Robovac - pet fur - RoboRock S6 MaxV

Forums › Gadgets, robotics, home automation, electronics (including wearables) › Robovac - pet fur - RoboRock S6 MaxV

mdf

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#286104 6-Jun-2021 10:37

Happy Queens Birthday (sales) all! Mrs MDF has seen the light and agreed to a robot vacuum cleaner. Main issue is pet fur (two cats), though a pair of tweens that seem to need reminding every other bite to Eat Over A Plate also contribute. Fully appreciate robovacs will not replace actual vacuuming, just aiming to make the actual vacuuming a bit less frequent. Living space (primary target for robovacuuming) is a mix of wooden and carpeted floors.

Online reviews I've read suggest the RoboRock S6 MaxV is a good value option for dealing with pet fur. Would appreciate any GZ corroboration and/or differences with that opinion. Aim is to spend up to the $1K mark, which the RoboRock seems to come in at.

One other point to perhaps mention is that we have a stupidly high carpet bar between the carpet in one room and the wooden floors in another - a good ~15mm. Super result would be a robovacuum that can jump that height but suspect it might be a bit much to ask. It's not the end of the world if I have to replace that carpet bar, but would be good to know the maximum realistic height difference that might work.

gbwelly

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#2718906 6-Jun-2021 11:00

Robot vacuum cleaners will totally replace actual vacuuming. Just wait until you see what it picks up on it's first run. I suggest you vacuum the house manually first.

I have cats, and a mix of floorboards and carpet. It is marvelous at dealing with fur.

One thing I suggest is getting the house clear of things it can ingest (aka usb charging cables 95% of the time) and running it on a schedule daily. People who only manually start it once a week don't get the killer feature -a freshly vacuumed house always. I have the first gen Xiaomi Mi, and it has on occasion jumped the threshold and decided to vacuum the back yard if the door is open, if your carpet bar is at all sloped then it should be ok.

Zorg2000

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#2720348 7-Jun-2021 18:58

I have a Roborock S6 and can't really fault it for cleaning. No pets but a couple of small humans. You get used to picking everything up off the floor when you do a whole house clean otherwise just zone off each room and do them individually. Keep an eye on it the first time around to see where it might get stuck and where to set no go zones. And yes they love USB cables. We have bar stools with a steel tube feet approx 12-15mm in height and it drives up over them without much issue, I haven't run it with the doors open as I fear it would have a go at crossing the aluminum joinery and make break for freedom. I do have self emptying envy though so I am keeping a watchful eye out for that feature on upcoming models that are reasonably priced.

irpegg

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#2720441 8-Jun-2021 01:48

Have an S6 MaxV with two dogs and a cat and it works really well. You will be surprised how much it picks up in its first week of runs, and i would suggest you have it on twice a day for the first week to really pick up everything and set a good foundation.

As long as that carpet bar is rounded off it should be fine to go over it, it is only two wheels, however, so if it's too high might cause the tail to drag and get stuck. If not you can always geofence it.

10/10 love the purchase and would recommend it to anyone.

shanes

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#2720586 8-Jun-2021 09:43

Maybe a bit late for the sales, but here's another vote for the Roborock S6 Max V.

We have two short haired dogs a cat, and a long haired daughter, seems to have no trouble picking up after them, I've had it for 7 months and have only had to de-hair the pickup roller/brush once.

I have new vanity unit sitting on the floor with the draws out waiting to be installed, I think it is made of 18mm timber, the Roborock has no problems climbing into it, climbing mats and transitions no problem, and as gbwelly mentions, I am wary that it does try and climb out onto the deck if the sliding doors are open.

Amazing what it picks up, I run it every couple of days and it keeps the place looking tidy.

I do run around picking up before hand, and have discovered cat sick before starting it, so if you have animals I wouldn't schedule it to run before a check...

jonathan18

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#2720663 8-Jun-2021 11:44

We’ve got an older model (S5), and can indeed confirm they can suddenly develop a keenness to escape the confines of a house - a while back I heard a sound from outside; following that I found the cleaner merrily vacuuming the veranda! I just placed a ‘no go’ line across the location of the front and back doors and haven’t had a repeat of the problem since.

Re carpet/hard floor drops - we have a decent drop between carpet and wooden floor between the dining and kitchen, and it manages this fine. It’s fairly noisy (hear a ‘donk’ each time it navigates the drop), and it’s pretty poor at picking up crud sitting near the carpet bar - would probably be better, TBH, if it vacuumed at right-angles to this (in line with the bar), but I don’t believe there’s any control over that.

mdf

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#2739639 6-Jul-2021 11:53

Just closing the loop on this one...

By the time I got around to ordering the RoboRock was out of stock at the sale price. We ended up with an Ecovacs Deebot T8 AIVI and been running for a month or so. *Super* impressed with vacuuming ability. @gbwelly nailed it with this one:

Robot vacuum cleaners will totally replace actual vacuuming. Just wait until you see what it picks up on it's first run.

Pretty much doing daily vacuums and it still picks up a lot of stuff; carpet looks really clean.

If I had to nitpick, the app could be a bit more intuitive but the vacuum itself is really good. The "AI" for obstacle recognition selling point seems to work mostly okay - we've only eaten one charging cable and the arm of a jersey, so could have been worse.

Azzura

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#2739680 6-Jul-2021 13:15

mdf:

Just closing the loop on this one...

By the time I got around to ordering the RoboRock was out of stock at the sale price. We ended up with an Ecovacs Deebot T8 AIVI and been running for a month or so. *Super* impressed with vacuuming ability. @gbwelly nailed it with this one:

Robot vacuum cleaners will totally replace actual vacuuming. Just wait until you see what it picks up on it's first run.

Pretty much doing daily vacuums and it still picks up a lot of stuff; carpet looks really clean.

If I had to nitpick, the app could be a bit more intuitive but the vacuum itself is really good. The "AI" for obstacle recognition selling point seems to work mostly okay - we've only eaten one charging cable and the arm of a jersey, so could have been worse.

Have a Deebot T9 here (self emptying)- works great. The app sometimes loses the house mapping (is a bit of a pain)...but slowly working out a routine to recover it (the map).

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timmmay

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#2739693 6-Jul-2021 13:32

Even the cheap $400 Xiaomi robot vacuums are pretty good. They clean well, support virtual walls and such, but they don't have as many sensors and they bash into furniture constantly, but with a rubber bumper. When it fails we'll buy a better model. Roborock is owned / made by Xiaomi.

I don't think the one I have replaces the main vacuum, which is much more powerful, but it reduces the frequency of using the main vacuum a lot. We used to vacuum 2 - 3 times a week, now we run the robot 2 - 3 times a week and use the big vacuum fortnightly.