What brand should I get? She wants one that goes back to the station to empty itself and charge up. Anything I should avoid?

Thanks.

We have a Eufy 11s, it has been good. It doesn't empty itself however. I also like that it doesn't upload maps of the house to the mothership like Roomba.

Which of the available models handle pet riders the best?

Depends if your pets are in the house overnight...

Ours is a Neato, about 3 years old & still going great.
All hardwood floors, with 1 large area rug.

Usually has to recharge once & i dump the box while it's charging.
We have a border collie mix, so a fair bit of pet hair to collect.

We have had one for a few years and several family members have them.

They do not work as well as a good upright vacuum cleaner.

quote:

Originally posted by .38supersig:
Depends if your pets are in the house overnight...

These things need an SSS*


* Shit Shutdown Sensor

We recently replaced our carpet in the living room and hallway with LVP and, due to having a dog, I was dry mopping a couple times a day to keep up with the fur. Having had a poor experience with a Roomba about 15 years ago I was hesitant to get another robotic vacuum. Since Costco has a pretty good return policy and after watching numerous reviews I ended up buying a ECOVACS DEEBOT T8 AIVI Vacuuming and Mopping Robot with Auto-Empty Station.

We've had it about a month now and I'm pretty impressed with it so far. It maps the floor and detects obstacles and has the ability to add virtual boundaries (I had a couple of spots where it would get stuck, adding a virtual boundary resolved that). I have it scheduled to vacuum every night after we typically go to bed for each area that has LVP including the (low pile) area rugs. I don't use it in the bedrooms as they are carpeted (I know some people use them on carpet, but I prefer a full sized vacuum for that).

You do need to keep up with the maintenance. I clean the filters once a week, make sure the sensors aren't coated with dust and the beater bar is reasonably clean.

I'd rate the mopping feature as fair, but that's not the reason I purchased this model. The phone app could be better, but overall we're pretty happy with the performance. I picks up an amazing amount of dog hair and the self emptying station works well.


Let me know if you have any specific questions.

quote:

Originally posted by SW_Sig:
We have had one for a few years and several family members have them.

They do not work as well as a good upright vacuum cleaner.

I don’t think they are intended to.

We have the cheapest Cordey brand it was like $75 on Primeday.
It has no fancy features. It runs once a day at 1:30 in the afternoon while we are gone.
I empty the bin when I walk in the door. We have a dog. I have to say I bought it not expecting much at all but have been very impressed.
They do make a big fancy one that empties itself into a bin that you have to empty eventually.
But it is bulky and can’t be hidden easily.
Ours lives under the buffet in the dining room and you would never know it was there.

I've bought two off Woot, both Roomba models, kiddos have other brands. The newer Roombas are really good.

Basset Hounds like to shed, a lot, this thing picks up lots of hound hair, dust, ect, we have wood floors and tile. It does good on the area rugs.

My vote is the Roomba on Woot.

We have no pets and the wife just wants it to clean up the dirt and grass I track in in between weekly cleaning. All hardwood on the main floor.

Two NEATO Botvacs. The first one I paid for with a 20% coupon at BB&B. Second one was sent for free from NEATO to test and review. Both are still working very well.

I know it's not your question, but my wife loves--loves!--the Dyson V8 Animal I bought at the recommendation of a previous thread on that topic. It's just the ticket for quick pickup after tracking in something IMO.

quote:

Originally posted by sjtill:
I know it's not your question, but my wife loves--loves!--the Dyson V8 Animal I bought at the recommendation of a previous thread on that topic. It's just the ticket for quick pickup after tracking in something IMO.

We have a Dyson V8. It’s really nice.

If you have pets that crap in the house, you need more training before a robot vacuum goes to work in you house. However,the Neato works great and they back up their warranty.

quote:

Originally posted by mark123:
We have no pets and the wife just wants it to clean up the dirt and grass I track in in between weekly cleaning. All hardwood on the main floor.

Should work really well, it's good at picking up whatever is around on the floor, dust, dander, dog hair, cat hair, and it gets under furniture, beds etc While we were changing out the floors in the house noticed quite a bit of dust and hair around the house without it running

It's hard to go wrong these days. Right now I have two Roomba's. I also had a Neato XV-14 for 7 years. One Roomba for 10 which I am still using and another I just got this year on prime day. I've heard good things about Eufy as well.

We just got the RoboRocks S5 Max and love it. It doesn’t have an auto empty station but that brand does have a line that will provide you with that feature. Not inexpensive, though.

Look up Vacuum Wars on YouTube where he does a good job at objectively pitting vacuums against other brand and measure things like suctioning power, battery life, vacuuming ability, etc.

quote:

Originally posted by choang3:
We just got the RoboRocks S5 Max and love it. It doesn’t have an auto empty station but that brand does have a line that will provide you with that feature. Not inexpensive, though.

Look up Vacuum Wars on YouTube where he does a good job at objectively pitting vacuums against other brand and measure things like suctioning power, battery life, vacuuming ability, etc.

The S6 is the only one on Sam's Club's app that had 5 stars but it and the S5 are both out of stock. The added mopping ability sounds like a great feature. Thanks for the YouTube suggestion.

Oh, the S7 has the self-emptying feature.

We have the Roomba that maps itself so to keep it from going over same area over and over. We like that we can control it via Android phone. We should have gotten the one that self emptied. We got that version for good friends of ours and they absolutely LOVE IT. John.