iRobot Roombas - Past, Present & Future

Back in the 1950s, all the forward-looking magazines like Popular Science and Life promised us a bright, clean 21st century with all kinds of Jetsons-style wonders and conveniences, like cities on the moon, meals in pills, jet cars, smart houses, and household robots.

Boy, did they get it wrong.

Not only are we still waiting on jet cars, smart houses, and the lunar cities (they can keep the meal pills), they somehow missed the electronics revolution that put a computer on every desk. But they did get a couple of things right, and one of them was the use of robots in the home.

You may be thinking "Huh?!" right about now, but that's only because you've forgotten about Roomba. But you're forgiven, because no one ever considered the possibility that a robotic vacuum cleaner -- and a cheap robotic vacuum cleaner at that -- would represent the very vanguard of the home robotics revolution.

Fifty years ago, if a futurist considered the possibility of a robot vacuum cleaner at all, it more resembled the Jetsons' Rosie than a foot-wide flattened disk: something like a human, which pushed a standard vacuum cleaner rather than being the cleaner itself. It took roboticists a while to get past the anthropomorphic robot idea, and Roomba is one of the results.

November 2008: Latest updates are in green.

iRobot's® Roombas®

It doesn't get any better than this!

Top technology from iRobot® and Hammacher Schlemmer's lifetime guarantee -- it's a match made in heaven! When you purchase your Roomba Vacuum from Hammacher Schlemmer not only do you get the best product iRobot® has to offer -- you also get to take advantage of Hammacher Schlemmer's unconditional and unwavering promise -- their merchandise is guaranteed for life.

iRobot® Roomba Vacuums
It looks like iRobot® has cleaned house and is now only manufacturing the following floor cleaning robots (Models 780, 770, 760, 560 and 530). Narrowing the selection makes it so much easier to choose the model that will work best as it appears they have weeded out the models that people were having so many problems with -- which is a good thing! Only the best of the best are available for sale from our online merchant and they also offer an unconditonal lifetime warranty!

Roomba® Pet Series
Spend more quality time with your pet - while Roomba® does the cleaning for you! The Pet Series was designed specifically for pet owners who are fighting the war on pet hair, debris and pet dander. This little hair ball sucker covers 3 to 4 rooms on a single battery charge depending on what model you buy. It's large debris bins, anti-tangle technology, and other pet friendly features will do the vacuuming for you and your household of pets.

iRobot® Scooba
The Scooba® floor washing robot does it all: it preps by sucking up loose dirt and crumbs, washes, scrubs, and cleans up after itself, leaving the floor sparkling and dry -- and it does it all in one pass. One of the Scooba's best features is the fact that it'll scrub every spot on your floor an average of four times, ensuring a thorough cleaning. It even gets up beneath the edges of kitchen cabinets and under tables to clean where normal cleaning tools don't. It's the only mop you'll ever need!

Captain Future? Not So Much

Boy, did they get it wrong.

November 2008: Latest updates are in green.