does anyone have a roombah vacuum?

[mopinko]

how do you like it?

[xmas74]

1. Nope.

All hardwood floors.
A friend's husband purchased one(the "cool toy" factor). She's not impressed. She said that it doesn't pull up as much dirt as an old canister that she bought at a rummage sale 10 years ago.

[mopinko]

4. i have no carpets, either.

i still have dirt, tho. maybe your friend is prejudiced against hubby toys?

[xmas74]

7. She said that it didn't work as well as items that were

a lot cheaper and that she did not recommend it. I can see her point. Why spend a ton of money on something when there is a much cheaper option out there just because it's "cool"?
Her hubby just doesn't like to get up for any reason and thought this was a good way to get out of doing housework. They live on a gravel road in the country and things constantly need to be swept and vacuumed. She said that it just didn't work as well(and she was more than willing to give it a chance). She could still see dust on the floors and the vacuum picked up a lot more dirt.

[mopinko]

10. i don't want it because it is cool. i want it because it would

save time. and work. i am so domestically challenged. i don't care if there is a little dust. it can only be better than it is now.

[xmas74]

13. If cleaning's not your thing

then anything would be better. My best friend is the kind of woman who wants to be able to eat off of her floors. Every time I'm at her house I get suckered into helping her clean(she never sits down). She also grabs some vinegar and a rag the moment she enters my house and starts cleaning. She's not insulting me-she just knows that I do it all alone, she hates to sit for too long and figures why not do two things at once. She visits and cleans at the same time.

[mopinko]

28. i'm pming you my phone number

pass it along to your friend, k?

[xmas74]

33. That would make her happy.

But our deal is that she will clean and I'm supposed to bake a few things for her to take home and freeze. She can't bake.

[mopinko]

35. oh, man

i wish i lived close enough to really do that. i would bake her anything that her little heart desired. i suspect she would faint dead away when she walked in my door, tho.

[xmas74]

38. She's used to it./

I visit her and I get into a baking and casserole frenzy, just for her. I stock up her upright freezer w/ casseroles and baked goods and she's the happiest woman on the face of the earth.
She loves that her MIL thinks she makes everything from scratch.

[RebelOne]

2. Doesn't seem as if any one does.

I'd be curious to know also because I have been considering buying one.

[ET Awful]

3. There was a thread about them a month or so ago

I know there were some people here who really liked them, I just don't remember who.

Personally, I want to buy a Dyson :P Not only do they really suck (I mean that as a positive thing) but they have such funky colors :evilgrin:

[mopinko]

5. yeah, dysons are da bomb, i hear.

my daughter wants one real bad. she says they use them in horse barns, which is a real acid test. but you still have to push it around, which is the part i am trying to avoid, see. given a choice between a perfect job and an easy job, i am the easy one.

[ET Awful]

6. Overstock.com has a good price on the Roomba Discovery

It's a refurbished model, but an excellent price: http://www.overstock.com/cgi-bin/d2.cgi?page=proframe&prod_id=1797797

[mopinko]

9. i'm reluctant to buy this online.

fry's has it for a little more than that. $230, i think it was. i can see it needing service, so i like to buy things like that local. fry's is a hike for me, but not out of the question.

[xmas74]

8. I want a Dyson too, as does my

friend who owns a Roomba. I have hardwood floors but I do have some area rugs that could use a good vacuum(compared to the one I own now).

[ET Awful]

11. They Dyson might just eat the area rug and go lookin for desert

:P

[xmas74]

14. I've heard they are very good.

I have a dog that constantly sheds, no matter how often she is groomed(brushed twice a day on average). And she has wiry hair so it seems to get stuck in the rugs and regular vacs don't do a good job of picking it up. I get down on my hands and knees at least twice a week w/ an old rug brush and forcefully brush it up, then vacuum.
I'd like to have something that works well enough that I no longer have to do this anymore. My knees are killing me!

[Xithras]

18. I have a Dyson now, it's the greatest thing ever.

I have a Dyson Ball Allergy, the white hypoallergenic model that's apparently only available at Costco. I can honestly say that owning a Dyson will physically nauseate you. Not because there's anything wrong with them, but because the first time you use it you'll be disgusted by the amount of dirt it pulls up. I used my Roomba and Hoover regularly before getting my Dyson and I'd have sworn that my carpets were cleaned, but I had to empty the bucket FOUR TIMES the first time I vacuumed with the Dyson because it kept pulling so much junk out of the carpet.

The Ball is incredibly cool to work with and, once you get the hang of it, cuts your vacuuming time by a third. Since I can ALSO push a button and turn the beaters off, it's replaced my broom for the hardwood floors too :D

[politicat]

12. We have one. It scares the cats.

(Which is just a benefit!)

It works great on the hardwood floors and on the low-profile rugs and floorcloths. It does not work well at all on DH's big, thick, tall rug in his office. We have to shake that one and beat it.

If you have really heavy, thick carpet, it's not for you. But if you need it the way we do - to take the place of dust mopping and such - it's fabulous.

[mopinko]

37. i wonder what the dogs will do.

i have three little terriers, and i suspect they will do a lot of barking. i just hope they do not attack. when the three of them put their minds to it, they can do a lot of damage. if they get the boxer in on the act, i may be in trouble.

[RebelOne]

15. There is now also a Scooba.

It mops floors. Check it out on SharperImage.com. But the price is $399. A little too steep for me.

[mopinko]

31. oh, man

you opened a whole can of worms. i just went to the company website, and i am now hopelessly confused. all the bright, shiny things......

[SpeedwayDemocrat]

16. Consumer Reports didn't like them...

From their February 2004 review...

"FANCY FOOTWORK? Because the Roomba lacks a hose, you’ll need something else to clean edges and corners. -snip-
What the Roomba doesn’t have is great performance. It’s certainly no replacement for a regular vacuum, as we found when we tried the Roomba Pro Elite, $250, a recent addition to a line that includes the basic Roomba and Roomba Pro. In tests using fine sand scattered evenly over an 8x8-foot corral, the Roomba picked up most of the sand, as did a low-priced standard vacuum cleaner. Although the Roomba required no human touch, it did require far more time (25 minutes vs. 3). And on carpets, it didn’t deep-clean the way most vacuums would.
-snip-
In a room with both area rugs and bare floor, the Roomba may not be able to climb back onto a rug once it cha-chas onto the floor. Our Roomba bounced off the edge of a rug as if it were a wall and sometimes became tangled in a rug’s fringe...The bottom line. The Roomba cleans uncluttered bare floors, but even some cheap vacuums outperform it on both floors and carpets."

[Xithras]

17. I had one.

Not bad overall, but don't expect miracles. They really just take the dirt off the surface, so they work well for hardwood or lightly used rooms, but wont cut it for heavy traffic areas or if you have kids that track a lot of dirt inside (like I do). Mine was also extremely loud, much louder than I expected.

I ended up buying a Dyson and selling my Roomba to a single, childless friend for $100. The Roomba is great at picking up his cats hair, and he thinks its the greatest invention ever. He hasn't had to pull out his full sized vacuum since I sold it to him, which was 4-5 months ago.

So my answer is basically this: The Roomba does a fantastic job cleaning the kinds of light dirt it was developed to handle. If animal hair and dust are your biggest problems, it will work wonderfully. If you need something a bit more robust, it's probably not the vacuum for you.

[tigereye]

19. as nice as it would be not to have to actually vacuum

manually, sounds like this thing doesn't really have the goods.

[sshaw1980]

20. if ya want an excellent vacuum get a

kirby...

it will cost you though but will outlive you... if you do need maintenance they
are easily fixed... you can even get re-builds at slightly reduced costs...

they even have transmissions and propel themselves, you just guide the thing...

my parents kirby is 45 years old and works like new... mine is 20 years old and
also works like new...

go to epinions.com and read the reviews on kirby...

the roombah is a toy, your better off with a regular vacuum...

[xmas74]

21. Welcome to DU!

[ContraBass Black]

23. My parents' 26 year old kirby died recently.

But the new ones don't appear to be of the same quality.

[sshaw1980]

24. get it refurbished

cost will be about $100 to $150 and it will be like new...

the newer ones contain some more plastic than the older one's which
are all metal parts...

but it's still one of the best vac's out there...

[ContraBass Black]

25. We've already replaced it

But we still use it as a buffer.

[mopinko]

26. i have an industrial canister, and an oreck scrubber.

kirby's are good. but i coughed for an industrial canister a few years ago. it was worth every dime. i have beaten the snot out of several vaccums. i am underwhelmed with the oreck, although i like it better now that i cut the stupid ass circuit breaker off the cord. it went off every 3 minutes, until is got tired, then it went off every 3 seconds. i sent one back, had a loaner from the store, then got my replacement, and they all had the problem. so i just attacked that sucker.

[commander bunnypants]

22. love mine

Its great if you have cats that explode fur on a daily basis

CB

[mopinko]

27. i have dogs, but

i only allow short haired, short tailed dogs. been down that hairy road. had enough.
does it pick up little crap, like bird seed?

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

29. Hilarious description of interaction between Roomba and cats:

http://www.earlygirl.com/roombaloo.shtml

[Robb]

30. I've had one about a year, and I adore it!

I've raved to the Lounge before about it. Yes, don't expect miracles, but it does nicely with wood floors (which I hate to vacuum with a regular machine) and it goes under beds and a lot of furniture.

It's a pain to empty and clean, but arguably less time spent doing that than vacuuming would've cost ya.

Something nice about a lot of random dirt and crumbs and stuff on the floor when you leave the house that's gone when you come home. :)

[democracyindanger]

32. Gave one as a wedding present to my brother

Doesn't work well with tasseled area rugs.

[mopinko]

36. there are no tassles in my house anywhere.

or area rugs, either. i am allergic to frue-frue of any kind.

[latebloomer]

34. My mom loves hers

but she's a sucker for any kind of gadget.

I'm not really sure how well it works.