Roomba Red Review

The following is my original review for the Roomba Red in September 2005 which I posted on Amazon.com. Though this is several years old, many retailers continue to sell the original roomba series (including the red) so the review is still valid. I recently purchased the latest Roomba model (the 500 series) and my review for this model can be found here:

http://hubpages.com/hub/Roomba-510-Review

I bought this Roomba because like everyone else the idea of having a little robotic vacuum do the work for me was just too good to pass up. The little Red Roomba worked very well for the first 3 days and then it quit... it would just go around in circles.

I returned the original purchase and came home with another because I was addicted to having this little guy run around the house sucking up all the dirt for me. It did not last... after 1 week this one did the same thing. Both times I followed the directions on the Roomba chat groups and tried to clean the blocked wheel sensor (there is an optical sensor in the wheel assembly that, when blocked by dust or dirt, causes the roomba to spin around in circles). I also called up the irobot customer support and they ran through a diagnostic procedure with me that showed it was the wheel sensor... I did what the support technician told me and blew compressed air on the wheel sensor only to have the roomba work for about 10 minutes before doing the "circle dance" again. After calling the support technician again she advised me to take it back to Target because they were on back order at irobot.

Once again I returned the Roomba and picked up another one... this was going to be me last try. Again it worked for about 2 weeks and after that KAPUT... the circle of death was back and my experience with Roomba was over. I returned it for a refund and bought the Hoover Empower from Amazon... a great vac that won't ever do the circle dance.... unless of course the sensors built into my legs ever get dust on them.

- you have to remove obstacles that might otherwise get the roomba stuck

- although it is bagless, the filters in the roomba have to be replaced about once ever 1-2 months

- it takes several hours to fully charge and the charge will drain pretty quickly if you have high carpet (although for the most part it will be able to finish average sized houses without a problem)

- cleaning the roomba is a bit of a chore. It seems like the time you save by not having to vacuum the floor, you end up using that time to clean out the roomba. You have to take apart the brush and a few other pieces to fully clean the Roomba and keep it running well.

- it takes much longer to vacuum a room then a normal manual vacuum would so it is not good for those last minute cleanups before guests arrive.

- THE WHEEL SENSOR PROBLEM IS TOO COMMON AND FREQUENT AND PREVENTS THIS FROM BEING AN EXCELLENT PRODUCT.

- Good cleaning despite its small size

- totally automatic and is actually kind of fun to watch as it cleans

- has a sensor that tells it when it goes over an area with a lot of dirt so it just keeps going over that area until it is clean

- much less noise then a normal vacuum.

- can clean underneath furniture and beds

- comes with a "virtual wall" that you can use to block it from going into unwanted areas

Please make sure you do your homework and go to some Roomba user forums and check out the complaints that other users have before buying it. It appears that most users do have the blocked wheel sensor problem and this is a serious flaw in this product. Although a lot of workarounds have been posted... they all entail opening up the roomba and cleaning out the sensor directly... this will void your warranty. If Irobot can fix the wheel sensor problem this would be an excellent product but until then you are better off with manual vacuum.

UPDATE: This review was based on my experience with the Roomba Red Discovery model in April-May 2005. Apparently there is a new model that has been released as of June called version 2.1. Hopefully this new version has the wheel sensor problem addressed... make sure you check with some of the user forums to see if things are better... and if you do buy make sure you get the new model with the upgrades because a lot of vendors still carry the older models!!

As of mid 2007, Irobot released the successor to the original discovery roomba line. This is the 500 series of Roomba which includes the 510, 535, 530, and 570 just to name a few. These are all essentially the same robots just with different features enabled. I will test a new 510 and post a new hub outlining the differences between the original and the updated model along with a full review of the new cleaner.