Getting My House Clean With Some Robotic Help @iRobot and @BestBuy #iRobotatBestBuy

Disclosure:  The reviewer has been compensated in the form of a Best Buy Gift Card and/or received the product/service at a reduced price or for free.

With three kids I feel like I am always playing catchup in my house, never really having time to keep up with all the cleaning I should.  I am amazed at the amount of crumbs and dust that is left behind on my floors each day.  I feel like I could vacuum all day long and never really have everything picked up.

With some help from the new iRobot Roomba 870 from Best Buy, I am able to get my house clean without actually having to stop what I am doing to clean it!

Some features of the iRobot Roomba 870:

• Uses revolutionary AeroForce Performance Cleaning System which delivers 5x the suction and removes up to 50% more dirt, dust, hair and debris.
• Can be scheduled to run when you need it to.
• Returns to Home Base to recharge between cleanings
• 2 Virtual Wall Barriers which keep Roomba in the rooms you want to vacuum and out of the ones you don’t – this is great if you don’t have time to pick up items off the floor of a room (like a toy room)
• Features a slim profile so it can clean under furniture, including beds, skirted furniture, tables, cabinets and more.
• Features a spinning side brush that can grab dirt and debris from from tough places like wall edges and corners.
• iAdapt Responsive Navigation Technology with cliff-detection sensors – so it won’t fall down the stairs.
• Large HEPA filter to catch dust, dander and other allergens out of the air with a bin full indicator that lets you know when to empty it.
• iRobot XLife Extended Life Battery doubles the battery cycles

So what did I think?

Well it is pretty awesome, not 100% convinced yet but its warming up on me.  I turned it on and it ran for about two hours, working its way around my house.  It has a weird pattern it follows but if you give it time it will go back and pick up what was left behind.  I was worried it wouldn’t clean under my tables and couches, but it did work its way under them.  That was a big plus for me as I hate moving chairs and cleaning under them.

I will admit I haven’t played around with the scheduling part yet but I do think its pretty awesome that you can schedule it to start when you want it to.  I don’t know that I would feel comfortable letting it run when I’m not home though because it could suck up a cord I missed or something else.  I did have it stop a few times to alert me it was stuck or sucked up something (my mini blind cord) it shouldn’t have.  I had no problems at all with stairs, it was careful around edges all together.

I will say it cleaned pretty dang good though.  Like I said it wasn’t 100% percent as I did notice some dirt still mainly around the edges or under our kitchen cabinets that it didn’t pick up, but for the most part it did great.  I would say it did good enough that I am still using it.  I love that I can tap the Clean button and have it run while I wash dishes, clean up another room or even just sit down for a break!

I joked with my mom when I was on the phone the other day with her that I was working hard vacuuming! I think it is a little hard in my house right now as I have three kids who leave so many toys and cords on the floor that I need to watch out for, but I think this might motivate them to keep stuff off the floor!

Normally I admit I vacuum as little as possible, I probably sweep more in my kitchen than anything.  With the iRobot I run this thing almost every day and let it works its magic.  Not sure its worth the $600 price tag but if its on sale, I would recommend it.  With summer coming up I can’t wait to have more time playing outside instead of stuck inside vacuuming.  Oh and this model even comes with two virtual walls (and the C batteries they require) which I wasn’t sure if I would use, but have found them to be awesome to get my iRobot to target one room or avoid another room (like the toy room for example.)

Yuck!  Where did all that come from?!

Virtual wall – just a small box (battery operated) that you put wherever you want the iRobot to not go:

Back to the Docking station when its done:

CHECK OUT:  Learn more about the iRobot Roomba 870 from Best Buy.