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Clean freaks: Share your thoughts about the iRobot Roomba i7+
People have been arguing about the utility of robot vacuums for as long as there have been robot vacuums. Some feel they're just expensive gadgets with extensive limitations, while others see them as important steps toward a real-life Rosey from The Jetsons. While reviewing the Roomba i7+, Engadget's Devindra Hardawar thoughtfully weighed the pros and cons of iRobot's latest model, the i7+. It's quieter and offers a much-requested self-emptying feature, but it's also quite expensive and requires proprietary bags. Despite these trade-offs, it still earned a solid score of 87.
Turn your Roomba's travels into 'Doom' maps
Game developer Rich Whitehouse has found a rather unusual way to celebrate Doom's 25th anniversary: make your robot vacuum pay tribute. The industry veteran has developed a script for the game data conversion tool Noesis that translates the floor maps from Roombas to playable maps for the original Doom -- yes, of course it's called Doomba. You'll have to specifically record the robot's journeys for this to work (you can merge files if the run is interrupted), but it can otherwise whip up a hellish version of your home with minimal effort.
Google and iRobot team up to better map your home
Your Roomba's home mapping could be useful for more than more effective cleaning. Google and iRobot have formed a partnership to improve smart home technology using consumer robots. The two will find "additional ways" to link their platforms beyond Google Assistant control, including the possibility of using a Roomba's map-based spatial awareness to "simplify home setup" and foster "powerful new automations."
The Roomba i7+ is the robot vacuum I’ve been waiting for
Adulting is hard. But over the past 12 years, iRobot's Roomba made it just a bit easier for me by keeping my floors clean, no matter how lazy I felt. But while the company has steadily improved its robot vacuums over the years -- by making them more powerful, adding sturdy rubber rollers and integrating room mapping -- they're still very similar to the first model that debuted in 2002. That's why the $949 Roomba i7+ is such a huge deal: It can not only vacuum your floors better than before but also empty its dust bin into a Clean Base. It's the epitome of lazy cleaning technology: something that can do its dirty work without making you leave your couch.
There’s finally a Roomba that can empty itself
Since 2002, iRobot's Roomba has been something of a status symbol: a robot vacuum that can clean your floors while you sit back and relax. It's steadily become better and more efficient at cleaning since it debuted -- the last flagship model, the Roomba 980, added floor mapping three years ago. But once your Roomba finishes up, you still have to unload the dustbin manually. It's a stark reminder that we haven't reached the automated cleaning utopia of The Jetsons. That changes with the $949 Roomba i7+ -- it's smarter than ever before, and it can unload up to 30 dirty bins on its own without any help. Rosie the Robot, here we come.
High-end Roombas will find your home's WiFi dead spots
That fancy new Roomba you got over the holidays could help suss out your home's WiFi weak spots this month. A forthcoming patch will add a wireless coverage map to the Roomba's vacuum heat map. From the sounds of it, the test group for this new feature could be relatively tiny.
iRobot and Black & Decker settle over alleged patent infringement
iRobot, maker of the Roomba vacuum, has taken to challenging its competitors over alleged patent violations in an effort to hold on to its market share. In April, it named a number of companies including Black & Decker, Bissell, iLife and Hoover in a complaint filed to the US International Trade Commission wherein it asked the commission to investigate their supposed patent violations and ban any products that it finds to incorporate any infringed upon intellectual property. Now, however, iRobot says it has reached an agreement with Black & Decker.
Roomba robotic vacuums now follow IFTTT instructions
If Roomba vacuums are going to feel like they're truly part of your connected home, they need to do more than dutifully clean your floors on a set schedule. Thankfully, iRobot is helping them do just that. It just added IFTTT "recipes" that tell Roomba robots when to clean or to interact with other devices. You can tell your robovac to start cleaning when you leave or stop when you get home, for starters. However, the cleverest tricks come when the robot interacts with the outside world. You can tweet to your Roomba to start a command, or have it post to Facebook or Twitter when it's done. You can even have it flash your Hue lights or play music (on Android devices) when it's finished, in case there's something you need to do immediately afterwards.
You can trust your Roomba with your home's dirty secrets
Earlier this week, iRobot and its CEO Colin Angle came under a bit of fire after Reuters reported that the company was looking to sell maps of customers' homes to companies like Amazon, Apple or Alphabet. The idea behind such a move was that maps of consumers' homes could help inform other smart devices, like lighting and thermostats, about the physical environment they're in. "There's an entire ecosystem of things and services that the smart home can deliver once you have a rich map of the home that the user has allowed to be shared," Angle told Reuters.
Roomba creator wants to do for gardens what he did for your floors
Let's be honest: while planting your garden can be fun, weeding it usually isn't. Not unless you enjoy crouching down for long stretches, anyway. You might not have to endure the drudgery for too much longer, though. Roomba co-creator Joe Jones and Franklin Robotics are launching Tertill, a robot that weeds your garden all by itself. The machine automatically roams the soil, using sensors to identify small plants (you use collars to protect young crops) and chop them down. It's solar-powered, so you don't have to dock it -- you can even leave it out in the rain.
iRobot's entry-level Roombas offer app control on the cheap
iRobot is bringing Wi-Fi connectivity to its cheaper Roomba vacuum cleaning robots. The company is unveiling two new models today, the 690 and 890, which sit below its top-of-the-line 960 and 980 machines. Unlike the 650 and 860 -- its previous low-end robots -- they can be controlled through the iRobot Home app. That means you customise their cleaning schedule, check their "cleaning status" and access customer support from any Android or iOS device. The Roomba 690 goes on sale today for $375 in the US -- the same price as the 650 it's replacing. The Roomba 890, meanwhile, will be out in "late Q2" for a yet-to-be-confirmed price.
iRobot starts a patent war over robot vacuums (update: ITC case)
It's getting nasty in the robot vacuum arena. iRobot has filed lawsuits against Bissell, Black & Decker, Bobsweep, iLife and Hoover for allegedly violating several patents for the concept of an autonomous room-cleaning robot. The company "will not stand by" as rivals "infringe on our intellectual property" by making similar competing machines, according to a statement. We've reached out to the companies targeted by the lawsuits and will let you know how they're responding, although it's safe to say they aren't likely to roll over.
Now Roombas check in with 'Clean Map' reports to your phone
How do you know if your Roomba has cleaned every inch of your floor? If you have one of the wirelessly connected series 900 Roombas, you'll start getting "Clean Map" reports through the iRobot Home app for Android and iOS. The machines now map the parts of your home they've cleaned by combining adaptive navigation with visual localization. You'll get those maps as part of the new reports, along with how much time the Roomba spent vacuuming and what the dirtiest parts of your house are. The app can now also send you push notifications on the robot's cleaning status.
Control Neato's robot vacuum with Amazon Alexa voice commands
Getting your robotic vacuum to clean the house is usually a matter of setting a timer or pressing a start button -- but what if you could just ask it to get to work? If you happen to own an Amazon Echo and a Neato Botvac Connected robot vacuum, now you can. Today the company announced that its Wifi-connected vacuum cleaner will take commands from Amazon Alexa. The feature is extremely straightforward, and features just two commands: start and stop.
The Roomba 960 is iRobot's cheaper app-driven robot vacuum
The $900 WiFi-connected Roomba 980 is pretty exorbitant for many folks, nice as it is, so Robot has launched the $700 Roomba 960. The new model has a less powerful motor and battery, but retains the WiFi connectivity, floor mapping and app control of the high-end model. The price is the same as Neato's BotVac Connected, so it could sway techy users who really want the extra control a smartphone brings. By contrast, the cheapest, non-connected Roomba 650 is $375.
Next for iRobot: A cute $199 kitchen and bathroom mop bot
After tackling ever-complex vacuuming, sweeping and mopping bots for most of your house, iRobot took a surprising turn for its latest product: it went small and cheap. The company's new $199 Braava Jet is a tiny thing meant to clean all of the nooks and crannies of your kitchen and bathroom. It's basically a miniaturized version of the company's Braava floor mopping robot (which itself is based on technology it acquired from Evolution Robotics, which used to make the Mint floor sweeping robot.) Given its price and tiny size, the Braava Jet could open up the dream of automated home cleaning to consumers who'd scoff at the pricy entry point for Roombas (which is around $300 for an outdated model these days).
ICYMI: Robot news round-up, 3D hand scanner and more
#fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-439685{display:none;} .cke_show_borders #fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-439685, #postcontentcontainer #fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-439685{width:570px;display:block;} try{document.getElementById("fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-439685").style.display="none";}catch(e){}Today on In Case You Missed It: iRobot sold its line of military robots to a US-based firm to focus on Roomba and a new chameleon robot changes color to blend in; a student built a 3D scanner with cameras and Raspberry Pi that is much cheaper than any other scanner; and a new pedestrian detection software from the University of California, San Diego, is nearly as fast as the human brain.
Neato's new vacuum is cheaper than Roomba, but more trouble
In the robot vacuum wars, Neato has made a name for itself by developing cheaper, laser-guided devices that are just as effective as iRobot's Roombas. In fact, while Roombas have been bouncing around walls for years with no real intelligence (something that's finally changed with the camera-equipped Roomba 980), Neato's lasers have helped its devices wisely navigate your floors since they debuted in 2010. Now with the BotVac Connected ($700), Neato also has a robot vacuum that's controlled by a mobile app. But while it does a decent job of cleaning floors, I found it to be much more trouble than Roomba's latest entry.
Roomba 980 review: iRobot's best vacuum yet, but too pricey for most
It's 2015 and I'm still waiting for Rosie the Robot, or some sort of equivalent home bot, to clean my home. We're probably years away from a Jetsons-like future, but it's easy to forget that iRobot's Roomba has already been around for over 13 years now, steadily getting better at doing your dirty work. Now with the new Roomba 980, iRobot is making its vacuum-cleaning bot smarter than ever before -- so much so that it's calling the 980 the most important Roomba since it first debuted in 2002. It has a camera and advanced localization technology that allows it to see obstacles and map your floors, and for the first time, it's also wirelessly connected and works together with a mobile app. Most importantly, it finally rid my carpets of cat hair. The 980 is the best Roomba yet, plain and simple. Unfortunately, its high cost of $900 puts it out of reach for most people.
Creator of the Roomba robotic cleaner is making a drone
Over the next few years, the market for consumer-facing drones is going to continue growing. And, as they say, the more the merrier. Enter CyPhy LVL 1, a sleek drone brought to you by the co-designer of the Roomba, iRobot's renowned robotic vacuum cleaner, Helen Greiner. She's now the CEO of CyPhy Works, which is a company that focuses on creating aerial robots -- albeit not for hobbyists. But that's about to change soon with its CyPhy LVL 1. Launched via Kickstarter, it is said to be the first drone for everyone, from young kids to old people, featuring a smartphone-based, swipe-to-fly remote interface, instant sharing of captured footage to social networks and geo-fencing.