I want to share my experience of using this product over the last 3-4 weeks to help others.
MOBILE APP:
When it arrived I gave it a quick charge and performed the setup via the app, which was really quick and painless. It found the robot immediately, accepted my wifi password first time and allowed me to choose a name, which I have unimaginatively chosen as Ozmo. So far so good. How Ecovacs have got away with using a logo in the app that is the spitting image of the cleaner robot from Wall-E I don't know, but aside from that the app works as it should and the UX, although room for improvement, allows me to do what I need to with relatively little frustration or dead ends. I'm able to use the camera on the robot (only when it's not cleaning) to patrol the house and check up on my toddler (who loves it by the way), which has actually saved me from adding a couple of additional static cameras in the playroom. I can also see how long the robot has cleaned, how much area it has covered, and how much battery remains. Finally it allows me to set a schedule and set various settings for cleaning, including cleaning patterns, how many cleaning iterations it should do and also to set the power of the vacuum and amount of water used when mopping. The app communicates with the robot pretty instantly, though it's not always up to date when you check up on where the robot is and how much of the floor it's covered already, and I also don't get push notifications, though I believe that's due to my terrible HuaWei.
Final thing to say about the app is that it wasn't super intuitive to set up multi floors, but it does do it. I'm not about to spend this kind of money on two robots for my two storey house so it was important that it had the ability to create two maps, one for each floor, and I set about this in the app. It turns out this is all done seamlessly by the robot without any user intervention - it should recognise that it is positioned in a new location when you set it down on another floor and go about mapping out the new area. However, when I did this it didn't save the map at the end, so it only ever showed one floor as being mapped. I deleted all maps and started again and this time it all worked, it just would have been useful to pick up the phone and ask questions about this to a product expert (more on that later).
WHAT'S IN THE BOX:
This is an area I was a little confused by. In my box I seemed to receive an additional mopping attachment, although there was already some kind of attachment connected to the vacuum that had a water inlet. Though I'm still not completely clear, I think this is some kind of pro cleaning attachment that may have previously been sold separately and now comes included, as there is no mention of it in the manual that came with it, or the digital one found in the app. This pro attachment has a plate that vigorously moves back and forth to scrub the floor like a mop as it goes. Aside from that it had everything I needed to be up and running, apart from the auto empty station which I believe will be available on Amazon some time in 2021 and will mean I will only need to empty the bin every 30 days, instead of every cleaning cycle. Though this is a small price to pay as it's a very small and easy task thanks to the good design of the dust box and locking mechanism.
MOPPING PERFORMANCE:
The pro mop attachment is good, though probably the weakest part of the product. I found that I am having to make it do two cycles, on max water setting, to really look like the floor has been cleaned. It does struggle with dried on food like baked beans, but does a reasonable job on my tiled floor and it generally looks cleaner once it's finished. But if mopping is your primary goal then there are other options on the market, but given this is included on the unit I think I will keep using it see how it goes, I'm certainly not rushing to buy an additional robot just for mopping.
VACUUM PERFORMANCE:
The amount of dust I empty at the end of each cycle shows just how much it is picking up so I think it's doing a really good job at vacuuming. It navigates round my house fairly efficiently and, although it does on occasion take an odd route, it rarely skips an area completely as evidenced by the map displayed on the app during and after it is cleaning. Its low height means it cleans under my sofas and beds, which is something I only do on occasions because of the hassle of moving everything, so I generally live a cleaner life now. The AI I'm sure will improve but so far I have not been completely convinced by its ability to identify objects. In particular it does struggle with cables and has managed to get stuck, or even pull over a floor standing lamp, when it's caught itself on the power cord. So I have now gone round the house and mounted all cables and power extension cables on the wall so that it doesn't get stuck on them. This initially felt like a massive hassle but actually means dust won't collect in these areas and they will actually get cleaned, where previously I would skip over these with my hoover. You could also just mark these in the app as 'no go zones' if you wanted to, I just took the opportunity to do some cable tidying.
SERVICE:
After it arrived I gave it a quick charge and it did a few laps of the house before it ran out of battery. Sadly, manually placing it back on the charging dock did not charge it and the call to the repair centre suggested it was probably a hardware fault. However, performing a reset on the robot myself appeared to get it back up and running again and it has now done many rounds of the house and charged itself at the end of each cleaning cycle so I think the problem is now resolved. It was frustrating to not be able to speak to a product expert; the repair centre number in the app is really just that, only interested in repairs rather than questions about the product itself or the mobile app. This is an area of weakness for the company for me. However, to their credit, they have been responsive over email and have reached out to provide me with post sales support, which has been excellent. Email support can generally be difficult with tech products like this so I hope it's not something I will need to rely on too often, but in my experience so far they have been able to deal with my issue efficiently and courteously so I am grateful for that.
I would recommend the product to others looking for a robotic vacuum cleaner and, although I have no point of comparison, I think it is well priced for what it does. It's just a shame it can't do the stairs!
| Brand | ECOVACS |
|---|---|
| Colour | Black |
| Package Dimensions | 51.2 x 42.4 x 18.3 cm; 4.7 Kilograms |
| Capacity | 420 Millilitres |
| Power / Wattage | 40 watts |
| Voltage | 14.4 Volts |
| Number of Speeds | 4 |
| Carpet Cleaning Performance Class | A |
| Hard Floor Cleaning Performance Class | A |
| Runtime | 3 hours |
| Compatible Models | Smartphones, Amazon Echo, Google Home |
| Special Features | ❶【On-demand Live Video Stream from your moving DEEBOT for a new level of monitoring and reassurance.】 ❷【With the upgraded AIVI™ technology，multiple obstacles can be recognized with 2X faster identification speed.】 ❸【Maps your home with 4x accuracy】 ❹【Powerful OZMO Pro Oscillating Mopping System】 ❺【With 5200mAh battery, DEEBOT cleans up to 3+ hours per charge. Ideal for large homes and spaces.】, 【Carpet Detection / Map Generated by App / FW OTA / Voice Report / Time Scheduling / Continuous Cleaning / Advanced Map Function / Dust Bin Detection / Water Level Adjustment / Floating Main Brush】 |
| Item Weight | 4.7 kg |
