Roomba 530 Vacuum Robot Product Review

A NaturalNews PhotoTour by Mike Adams

Here's a look at the collection of components you get in the Roomba 530 package: The charger on the top left, the two lighthouses on the top (which allow you to block off doorways or hallways so that Roomba stays in the room you want), a spare filter and the Roomba robot itself.

You'll have to buy more accessories at the Roomba website, and they're not cheap, but you get 15% off your first order when you register with iRobot as a customer. I've found that instead of having to buy new vacuum filters all the time, I can simply rinse it under water and get out 90% of the dust that clogs it, then insert it back into the Roomba and use it again. So far, I haven't had to replace anything.

The charger on this unit is supposed to be an "auto dock" charger. According to the manual, Roomba is supposed to seek out the charger when it gets low on batteries. As far as I can tell, this only works when Roomba is right next to the charger. It doesn't actually wander around your house in an intelligent way, seeking out the charger. So "auto dock" seems to be essentially useless in my experience.

If you pick up Roomba and place it near the charger, then press the "Dock" button, then Roomba will, indeed, slowly meet up with the charging station and give you an audible alert to let you know it's charging. While this is kinda cool, it's no faster than just picking up Roomba and placing it on the charger yourself. So the "auto charge" feature seems to be more hype than anything really practical.

Now, if Roomba actually remembered the location of the charger and sought it out on its own, even across the entire house, that would be impressive. Maybe we'll see that feature in a future model…

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