The rise in sales of robotic vacuum cleaners clearly hints that sooner or later you will wonder:
1. Type of cleaning of the robot vacuum cleaner
Robot vacuum cleaners are divided into three classes based on typecleaning: some can only do dry cleaning, others only wet cleaning, and still others can do both. Which type is best to choose? As when choosing any other equipment, it is worth remembering that universal devices are always a compromise solution. Gadgets with a narrower specialization will always cope with their tasks better. This is especially true for wet cleaning, where a specialized robot floor polisher will always do a better job than its universal counterpart, which, in essence, only wipes the floor with a damp cloth. In this case, he can, for example, stain a white carpet by driving onto it while performing a task. In general, in practice, it makes sense for owners of large houses and apartments to think about automating wet cleaning. In this case, it makes sense to buy a separate device. Buyers of universal vacuum cleaners stop using the wet cleaning function after 3-4 times (it becomes too troublesome from the point of view of servicing the robot, especially if the apartment is not large). Therefore, in the vast majority of cases, a vacuum cleaner designed for dry cleaning only will suit you.
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2. What area is the robot vacuum cleaner designed for?
The second important question to answerbefore buying a robot vacuum cleaner: for what area is a robot vacuum cleaner needed? A simple vacuum cleaner can handle an ordinary one-room apartment. In this case, buying an expensive model will not provide any tangible benefits. But for cleaning houses with a couple of floors or 3-4 room apartments, you will need more complex equipment: battery life, mapping technology, the ability to remember the arranged furniture and the point to which you need to return after recharging in order to continue will also be important. cleaning. Simply put, the larger your apartment, the more sophisticated a robot vacuum cleaner needs to be to handle your cleaning needs.
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3. What kind of brushes do vacuum cleaners have and why are they better suited
The roller brush is the main element of cleaning anyrobot vacuum cleaner. They come in three types - with bristles, rubber and combined. Obviously, rubber brushes are better at removing small debris and pet hair, so they are preferable. But only iRobot's Roomba vacuum cleaners use two brushes at once (their brand name is Multi-Surface Brushes). Both brushes rotate towards each other, creating a broom and dustpan effect. Which, of course, has a good effect on the quality of cleaning.
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4. Does the vacuum cleaner have a HEPA filter?
Today it seems obvious, but the cheapestrobotic vacuum cleaner models do not have such an important component as a HEPA filter. HEPA stands for High Efficiency Particulate Air and is translated into Russian as a high efficiency air filter. Such filters trap dust particles tenths of a micrometer in size and do this not due to the sieve effect (when the particle size does not allow it to pass through the mesh), but due to the filter materials (fiberglass fiber) and the folded “accordion” design. All modern models of vacuum cleaners, of course, are equipped with such a filter, which is another reason to think about the advisability of purchasing vacuum cleaner models with an extremely low price tag. At the very least, it should raise questions, and now you know the answer.
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5. Can the robot vacuum cleaner recognize areas of high pollution?
The performance of a robot vacuum cleaner is affected byalgorithms that control its operation and special sensors that allow it to navigate the room and make appropriate decisions. For example, iRobot's Roomba robotic vacuum cleaners use proprietary Dirt Detect technology (literally, dirt recognition), which allows the robot to identify areas with increased contamination during the cleaning process and change its behavior, returning to them again and again (by the way, this is well shown live in our video). This ability is definitely an advantage when purchasing.
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6. Continue cleaning after recharging
For owners of large houses and multi-roomIt will be useful for apartments to find out if the robot vacuum cleaner has a function to continue cleaning after recharging. The most intelligent models understand what area they have already cleaned, so they can return to the base to recharge the battery and then continue cleaning from the very place where they stopped. Less intelligent vacuum cleaners will begin work again in this case. As a result, they will carefully clean part of the room without human intervention, and simply will not get to the remaining part.
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7. Cliff sensors
Another feature is so common inmodern models of robotic vacuum cleaners that we have already begun to forget that the cheapest models do not have it at all. Each decent vacuum cleaner has special sensors (cliff sensors - they are quite large in size and can be easily seen visually by turning the vacuum cleaner over), allowing it to determine what needs to stop, otherwise there is an abyss ahead. It can be useful in practice only to owners of two-level apartments and two-story houses, but at least they should know that there are vacuum cleaners that do not have such sensors.
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8. Self-cleaning of the garbage container
If you have a large enough apartment or house,It makes sense to think about automatically cleaning the garbage container of the robot vacuum cleaner. This can be useful, for example, if you are away for a long time - the robot vacuum cleaner will regularly clean the house, requiring no maintenance and automatically emptying its waste container after each cleaning. For example, the Clean Base comes with the Roomba i7+ (we have a review of it, by the way) and Roomba S9+ robot vacuum cleaners. The capacity of the disposable container inside the Clean Base is enough for 30 cycles of the robot vacuum cleaner. This allows you to keep your house clean for a whole month even in your absence and performing automatic cleaning every day. And under normal conditions, owners of such vacuum cleaners come into contact with debris from the vacuum cleaner 30 times less often.
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9. The presence of a camera and what it affects
Vacuum cleaning robots are interesting in that they arefully automated devices that can operate autonomously and make decisions based on the situation. They are equipped with a variety of sensors, allowing them to better navigate in space and understand what is in front of them. The presence of a camera significantly expands their capabilities, although this does not mean that a vacuum cleaner without a camera cleans worse. He will simply spend more time cleaning because he has less information about what is in the room. The difference between using a laser and a camera can be clearly seen in this gif explaining how vSLAM technology works in iRobot's Roomba vacuum cleaners. Instead of a laser, these robots use a camera and sensors, allowing them to analyze in space up to 240,000 points per second.
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10. Smartphone application: what does it improve?
Of course, the presence of a smartphone applicationimmediately turns any equipment in the house into “smart”. Although in practice it is much easier to go up to the vacuum cleaner and press a button on its body than to take out your phone, launch the application, and wait until it connects to the vacuum cleaner. However, the application is always useful as soon as it comes to setting up or maintaining the vacuum cleaner. In the application, for example, you can easily set a vacuum cleaner cleaning schedule for every day of the week. You can monitor the condition of elements that require routine replacement. And in older models of vacuum cleaners, you can watch the robot move around the apartment according to the map it drew. Or send the vacuum cleaner to clean a specific room by pressing the corresponding button in the application menu. iRobot Roomba vacuum cleaners have this feature called Imprint Smart Mapping.
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11. How a robot vacuum cleaner cleans the corners of rooms
An important question that interests everyone who seesrobot vacuum cleaner: how can it, given its shape (in the vast majority of cases, it is a circle), clean the corners of rooms? In fact, a lot depends on the design of the broom brush, or rather its placement. But it is obvious that the cleaning efficiency in corners is higher for vacuum cleaners that have an appropriate body shape that allows easy access to the corners:
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12. The first step towards a smart home: robotic vacuum cleaners working together
If you have already decided to take it seriouslyautomation of house cleaning and are looking for the most advanced technologies, you will probably be interested in the possibility of organizing fully automatic dry and wet house cleaning. So far only iRobot vacuum cleaners have this opportunity thanks to technology called Imprint Link. We have a paired review of the Roomba S9+ and Braava Jet m6 robots, in which you can find out details and impressions of this miracle of modern technology that makes your home a little smarter.
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Video for the curious
For those who find it more convenient to perceive this information invideo format (or share a link to it), here is a video from our channel. Use it and forward it to your friends who are looking for a suitable robot vacuum cleaner model.
In the dry residue
Now, you definitely know the answers to the main questions facing the choice of a robot vacuum cleaner and you can better understand what these devices are and what you need to pay attention to before buying.
In working on this editorial material, created taking into account the interests of readersgg, advertiser participated - iRobotUkraine, interested in you learning more about robotic vacuum cleaners, their capabilities, and after reading the text you can understand how they can help improve your life.
Model range of robotic vacuum cleaners thatiRobot Ukraine supplies the Ukrainian market, covers all price segments and offers models of modern devices for cleaning automation for any budget and for apartments and houses of any size.
- iRobot Roomba 605 - entry-level model for one-room apartments (5,499 UAH)
- iRobot Roomba 980 - a popular model of a modern robot vacuum cleaner for large apartments and houses (17 999 UAH)
- iRobot Braava jet m6 - a robot polisher that can work together with a robot vacuum cleaner for dry cleaning (18 199 UAH)
- iRobot Roomba i7+ - older model of robot vacuum cleaner with automatic Clean Base station (30,599 UAH)
- iRobot Roomba s9+ is the flagship model of a robotic vacuum cleaner, equipped with the maximum range of cleaning technologies (UAH 39,999)