Home > Consumer Reviews > iRobot Roomba Pro Intelligent Floorvac Robotic Vacuum

I have two kids, two indoor cats and a dog. "Roombie" is a life saver for me. I run him almost every day. He keeps the fur/hair/crumbs from getting out of control. The house is cleaned every other week with a real vacuum, but Roombie keeps it neat and tidy in between. I will admit that I spent about two weeks "Roomba proofing" my house and figuring out areas that he could clean in one run. I have a lot of Pergo and tile, but my bedrooms and family room are carpet. I did tape under the fringe on two rugs and replace two others with non-fringe rugs. I have three or four items per area that I pick-up before he runs (fragile statues, fringed throw rugs, a very long shag rug, etc,). Once I figured out what caused him problems it was easy. I am constantly amazed at the amount of hair and debris my Roomba picks up. He fits under several sections of the sectional and under beds(where one cat likes to sleep). He gets the corners amazing well. I have been VERY impressed. I start him before I leave for work, then plug him in when I get home. I think one of my cats thinks he's a playmate! We empty him after every cleaning and I clean his large brushes once a week. My only wishes are that 1) on large room setting he run until his battery dies and 2) the little rotating side brushes were replacable (mine are pretty beat up already). I LOVE my Roomba!

Even though there's a picture of a Dog on the box this machine will not work for that kind of Vacuuming. The long dog hairs just wrap around the beater brush and cause a big mess. Very little of the hair acually made it to the waste bin. If you don't mind dismantling the brushes every time that you use it, then i guess it would be OK. But be prepared for 15 minutes of disassemble and cleanup with each use.
The manufacturer needs to figure out how to transport long dog or cat hairs past the brush assembly. Until they do that i wouldn't buy this vacuum. And they should take the picture of the Dog (and the Dog hair on the carpet) off of the box.
Other than the hair problem, the unit seemed to work fairly well.

maybe a few models (and improvements) down the line. We'll see - I wanted so much for this to work out well for me, but after picking up all the cat toys and cords, moving all sorts of stuff out of the way, it still needed constant supervision just to do my 14'x 16' living room! The bottom of my sofa slopes down a bit in the back; my Roomba Pro Elite ran under the sofa, vacummed a few minutes, then got stuck; I had to lie down on the floor, shove it toward the front, then get down in front to pull it out. This was pretty difficult for me because I'm disabled ... which is why I was so hopeful about Roomba!

Then, it continued to get confused, stuck, etc. many more times during the process. It did pick up quite a lot, but since the dustbin thing is so small, it had to be emptied about four times (my floor had been vacuumed a week before). When it was finished (it missed quite a few areas, so I just drove it to those areas and used the Spot feature), I had to move everything back the way it was, retrieve and plug in lamp cords, etc., etc., etc. I was sweating gallons, more exhausted, achey, and in more pain than if I'd just gotten out my old vacuum cleaner and vacuumed the room myself! It took me four days to recuperate.

I have to say that if my floors were entirely tile or wood, the Roomba might have proved much more satisfying to me.

I packed it back up and am returning the Roomba, but I am still hopeful that someday I'll be able to buy a better Roomba, or a similar product that meets my needs.

I got my Roomba this week, and so far I've cleaned my living room/dining room floor (berber wall to wall carpeting) and my kitchen/hallway/powder room (laminate imitation 'hard wood'). I had vacuumed the day before with my upright vacuum cleaner, so I was surprised when the Roomba stopped part way through my carpeted living room/dining room. It beeped at me to tell me I needed to empty the dust bin - there was a lot of dirt there from my supposedly clean floor. It took running the Roomba three times until it could clean this 500 square foot area without stopping (and this third time, when it was done, the dust bin was nearly empty). (I expect I'll use the Roomba about once a week, since my job takes me out of town during the week - I used to vacuum about once a month with my upright, but this is SO EASY TO USE!!!)

The carpet and laminated flooring are three years old, and I'd never really noticed how much 'stuff' had accumulated in corners and along the edges of my two couches and my book shelves. When Roomba was done with cleaning, I didn't recognize my floors (they were so clean I thought I was in my daughter-in-law's mother's house - she's a cleaning fanatic.)

In addition to the bristled brush and a rubbery brush on the bottom of the Roomba there's this little wimpy-looking pair of little brushes that spin near the bumper on the Roomba - they look a little like the old-fashioned mascary brushes (but with softer bristles), and the 'handles' are rubber that's about the weight of a medium-heavy rubber band. I couldn't believe this could possibly help to clean around the edges of the wall and furniture - but the little spinning edge brushes 'sweep' debris stuck along the edges under the main brushes of the Roomba.

The battery charger that comes with the Roomba takes 12 hours to charge and will fun Roomba for 60-90 minutes, depending on the type of floor it's cleaning (I get about 70 minutes out of a 'full charge' on my berber carpeting, and 90 minutes on the laminated flooring.) BUT you can buy a separate 'rapid charger' accesory that will charge the battery in 2.5-3 hours. For me, with my 'only home on weekends' schedule, the rapid charger was something I NEEDED.

There's also a remote control unit - (the model I bought came with it, but it can be purchased separately.) I don't usually use 'remote controls' for anything, BUT... the Roomba can get 'stuck' in certain areas where it's hard to reach, and the Remote Control can be used to 'drive' the Roomba out of the 'stuck' places. (I have a very large marble end table in a corner where I have two large leather couches at right angles to each other, and I NEVER vacuumed under there because it was just too awkward to reach. My Roomba wandered under that table and just couldn't figure out how to get out again, so I crawled around on my hands and knees trying to reach the Roomba. THEN I looked at the remote control unit and the instructions and saw that I didn't need to crawl around if the Roomba got 'stuck').

Also, the RoombaVac web site sponsors a 'forum' for Roomba users - I've gotten lots of useful information from that 'foum'. For example, Roomba came with a pack of 3 filters, and I ordered another set of filters, figuring they'd need to be changed often. But a Roomba user posted today and said she's still using the same filter after more than 300 hours of cleaning - she takes it out and washes it in warm, soapy water whenever she empties the dust bin, and lets it dry while she's recharging the battery. So I guess I now have several years worth of filters!

I am VERY glad I got this Roomba!

I recently bought a Roomba Pro (the blue model) online. It was a total dud. It didn't do anything but drive forward, do a couple of circles, play a sad song, and stop. When I called the Roomba helpline they told me that there is a "problem" with the chargers on the Pro and Pro elite models. (You can actually go to www.roombavac.com to read about the charger problem.) I tried the rapid charger instead - which is supposed to fix the problem - but it didn't (Roomba also sent a charger patch which did not fix the problem either). Maybe there is something else wrong with the one I got. I really don't know if the faulty charger caused the problem I was having. Nevertheless, I returned it and went to Linens and Things to get the regular old silver model. It works perfectly and I am completely satisfied. The new features on the pro and pro elite models are just not worth the extra money and the headache caused by the whole charger problem. Stick with the old model. It is the same cleaner with a charger that works.