they bought several years ago, and does actually do basic mapping, using wheel rotations to measure distance instead of something like lidar.

(I have one of the original Mints from before iRobot bought them, though I've not really used it since getting a Neato)

no i think the one op is referring to is a new development.

The first time I saw a "self-emptying" Roomba station, I thought it was something you plug into your central vac outlet. Is there a reason we don't have that yet?

> into your central vac outlet.

Is that something common? Never seen that, never heard of it, had to google to find out what it is. Maybe that's more of an US(?) thing and too specific?

It exists, but it's not that common. My uncle (in Belgium) had one in his house in the nineties, with mixed opinions. Every x years there's some hype around central vacuum cleaner systems in the building industry, but the excitement is always short lived: no matter the improvements, it's still vacuuming. And most people don't like to do that very often.

I also have a robot + mop combo from iRobot and it’s pretty good. Mine’s the more entry level vacuum without SLAM but it’s good enough. If/when it dies I’ll upgrade.

My i7 seems to work well enough in dark (but that was after it mapped the house)

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