Some weeks ago I had a robot move into my house. It's name is Deebot.I tried....I really tried to like this little pink robotic vacuum. I mean...it really is cute. But will cute be enough?? Doubt it.
Although I must say that for some reason, my husband seems to have a fondness for it. Could it be he just feels badly for the sweet little pink thing?
First let me say that if you didn't already look this item up online, you would NOT know that it is for "bare" floors. You would think that it would say something about that on the box....but NO...it doesn't...unless you consider the wording "floor cleaning robot" to mean just that...floors - not rugs...not even a throw rug. So anyone who simply saw it on the store shelf would be in for a surprise if they thought it would do more.Seems like an important detail to me!
One thing I can say for it...it's pet friendly. No...not in the fact that it'll keep your house completely free of pet hair and such...but with regard to the fact that it doesn't scare them.
Nope, my cat doesn't even bother to leave the room when Deebot is running. She would run to another floor of the house when a regular vacuum is turned on, but not this one. It's pretty quiet and small and low to the floor. All things that the cat finds easy to deal with. So, in that way...it's quite "friendly".
Another plus...it'll go where you'd rather not.
Under all the furniture and into anywhere that is close to the ground and tight to get into. It's pretty low profile, so will usually slip right in. Will it find it's way out....well...sooner or later...lolBut let's face it....if we don't have to move furniture....there's something to be said for that.
How much will it pick up??
Well...it really try's, but let's face it....it can only pick up what it has room to capture. The dust/dirt container is not all that bad...but small enough to need to be emptied on a regular basis. At least this process is easy and only takes a few minutes. It also has a filter.
There are simple instructions that come along with it.
The instructions are light on detail. Part of it relies on diagrams. Guess that's fine since it is really pretty self explanatory. One button for on/off. One button for on/pause. A flap to get at the dust bin.Oh yes...it also has two spinning brushes that spin off to the side...making it look a bit like a giant spider...or at least that the first impression I had of it...lol
There are two sets of brushes so you will have a spare right off the bat. Nice. They are easy to attach and remove and it certainly makes cleaning them a breeze.
The little side brushes make up for the fact that there's no roller brush underneath as with a regular vacuum. It simply has it's wheel for moving and the suction at the bottom. The little brushes are meant to move the dust toward the suction underneath. Works most of the time, but as you might expect, they sometimes brush the dust in the other direction which makes cleaning up a bit longer.
The fact that there is no rolling brush on the bottom is a plus & minus. The minus is that this is really why it won't do anything with a rug. There simply isn't anything there to brush at the fibres. The plus is that unlike a regular vacuum, you don't have a messy tangle of hair and such that you need to cut away from the brush every now and then. Personally...that's never my favorite job.
Other items mentioned in the small write up on the box are the fact that it claims Deebot will sense furniture and obstacles and not bump into them and damage furniture, and that there is a sensor that will keep it from falling down stairs.
Well....not so much for either item. Upon setting it out for it's first run around the house....it promptly bumped into almost every piece of furniture. Not hard enough to cause damage which is good, but had me wondering if poor Deebot had a vision problem.
Needless to say, I didn't trust him not to hurt himself with stairs, which I can tell you, he would have!!
All these nice sensors...and I have one who runs around sense"less".
Another selling feature of Deebot is that he is supposed to be able to tell when he's running out of power and head off to his charger to recharge. One thing you must be sure of is that your charging port is quite flush against the wall and can't move. Deebot will push it into a position where he can't get to it otherwise. For the most part this works well, however, one day he didn't realize he was getting low and ended up looking like a drunk who couldn't find his way home. I had to carefully lead him to the charger and help him mount up. Felt a little bad for the poor fellow.Finally, he is said to be able to be easily set to run around cleaning every day at the same time. This looks like an easy feature to program, however, due to the fact that I don't quite feel as if I can let him play on his own just yet without being around to babysit...I haven't tried this feature.
Maybe when he gets a little older!!
