iRobot Roomba Combo j5 Robot Vacuum & Mop – Identifies and Avoids Obstacles Like Pet Waste & Cords, Clean by Room with Smart Mapping, Works with Alexa, Ideal for Pet Hair, Roomba Combo J5

Do you need the J7 model or a different Roomba model? Had the J7 for a week so far with excellent results. I experimented first with a 600 series Roomba but realized I needed the more advanced mapping, front camera, obstacle recognition features of the J7. it recognizes charger cords, sock, boxes, or stack (and is even guaranteed to recognize pet pooh and avoid it). For me this higher tech mapping and recognition lets me not worry if household projects mean I have left out a box or shoes, whatever, in the room. The J7 recognizes stuff like that and cleans around it without getting stuck. Some other models, including the higher end S9 I think, require you pick up more and tidy more before you clean. That's just fine for people whose house stays more organized all the time than mine does. Meanwhile, the cleaning features of the J7 work brilliantly. The S9 has more suction power, and more edge cleaning intensity, so I wondered if I'd be regretting that, but the J7 cleans my hardwood floors and my low pile area rug brilliantly. I've read that deeper pile carpet will benefit from more suction, but my house is mostly hardwood floor and the J7 is brilliant at that my one 10'x16' rug is spotless too.Do you need the self-emptying feature, the "+"? It's such a good feature that it was tempting. However, I was upgrading from a 600 series and wary of spending the high premium for the self-emptying feature when I was finding a good discount on the J7 by itself. What I have found so far is the J7 can easily clean the three large rooms I use it for, clean them fully three times before I get a message the dust bin needs to be emptied. Roomba customer service explained you can expect 800 sq ft of cleaning before you have to empty the bin. This varies probably and that's square feet as measured by the Roomba's cleaning pattern which won't include some of your furniture and fixtures so the cleaned footage measured will be lower than your actual room square footage as measured for the property.Also I wanted to put the Roomba's dock in a spot against my wall where I didn't want the taller self-cleaning box to stick up above the dock. It's a well designed box and not as tall as the i4 model's version, so that shouldn't stop you if you have a spot for it. Worth noting: you need to locate the dock against a well where you have at least 18" or so of space on both sides, and four feet if room in front of the Roomba. That's for navigation.The J7 dust bin is so easy to remove, empty, and replace, that it's just not an issue for me--certainly don't regret not having the self-emptier at this point. The dust bin parts are designed well: a button on the side pops the bin out the side of the machine; another button opens the bin so you can dump it once you have it over the trash. The filter comes out easily too so it can be tapped on the trash bin to clear it. Customer service tells me the dust bin can be washed in warm water and soap too, so you can get it quite clean if you want. They said not to get the filter wet though. One thing to consider is that the Roomba sides can get dusty too from cleaning, even the top can get a bit dusty because it cleans under couches so well and under cabinets, when there's room for it. That means that I've been wiping down the J7 after a full clean of all three rooms. Maybe this won't continue--my rooms were neglected for a while so my J7 may be cleaning more dust this first week than it will clean in the future. In the two rooms it's cleans several times now, it doesn't' get dusty.Even if the outside of the Roomba stays clean, however, the dust bin itself will be be a bit dusty when you remove it. So if handling the bin while you empty it bothers you, then the "+" self-emptying feature is for you. If you have the "+" feature, the dust from weeks of cleanings empties into a collection bag you eventually pull, discard, and replace with a new bag.Mapping: One of my rooms is two steps down from other two. The mapping is so clever I just lift the Roomba down to the lower level and say "Siri, tell [J7] to clean the [room]". The J7 figures out where it is in the room and cleans it fully. When it tells me it's finished, I put it back on the higher level and say "Siri, tell [J7] to go home" and it heads for its dock to charge.Customer service: easy and quick to ask questions.

Don't buy this. It doesn't obey a button push "start" manually. It disconnects from the charger, stops working randomly, has to "go home" and charge to be able to vacuum all my downstairs (less than 800sq ft), side spinners run sometimes and sometimes don't. I have gone through two repair claims with IRobot. They have sent me parts once and a whole new robot the next time. I asked them if I could just return this Roomba and get a better model. Paying more of course. Nope. Not allowed. They said I can only get a new model by buying a new one myself or if mine breaks to the point of needing replacement again and they happen to be out of stock, they'll give me the closest equivalent model to mine.Don't buy. Upgrade to something better. I've researched the Roborock and it's about $750+. I wish I would have just spent more. I had an old roomba. Bounced around on all the surfaces here there and everywhere but it vacuumed and WORKED when I pushed the button. I'd rather have a sporadic path and no wifi and no app than an app and robot that refuse to obey. I wrote "NOPE!" on a sticky note and it's on my Roomba. Because we say that is what it always says. NOPE, not feeling it today, but thanks for the request. Nope to iRobot. Nope to this Roomba.

I have had several Eufys over the years and I always swore by them as a great little robovac. The Eufy is half the price of the Roomba and I always thought a robovac is a robovac, right? Wrong!The Eufy does a good enough job, wandering aimlessly around sucking up dirt and getting stuck… a lot. I finally got tired of going to help it and realized I may as well vacuum myself if I have to keep going to help it out all the time. The Roomba was on sale and I was so ignorant of what it actually brings to the table that I bought it because it was thicker so I figured it wouldn’t get stuck under as many things. Little did I know, this thing is on a whole different level.There is plenty of information out there on how to do mapping runs and design your layout etc. and I admit I didn’t do any of that and still don’t understand it well enough to explain it to anyone else, so I won’t try here. In “Eufy mode” I used it the same way and just set it going in a room. Only after it finished did I realize it was learning my floor plan and after a few times it had enough information for me to name rooms, set no-go areas and set up favorites etc. The first time I looked at the app and realized it was sending me pictures (pictures!) of obstacles and asking me whether this was a permanent or temporary obstacle and what area was carpet vs non-carpet, did the penny drop as to why the Roomba was more expensive. Through trial and error I now have a fully mapped house with named areas, no-go zones (such as under the treadmill) and known obstacles. I LOVE this thing!Where I have had issues (not sure they are serious enough to be called “cons”) I explain below.It never gets stuck under anything. In a month of running it almost every day, it has only twice sent me a message saying it was “near a cliff” which I eventually figured out was because it was on the edge of a rug with a light border and a darker inside pattern. It relies a lot on light to make its judgements so if the light isn’t terribly good in the room a thing like the floor going from a light to a dark color seems to confuse it. On brighter days it has made that transition without issue.For the same reason I figured out why a couple of times it returned to base without finishing the job (you know this because it tells you - the message was "path blocked"). I came to realize it doesn’t like to run in the dark. On both occasions I had left it running overnight and when Alexa turned off the lights and it couldn’t “see” it gave up and went home.When I first got it, it would stop and tell me the bin was full when it wasn’t and I thought this was going to be the most serious downside, because it had not been running very long when it would think the bin was full, even though the bin is quite large (larger than the Eufy). I have two long haired dogs and I found that the dog hair was obscuring the sensor for the bin, making it think it was full when it wasn’t even close. Setting it in the app to run with a full bin fixed that and unless you have either a really large area or a lot of pet hair in one run, I don’t believe it will end up getting clogged running with a truly full bin.Lastly, yes, it is noisy… but that is a small price to pay for such a time saving way to keep my floors in such good shape. I have come to like the sound of it, knowing it is running and makiung my life easier :)I haven’t tried it yet with Alexa, so I don’t know about that. The battery life could perhaps be a bit better, but if it hasn’t finished (I have one large area where this happens) it just goes back to base and recharges before resuming and completing the job. Again, you know this is happening because it tells you.Definitely a good buy and (sorry Eufy!) I can’t believe I waited this long to get one.