I've bought a pet. *My* kind of pet.
I bought a Roomba.
I'm up early, but it's a Sunday morning, so I'm doing a digital detox, so I've got some time, and I've decided to let the Roomba run while I get some reading done. I wanted to read in The Chair. However, on the first run (which I allowed it to do while I headed out), the Roomba decided that it was on a cliff (and reported that over the app), and quit. The Chair has a rather thick power cord, and the Roomba tripped over that. I have figured out a way to keep the cord off the ground and still plugged in, but it's not a setup that I can leave all the time so it means that I have to plug and unplug the chair if I'm going to use the Roomba. And it also means that I basically have to leave the chair unplugged if I'm going to run the Roomba at random times. A bit of an annoyance. It is annoying how much picking up you have to do in preparation for a Roomba run. There is, of course, the breaking of the caroler figurine, and it has also knocked over a picture that was leaning against a wall while waiting to be mounted. (There's a folding step-stool leaning against a wall that it knocks over on a regular basis.) I'm also concerned about anything left on any of the lighter tables, and I'm aware of any chords or anything else that would normally be on the floor, and how well tucked away they are.
The second run of the Roomba was significantly more effective, in terms of not getting itself stuck in areas, but it still seems to rely pretty heavily on "random walk." Fortunately I don't have an Alexa, so the Roomba is not reporting to Amazon the dimensions of my home.
Just now the Roomba got stuck under a chair, and took about twenty tries, and a couple of minutes, to get itself out.
I find that it is surprisingly noisy in operation, although not as loud as other types of vacuum cleaners. That's mostly on a bare floor: on carpet, it's a lot quieter.
I finally figured out how to open an empty the dirt trap but I will have to see what I can find in the way of instructions for how to clean the various parts, which seems to have to be done on a pretty regular basis. There is a suggestion that some of the parts need to be replaced on a fairly regular basis, and I'm not quite sure what how I'm going to do any of that, since this model seems to have been discontinued by iRobot. And I'm not absolutely sure what model it is, because the box said 691, but the app reports 675. (The iRobot Website provides pretty much zero help.)
After six runs, the Roomba had not still not been able to find its home again, even when it reported, by the app, that it was low on battery and therefore returning home, or was paused, via the app, and, by the app, commanded to return home. In one instance, when commanding the Roomba to return home, it did seem to seek in the general area of home, but then gave up.
So I did some more research. And found, via other channels (definitely not on iRobot's Website), that the placement of the homes/docking/charging station is quite important. Roomba's tend to home in on home via an infrared signal. Therefore, the Roomba should have a clear view of the infrared signal, and, therefore, furniture should not be around the Roomba docking/charging station. Some sites specify that there should be half a meter clearance to either side of the docking station, and a meter and a half clearance in front. I am experimenting with placement of the docking station, since I don't have an abundance of bare walls, without furniture, with electrical outlets, as places to create a home nest for the Roomba, and for no other purpose. My initial test is going to be slightly behind a large chair, but with a couple of clear paths to get to, and or see, the docking station for the infrared signal. I'll see how well that goes. I do have another option, with greater clearance in front, although with less clearance to one side. We'll give it a few test runs and see how it goes. (Having given it a few more runs, it can find it's way home when you command it to, if you make sure it has at least ten minutes of charge left, but it took it a long time to be able to dock itself when it decides it's getting low on battery.) (After about a dozen runs, it *did* finally find it's way back on its own before the battery ran out, but then failed on the next couple of runs. When it finally did it a *second* time, I kind of felt like I should feed it a dust bunny or something as positive reinforcement or a reward ...)
I can probably, in ten minutes, pick up more dirt and dust with the Dyson, than the Roomba does in an hour of random operation. There doesn't seem to be any particular point in letting the Roomba run every day. It doesn't seem to pick up that much dirt, unless it's been left, for a while, to accumulate. I also find that the floor does have visible items on it, although I can't say, for certain, that this is immediately after a Roomba run. But, at the moment, having a Roomba seems to be of more value for the entertainment, then for cleaning purposes. (My little brother and his wife found it fascinating.) (And so did my great-grandson: he was absolutely enthralled, and, whenever it went under a couch would get down on the floor, look for it, and call to it :-) (And watching the Roomba making *really* bad decisions about which way to go next can make you feel oddly better about how well/poorly you are doing with your own problems ... :-)
Having to leave the house Roomba proof (very similar to kid proofing a house), if you want to run the Roomba at random times, or, alternatively, picking up loose items, and ensuring that there is nothing that the Roomba can knock over, before you set it loose, does reduce the cleaning convenience value.
The Roomba also seems to have a predilection 1) for the living room, and 2) for getting underneath things. It seems to want to spend time under the couches, under the big chair, or under the bed either in the master bedroom, or in the spare bedroom. Since all of these items have dust skirting around them, allowing the Roomba to spend time under them doesn't seem useful in terms of cleaning utility.
There seems to be another "pet-like" aspect to the Roomba: while I was working on a fairly complicated piece of work, the Roomba was in my office for probably the entire half hour, and, every time it left, came back in again ...
Then again, every couple of days I can just let it run, and ignore it, and it does pick up *something*, so ...
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