iRobot Roomba Scheduler 4230 Robotic Cleaner

I bought the IRobot Roomba Scheduler in the beginning of 2006. It's been 7 months and I still love it. Let's find out why~

I used to pride myself in how clean I kept our home. But life keeps getting busier and busier. Keeping the house clean started to become more and more difficult, due to the lack of time I had.

Enter the Roomba. Researched it thoroughly. Could it be possible to have a "robot" do the vacuuming? Yes, it can! 95% of the reviews I read from everyday people loved it!

The Scheduler enables you to preset up to 7 cleaning times to automatically activate Roomba and Virtual Wall Schedulers. Fantastic! I can vacuum while I'm sleeping!! Waking up to a vacuumed carpet is great! The Virtual Wall Schedulers act as boundaries and keep your Roomba where you want it. The Roomba also has a Stair Avoidance System so it won't fall down any stairs. The Surface Transitioning feature allows the Roomba to adjust from carpet to bare floor with ease.

The three power cleaning modes: Clean, Spot and Max allow you to set for desired vacuuming. With it's Advance Power Supply Battery the Roomba has up to 120 minutes of continuous cleaning time. It is amazing how much dirt it can pick up. The dirt collects in the debris cup and you just dump it out.
The bristle and beater brushes are removable for ease of cleaning, as is the filter. When Roomba is done vacuuming, it returns itself to it's docking station to recharge. With the Fast Charger the Roomba fully charges in less than 3 hours.

I feel much better about myself and my home when the carpet is vacuumed. By the way, we have three dogs; a Great Dane, a Basset, and a Chihuahua. Pet hair is not a problem for the Roomba!!

Our little Roomba has become quite the accessory of convenience in our home. We purchased ours at Best Buy, with the extended warranty which I highly recommend. He's been doing a good job on our floors since we let him out of the box.

Our home is primarily hardwood and linoleum in the kitchen, with a large area rug in the living room. I like that Roomba can adjust his height to get the best sweep on any surface. It's also nice that I can have our back porch door open without worrying that he will fall down the stairs. The scheduler aspect of him has not really been used a lot - Roomba's primary place in our house is to help in those times of crisis when someone calls and is coming over right away and the house is a mess. It's nice that Roomba can handle the sweeping which leaves my husband and me able to handle the rest of the duties. However, on occassion, I have used the scheduler and had success. It is nice to come home to a clean floor without having to do any of the work!

The only thing I would say in caution of someone thinking of purchasing a Roomba of any kind is to consider the amount or presence of pet hair in your home. Our 2 cats, one of which is long-haired, seem to shed a lot, and we have found that pet hair has a tendency to clog Roomba up. His brushes will keep going, but the hair will just gather as it slides along the floor instead of actually being sucked into Roomba's compartment. The pet hair issue is the only problem we have found of Roomba so far.

Thankfully, Roomba comes with a multi-tool that helps clear out clogs, cut through hair wound up in the brushes, and keep his parts clean. This is helpful when it comes to emptying his compartment. When he's full, it's fairly easy to empty him, clean his brushes up, and get him on his way once again.

Roomba's self-sufficiency really seems to make him the ideal house cleaning companion, with little to no maintenance (other than emptying and clearing his brushes every once in a while). For this reason, I would recommend him to anyone looking for a little extra cleaning help. Roomba Scheduler would also make a good gift for elderly or handicapped persons - his remote control allows him to work and maneuver hands free.

This is the BEST gift I have ever received. Being disabled, vacuuming is quite a challenge and one of those chores that I dreaded. No more. I have mine on the first floor, scheduled to clean daily. Rarely does anyone stay on the second floor so once in awhile I will take the roomba upstairs, start her up & let her go, she easily cleans what dust is up there. I haven t touched my regular upright vacuum in the last 10 months and I dont even know why I keep it? For those looking into maybe buying one, if you have kids that leave toys everywhere, think again as you must keep your home tidy where the floors are concerned as the roombe will pick up everthing, toys, socks, little throw rugs, wires etc. The best thing to do is to watch it the first couple of times it runs as then you can see if there is going to be a problem. Will it go under your furniture, will it get trapped between the floor and the lower kitchen cupboards, will it try to eat the bathroom rug or the T.V. antenna cable? I need to empty mine every two days now, but the first couple of runs, it was daily. I have only two of the "virtual walls" so until I get another, I dont want my roomba to bang on the closed bedroom door when my husband is sleeping, so I'll toss a couple of the sofa throw pillows by the door. Roomba will touch those & turn around. Yes, the roomba makes noise, sometimes when my kids come to visit they will fall asleep on the sofa or floor, and they will stay sleeping while roomba cleans. the noise is nothing compared to a regular vacuum. I can't say enough great things about my BEST FRIEND. I plan to get the roomba that washes the floors next, as that's another one of those dreaded chores, since I became disabled. I believe everyone can benefit by having a best friend especially those that are challenged, physically. I was quite upset watching the "Tonight show" (one of my favorites) when Jay Leno threw a roomba over his desk, towards the floor! I'm not sure whether it broke as I couldn't tell to look at it? BUT STILL......

After a less-than-satisfactory experience with a Scooba floor washing robot I was able to sell it as 'slightly used' on ebay at a small loss and got a reconditioned Roomba with the balance in my paypal account. Our floors are very irregular Indian slate with wide grouting. The Scooba got stuck a lot and was frustrating although it did an excellent job on the one, small, smooth-floored room we have.

The Roomba negotiates the irregular slate floor fine and vacuums up lots of stuff, even after the cleaning lady has had a pass at it. Roomba works fine on our short-pile & berber carpets, too, raises the pile after a few runs, and does as well or better than the Oreck our cleaning lady uses. Now, her instructions are to vacuum the stairs and the few places the Roomba can't reach and to spend the time freed up by the machine vacuuming the uphoulstry and scrubbing the slate/grout with a boat brush instead of a sponge mop.

At first I though I had a dead-on-arrival unit since it wouldn't work but a few minutes even though the charge light was solid green. A chat at the iRobot website said to leave it on charge for 3 days, un-interrupted. That got it going fine and now it's been used a dozen times, cleans for an hour and a half on the 'max' setting, and finds its way back to its charger so it's ready to turn loose in another room when I get back.

Another problem is that if it picks up leaves or rocks, we have a _lot_ of plants that come inside during the winter so, it will stop working until its brushes are cleaned.

It will move from a hard floor to an area rug with no problem as long as there are no fringes, which it will grab and choke on. And, it has trouble negotiating the threshold strip between rooms so I set out the virtual wall to keep it contained to one room -- this works best anyhow, seems like 12 X 15 might be the biggest area it can roam effectively.

I'm hoping that a later version of the Scooba will have the big wheels of the Roomba, which makes it able to handle irregular floors.

And, we've got good places up & downstairs where the Roomba can park itself so will probably get another one and use the 'scheduler' features more effectively.

These iRobot machines are not toys. Although I'm new to them, they appear to be durable and are excellent applications of robot technology. The iRobot site has replacement parts reasonably priced, and I expect to get a few years' service out of the Roomba.

I have Roombas for 2 years. It is the best invention since the alarm clock! .....Bear in mind that the die soon after the warranty is up!

This product is definitely a help. I gave mine to my aunt because she can't vacuum with even the lightest of vacuums and she is pretty obsessive about cleanliness. Also, she had a smaller house and less to maintain and she is elderly. For her, the ROomba is all she needs in between regular visits from us to help out with deep cleaning. It can work while you are sleeping, too.
If you have pets, keep an eye on them, though. A visiting dog tried to attack our Roomba, so keep that in mind.
But this nifty device does pick up crumbs, pet hair and plenty else. It won't get stuck tar or gum off your floors but hey, you weren't expecting miracles, were you?

This is the second Roomba Robot purchased! One is for upstairs and one is for downstairs. It is amazing! Keeps toddler crumbs picked up, and finds its own home when its battery runs low. Amazing!!

We have this at work and I give it a average. At home it would be great to pick up the house a bit everyday. But if you have high traffic in and out it don't seem to pick everything up.

According to my wife, this is the invention of the century. Every time I come home from work and go into the master bedroom, the carpet looks like it was just vacuumed. And, yes it was, but by the iRobot Roomba. It seems to find it's way into every nook and cranny and runs for a full 2 hours on 1 charge and finds it's way back to it's docking station or signals you that it can't find the station so you will give a lift back home. It is awesome. My wife has always been a vacuumaholic, but has finally met her match. We have some very expensive vacuums, but none of the others vacuum on their own.

Easy to operate cleans my tile floors very well. The Robot cleans well and is easy to clean and maintain. The unit returns to its base and recharges itself. Then runs around cleaning while sleeping. Being an owner of three cats one long hair Persian, I have to clean ROOMBA more often. But well worth the time it saves me. GREAT lil' BOT! A must BUY!

This thing has BLOWN ME AWAY!!! I have 4 dogs and the dirt on the floor is amazing. Where is does not do a SUPER job with the hair and it must be emptied always; it is sooooo worth it! I have 2!

If you have the need to "MULTI TASK " WHAT AN INVENTION !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Now I can dust and vacuum at the same time,then windex and still be vacuuming at the same time.. haha ,,make the beds and still vacuuming.... Who would belive this ? Unless......... YOU OWN ROOMBA !!!!!
Just press button and go go go ...... I LOVE IT AND I BET YOU WILL TOO !!!!!!!

EASY AS 1...2...3... WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

It is hard to believe that the unit does as advertised. There is not a lot of whiz bang whistles, music etc. It simply starts, vacuums, and returns for recharge. It consistently completes its daily work task without fanfare. My wife, who is a technology skeptic, even remarked how well the unit works and shocked me when she ask about a unit to mop. If you need to have a consistently cleaned floor, this unit is for you.

This thing will blow you away! I was talked into getting one of these by a friend of mine. I just didn't believe it was as good as he said it was. It is amazing! I have a 3 year old 80 lb Golden Retriever with long whispy hair. I have my iRobot (R2) go over the carpet almost every night. It runs about an hour and a half on carpet. I also have hard wood floors and it runs about 2 hours on one charge for that. This thing picks up an ungodly amount of hair everytime. I have to clean my R2 everytime after each vacuuming because of all the hair. Cleaning consists of dumping the dust bin (which holds a lot!) Then I remove the brush roller and rubber roller and pull all the hair off. When R2 is done it redocks and the carpet actually has vacuum rows like somebody actually ran a vacuum themselves. Although the patern R2 makes is not straight and makes no sense. It uses an algorythim program to dictate where it goes to cover every square inch at least twice. I can't brag enought about this thing. I know my family and friends are sick of hearing about it, so I have to take my bragging to the web. I almost bought another one just to have another one. But I don't need it. haha You can buy replacement and add on parts on the iRobot website. I have a Bachelors in electronic engineering and there was A LOT of thought and design put into this. It has truely impressed me. For example, the designer used two large wheels for the drive and one small wheel in the back. This allows it to easily go from my hardwood floor over the trim onto my carpet. It does actually suck, vacuum. Which supprised me because of the use of power that can take. But the alternately spinning brushes catch almost everything and the vacuum sucks up the rest. It isn't as quiet as I thought it would be. What's loud is the drive mech. It sounds like a toy tank with remote control. It's hard to watch tv and have R2 on. So I just program it to come on around 2 or 3am each morning. Oh, and you have to pick up everything off the floor the night before so it doesn't get stuck on anything. It will get stuck on rugs with fringe and small rugs will sometimes get tankgled up in the wheels. You can drive it with the romote but it is very cumbersome and not practicle. If I have a small area I want it to get I just hit the 'spot' button and it does like a 4 foot circle out and back in and stops. Highly, highly recommend the iRobot. I'm still angry at myself for not designing it! Have a good one.
Jeff

The best thing about the Roomba Scheduler is its ability to clean where we don't often go - under beds, sofas and the like. Setting up the schedule is a breeze and this feature allows you to do nothing and just when you want it done, your carpet is vacuumed. The larger dust bin in this model over the first version is a plus. Roomba does a great job for maintenance vacuuming, but use of a standard vacuum is probably a good idea on a monthly basis due to Roomba's suction limitations. I must admit that I do not get the 3 hours of battery power that is advertised. Will clean one decent sized room and then need recharging. Roomba often gets stuck under our hope chest - tries too extract itself, but usually jams itself in pretty tight. The invisible walls also tend to project too wide a beam meaning that the unit will avoid an area where you need cleaning. Overall, I wholeheartedly endorse the Roomba without reservation.

Bought a Scheduler for my wife for Valentine's day (how often can you say that about a vacuum?). She absolutely loves it. In fact, we just added a Red for the upstairs. Basically we use the Scheduler for every day vacuuming of the room with the most traffic, and the Red for weekly vacuuming elsewhere.

The Roomba has excellent pickup and the dustbin holds a remarkably large amount of dust. The scheduling feature is fantastic and it's nice to come home every day to a freshly vacuumed home. And the Red is great for the rest of the house. We just set him up to clean one room while we go shopping or out to dinner. We come back and he's done.

Only issues with it are the fact that if you accidentally leave something on the floor, like a wrapper or a sock, the Roomba will get hung up on it. But in the end, this ends up being a net positive, because it has forced us to be sure we tidy up better after ourselves. Also you have to place the home base on a wall with plenty of open room on either side (maybe 3-4 feet on both sides) Otherwise he sometimes has a hard time finding his way home. He used to get hung up in the corner until we moved the base further away from the corner

For those with dogs who worry about how they will react to it, ours were thoroughly unimpressed and had virtually no reaction. Also, there is FAR less pet hair in our house than there used to be. It's also a great conversation piece when we throw parties. And you too might notice yourself referring to the Roomba as 'he' before too long.

And considering this costs about the same as a decent vacuum, I can't imagine not wanting one.

I received the 4230 Scheduler box, but inside was a 4210 Discovery model--I filed a claim and received a refund, but still had to eat the return postage and all the time, frustration and effort the claim and mailing required. I would never order another high ticket item on eBay again. There are too many unethical people out there these days.

Works well, though I havent used the scheduling feature.
I use it in the bedroom mostly as it is able to get under the bed.
I have dogs and it is great for picking up hair that they shed.

This product is fantastic. You can schedule it to run while you are away from home. I use it while I am at home, because it can get hung up on bathroom rugs.
It collects pet fur from places your normal vacuum cannot reach. I can now vacuum once a week and run the Roomba each day and that takes care of all the fur. We have one dog and two cats in our home so there is lots of fur to deal with. And this little robotic vacuum has been amazing. Anyone with allergies due to pet fur and pet dander should buy one of these. It really helps to cut down on that problem as well.
The only cons I have seen is it can get hung up on throw rugs. And if you have a lot of fur you have to empty the dirt bin more than once during the run cycle.

Noisy? na.. not compared to a regular sized vacuum or even a dustbuster. I'd say the noise is comparable to an electric radio controlled car or a dish washer. I have been using it for a week and my house has never stayed this clean before. I have 4 cats and they tend to fuzz up the place pretty quick. I'm amazed to see the amount of fuzz this thing picks up daily. So far I've on used it on my tiled downstairs but it seems to transition well between the area rug and the tile. It sucks up cat litter ok, but pet food seems to be more of a challenge. If it roll right over it, it will suck it up; but if the little side flipper gets it, it usually bats the little nuggets across the room. Just remember it’s a vacuum, not your mother, it will pick up dirt and fuzz just fine; clothes, papers and garbage that’s your problem.

One Disadvantage is Gets stuck on small mats (ie doormats, bathmats). Programming the sheduling is kind of a pain. But otherwise a good machine

Genius machine
Keep the floor very clean
The battery is really 2 hours discharge.
Home base charging is really cool and schedule module is easy and works like it should be.

I purchased a remanufactured Roomba and thoroughly enjoy the convenience of having it vacumn while I am working on more enjoyable projects. It does a thorough job and is able to navigate well through out my home. I have three cats so it is especially helpful in removing cat hair.

We bought two Rhombas as presents for our adult children this Christmas. It was fun to see their reactions. At first they wondered if we had wasted our money but the Rhomba soon showed all of us what it could do. We laughed as it went on its maiden voyage in our son's house but our respect grew by leaps and bounds when we later emptied the canister. We now have one in our home and use it every other day and feel good about how clean our house has become. Regular cleaning is the key. It's like a very practical toy...entertaining and very useful.