IRobot Roomba 505 Robot Vacuum Cleaner Review

Since its introduction in 1997, vacuum cleaner robots have been on the market for a relatively long time, but many people, not only have they never seen such products, and more often than not have heard about the existence of the class of devices themselves.

Not so long ago, a friend asked me to contribute to the selection and purchase of a robot vacuum cleaner, after studying the available models and purchasing the selected device - the cherished device was in my hands for a while, I could not miss the unique chance and took up testing in order to satisfy my own curiosity and share with the Habra community.

After my brief acquaintance with the vacuum cleaner and a brief study of it, I am ready to share my product reviews and conclusions about the class of devices in general.
Attention - there are a lot of photos under the cut (traffic).

At the moment in Moscow in retail you can buy almost any model of the robot vacuum cleaner almost from any manufacturer. Although the class of devices has long been on the market, it is still very specific and not popular among a wide range of consumers, so you probably won't find such products in well-known electronics stores, but using the Internet search you can easily find small shops or more often pavilions in the markets, who sell such vacuum cleaners.
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When choosing a robot vacuum cleaner, I was guided primarily by the manufacturer, the budget allocated for the purchase was no more than 15,000 rubles . Having studied the offers in this price range, I concluded that I have no choice and need to stop at iRobot . Of course, for this price, you can buy a product from another manufacturer, but all the time I ran across unknown Chinese offices, but iRobot was a company that was born and works in the USA with a founding date in 1990.

First of all, I was struck by the absence of any reviews of any robot vacuum cleaners at all, all the reviews found on the network were either about the very first and ancient models of vacuum cleaners, when there was a rush to a new type of high-tech product and many publications wrote about them, or stumbled upon biased mini reviews from the manufacturers themselves, who naturally did not tell anything interesting. In a way, because of this problem, I decided to write this review.

The choice fell on the youngest model in the iRobot product line - Roomba 505 , the price of which starts from about 11,000 rubles .

Photo review:

Having bought and pripev home vacuum cleaner, I gave a photo session:



As you can see in the photo, the box with the device is not huge, its weight is about 6 kilograms and there is a handle for transporting, so going to the store and purchasing the device will not cause much trouble and you can spend this whole event on your own two.



Included are a bunch of waste paper: detailed instructions in English and Russian, a quick start guide (in English only), a warranty card and a guide to solving possible problems.



Included iRobot Roomba 505 has a Russian certificate of conformity with the GOST standard, which can speak about official shipments to Russia.



Included is a strange warranty card, its oddity in the absence of the address of the service center, there is only a telephone and an e-mail. Also, the seller did not bother to completely fill out the warranty card by actually presenting an extended warranty.



In the box everything is neatly packed and carefully laid, to damage anything during transportation is almost impossible. The photo shows the vacuum cleaner itself, the charger, the tool for cleaning the brushes and 1 virtual wall to limit the area of ​​cleaning.

iRobot Roomba 505 does not have a dock for charging as more expensive models, the robot will simply return to the place where it started to work, and you will have to charge it yourself.

Due to my lack of any decent camera, then I will bring videos made not by me, but from youtube, but I guarantee 100% compliance of the robot's behavior on these videos with reality.

Specifications and features:

• Weight 3.8 kg, diameter 34 cm, height 9.5 cm
• Battery life up to 180 min
• Remote control (not supplied)
• Dust collector with cyclone filter, with a capacity of 0.50 l
• The brushes rotating at high speed efficiently collect garbage in the garbage can, are easily removed and cleaned.
• Fine filter retains small dust particles and allergens
• Equipped with an anti-mud system that helps the Roomba not get stuck in wires, cords, carpet fringe
• Side blade brush allows you to very effectively clean along the baseboard and in the corners of the room
• Equipped with height difference sensors, detects steps, other height differences and avoids falling.
• 1 year warranty

My findings after use:

As the advertisement on the official website says, a height of 9.5 cm allows you to climb a vacuum cleaner under a lot of furniture and clean it wherever you would get a regular vacuum cleaner with its straight brush. In fact, all my sofas in the house turned out to be lower than the robot, and he couldn’t clean under the sofas, in general, like me with a regular vacuum cleaner, so we can count a draw.

A virtual wall can be used to designate a way out of the room, you can not believe the description on many websites of online stores about the possibility of cleaning in several rooms at a time, this is not so. My room is about 56sq.m. I cleaned the vacuum cleaner for about 2 hours; there is not enough battery power to clean the two rooms, so it’s better to mark the exit from the room with a virtual wall if you don’t have a door.



Any carpets and wires robot-vacuum cleaner overcomes with ease, for all the time there was not a single case of jamming. Even drove to the computer desk in the thick of the wires, the robot himself got out of there without noticeable problems.

The noise level is lower than that of ordinary vacuum cleaners, of course, it’s not possible to sleep in the same room with a working robot, but in the next room you can sleep well, you can program cleaning even at night if nobody sleeps in this room.

You can see the operation of the device in the following video:


The algorithm for finding the path to the ugliness is simple - the robot simply turns to a certain degree in the side when encountering any obstacle. All turns and distances are remembered and used after the end of the cleaning to return to the place of the start. Whether the robot uses this data when cleaning I couldn’t find out, I didn’t watch him for a very long time, but apparently he searches for the way to the disgraceful simple algorithm described above, it just turns randomly and that’s all ...

I can’t say good or bad words about the quality of cleaning, the dust collector was full, I collected something, it’s hard to say better or worse than a regular vacuum cleaner.

Another video with the real operation of the device:

About the class of devices in general:

For widespread use, vacuum cleaner robots are still expensive, see for yourself, the price for the cheapest Chinese model starts at 8,000 rubles , for a more advanced and high-quality product you will have to pay even more when you can buy a regular more or less normal vacuum cleaner for 4,000 rubles but over time the price will only go down. In the meantime, such vacuum cleaners will be a good tool for geeks and enthusiasts who do not like to do their own cleaning, and you can greatly impress your friends with such a machine.

I consider the cleaning of a small office to be an excellent application for the device; you can program the robot to clean the office in the morning before the arrival of employees.

In general, my friend, for whom this robot vacuum cleaner was bought, presented it to his wife, who has been using the new device for a little more than a month and is quite happy with the gift, so there is no question of regret for the money invested.

Are there any owners of robotic vacuum cleaners in Habré? Share your impressions of use ...
If you have any questions about the device - please ask them in the comments, I will be happy to answer you ...

And finally, a little bit of humor:


upd: on Habré already was a study of the trajectory of the robot, here is what the picture turned out with a long exposure: