iRobot - Combo J5+

I had an i8+ which died and got exchanged for a j5+ this never worked and after 6+ months of troubleshooting I finally got a replacement unit that works. I will never buy a Roomba again.

i have a j5+ and it will be the last roomba i ever buy lol. actually the worst thing i’ve ever wasted money on and i got banned from the sub for saying that

I would think the C20 would be much more convenient than the j5+. Although there's no internal water tank on the C20, the dock has both clean and dirty water tanks on the base station, and can automatically wash the mop. It will have to return to the dock frequently to keep the mop pads wet, but it should do this automatically as it's cleaning. With the j5+, pretty much all maintenance on the mop will be manual, meaning you will be responsible for cleaning and drying dirty pads, and refilling the onboard water tank (which will be smaller than the C20's base tank). Additionally, since the C20 washes the pad multiple times during the job, the pad will be less likely to smear dirt across the entire floor. Finally, the spinning pads on the C20 will provide more scrubbing power than the stationary pad on the j5+. Astroturfing is always a concern with reviews; the best thing is to look for reputable reviewers. Just A Dad on YouTube has recent reviews, including a comparison with the Eufy X10, and he has a good reputation for being independent.

I run a Roomba J5+ daily on the main floor where my GSD hangs out. And a couple times a week in the bedroom/hallway, because she sleeps in there with me. Been doing this for a little over a year, and it has helped a lot. It does pretty well at keeping up with the hair. One thing I've noticed though is that, at least in my house, the dust filter needs to be cleaned regularly, even with a self-emptying vacuum: every two or three runs or so. This is because dust (not hair) tends to cake onto it, and the self-empty feature doesn't pull that off very well. If it gets even partially blocked the vacuum won't pick up debris and dust as well. Fortunately the dust filter is easy to get at. Keeping the equipment clean will help it perform at its best. My house is probably dustier than many because I have carpet throughout, except in the obvious places (kitchen, bathrooms). There's no roller brush on most Roomba models; instead, it's a pair of rubber (or silicone?) rollers. Nothing gets stuck on them, though you may have to take them out and clean around the axles occasionally. Robot vacuums definitely help, but I don't think any robot vac is going to be completely hands-off, set it and forget it.

Do you have it set to vacuum while mopping, sucking up moisture which makes hair and dust clump? I think the auto empty of Ecovacs/Yeedi is on the weaker side (at least comparing my X1 omni with my roomba j5+). I'd make it clean one small custom zone or room at a time on a schedule so that the hair doesn't build up too much between auto empties

I'm really happy with my j5+. Every run is fine and I have ~450 hours on it. It's navigation sucks compared to my lidar bots and it can't run in the dark. It also seems like the older combos are less reliable. With that being said it vacuums well and has good obstacle avoidance. It can handle insane messes thanks to the bin sensors

My j5+ is really good with pet hair. No clogs or tangles. Long human hair does get stored inside the rollers, but will eventually wrap around the rollers My Ecovacs x1 and roborock s6 have a bristle brush that pet hair gets stuck in

Obstacle detection/avoidance of the j series is good, it's the navigation that is problematic (hard hitting walls/furniture, poor coverage, and getting lost) I feel that this model needs better anti-tangling tech to be more competitive

Just avoid Roombas. They're really loud so you can't really run them when you're in the house whereas Eufy and Roborock are very quiet (maybe not all of them just the ones I've seen). Roombas have also fallen behind on software, I spent €900 to replace my 4 year old 960 with a J9+ Combo, it's constantly struggling to dock, if you take if off the dock yourself it loses the mop function unless you restart it literally 10 times and it's forever getting stuck or ignoring the saved map. Now I have the clean bag full error after two months when the previous bag lasted me a full year. I got a J5+ for upstairs and it's equally bad. Can never find the dock or will do a random 10 minute clean before going back. My 960 wasn't perfect but when I bought it, it was one of the only decent ones on the market as they hadn't taken off at the time and it was also on the US market for like 4 years by the time I bought it.

We have a j5 I think which has been fine then actually bought the Braava mop which was great, whilst it worked… it stopped working within warranty and they won’t replace it or refund me as it’s a discontinued product. They only said I can have the most basic combo model which I don’t want. Have been arguing with them for a while now. If it’s a discontinued line and no replacement can be offered then please just give me a refund not something useless to me!

Roomba Combo models are so lame compared to older iRobot products! I know, I've tried one. Highest rated are Roborock and Dreame. I'm very happy with my Dreame bots.

There’s actually a roomba that does both vacuuming and light mopping (think of it like roomba swiffer). It has a reservoir of the liquid at the charging station and a bag dispenser for the dust as well. I never felt older than when I got genuinely excited for a roomba like I would for a console when I was younger. That’s my “treat yourself” buy when I get my next bonus lol

iRobot already did that with their first generation iRobot Combo (R11xx). The Roomba Essential was also not made by iRobot. Now it seems none of them will be. I just don't understand the end game for iRobot. Are they just gonna be riding on the brand name from now on and slowly disappear into nothingness because why would OEM give 3rd party better tech and design than they use in their own robots? iRobot, as much as they've been weird and stubborn with some things, I still love their core design of robots since introduction of E series and later i. I loved how they ALL had identical main roller brushes, identical side brushes, identical filters, identical dust bins, identical almost everything. Not only it's cheaper for them to supply 1 type of each part, it's easier for users, for regular maintenance and repairs. I work in this part of the industry and I can't stress enough how many times customers/consumers have no clue what device they have, be it robot vacuum or a regular vacuum. If you just need to tell "I have a roomba" and that's all it's needed to know which part you supply. So many Chinese robots as well as ones from other well known brands like Electrolux, Philips and Rowenta have different parts for almost every model and it's soooooooooooo annoying.