Roomba and Scooba www.irobot.com

if yu are tempted by the blurb and 30 day no risk guarantee to try the top of the range irobot --resist. It is a useless bit of kit. If you are bothered about a clean house its no good--if you are not, why waste your cash for a few less crumbs. It is an earatic mad thing that can spend an hour or more circuling about and still manage to avoid the most obvious dirt.

The support service is exceptionally poor--they just didn't answer the specific points and respond with generalities and banalaties.

And when I came to return it the process was fruaght with difficulty. First they said no problem and offered to arrange collection. Then after a week or so and endless time spent chasing they told me it was my responsbility to arrange return! had they said so to begin with I'd have happily done it.

In all it cost me a lot in time as well as the courier costs to return it in order to try it out.

The Irobot is not durable. It falls off my sliding window to my planter every time the window is open. Within 8 months, it stops every time it hits the wall and I got it fixed for free but after 1 year it refuses to start and when I brought it back thinking that it was the battery, I was told that it was not the battery and had to pay $50 for service charge. Then 1 week later I received a call saying that I have to change my battery and charger. I felt cheated because it does not take 1 week just to find out that it is the battery and I don't think it cost $50 just to say that the battery needed changing. Furthermore the charger was fine when I sent it. Even my 10 year old vacuum cleaner that cost me less than $100 is still serving me until today. I would not recommend it to any of my friends or enemies. The after sales is lousy.

I brought my scooba 385 last February directly from irobot. After washing 3 floors it broke down and had to be sent back for repair to Germany. When I got it back it continued to fail. Stops cleaning after 30 minutes. Continually needs resetting. This is the biggest waste of money robot on the market. I owned two robomow robot lawn mowers which are fantastic hence my purchase of what I though would be another labour saving device. Do not make the same mistake as me, stay away from iRobot products, in my experience they are expensive £300, poor quality for this price and very very unreliable.

We bought a 560 about a year and a half ago after reading all the reviews we could find. In the time we have had it the batteries have been replaced once and we are waiting delivery of a new brush assembly. Overall it is a very useful tool, we bought it to stop our little girl from picking bits up off the floor when she was crawling and toddling and also because with a new born it was a battle keeping the place clean.

On the plus side it does work quite well - you need to empty it regularly and clean out the brushes, particularly if anyone in the house has long hair, but you will still need to hoover every couple of weeks to get the odd bits it misses in corners. The gear assembly needs to be opened up and cleaned out every 6 months or the brushes get very difficult to turn and you hear a click click noise, ulimately the whole thing wears out and needs to be replaced. Apart from that its been a good machine,I think its a bit overpriced and the virtual walls are not really necessary for us and will miss it when it finally packs up.

I just wanted to alert potential buyers that iRobot (the manufacturers of Roomba robots) treat their customers with open contempt.

I tried to order one from their website but got rejected because of iRobot error. So I complained. Their response for breathtaking:

"Once again our selection system proved flawless. We keep avoiding the pain in te [sic] a** customers."

Potential buyers beware: iRobot thinks that you are "a pain in the a**".

My Roomba works well, when it works. I must admit that I use it every day on a different room on max. I have to return it to be fixed every three months. Thank goodness I bought an extended warranty and the service center is about 15 minutes drive away. The battery has a limited life. I was advised that if I ran it on maximum and did not allow it to get back to the home base, the battery life would be extended. I do this every time I use it. Still no luck - will need to buy a new battery every so often.

we just returned our second roomba back to costco.we really liked it. i dont know why it didnt work but it would run for awhile and stop beep twice. we cleaned it according to the book, set it back down and it would run for about 30 seconds. beep twice, we would remove the basket and no dirt was in it'. we are afraid to try it again.

I am very happy with Roomba 560. Well spent money. I would recommend without hesitation. Bring new things IRobot!

Fantastic vacuum cleaner. Good cleaning, does the corners and under furniture, dirt compartment reasonable. Takes a while to clean a room but who cares! Does not do stairs but some people just brush dirt to the bottom.

This has to be the best purchase ever!!! I own a very hairy collie and hoover my kitchen at least 3x day. This vacuum not only gets on with the job by itself, but (surprisingly) the results exceed any previous model I have had before (trust me I have tried everything including more expensive dysons, miele and sebos). The dog has quickly got used to it and is not at all scared. The roomba is not particularly loud and even though the collection box is small, it is quick and easy to empty. I just wish I had bought one sooner and gone for the model up which has a timer. Now eagerly awaiting delivery of a scooba (floor washing model) from the US. In summary I cannot recommend this machine enough and if it only does 2yrs it will have lasted longer than most vacuums I have tried, cost me less and given better overall service.

The Romba is fairly user friendly, tedious to clean but worth the trouble. If it lasted longer, it would be worth it! I would not recommend to anyone. Mine worked no more soon after the warranty ran out even though I purchased a new expensive battery. I was offered an out of warranty "deal" to purchase another Romba for $99.00. I was not offered a refund on the new battery.