The robots are taking over – or so it seems. With more amazing advances in technology it’s easier than ever to own incredible devices that make our lives easier.
The best thing about it? A lot of this amazing technology is becoming more affordable. Take the Hoover 2-In-1 Robot Vacuum Cleaner & Mop – HG4 Hydro, for example, which is on sale for £249 down from £299. And it just happens I’ve been testing out over the last few weeks.
I’ve always been a bit sceptical about the likes of robot vacuums. Having been let down by various bits of technology that promise the world in the past, I was left wondering if a robot vac could really live up to the hype.
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It sounds so simple, but I’ve wondered if such a device had the ability to navigate its way around the house and leave the floors sparkling. How did it fare? I put it to the test…
Pros:
- Fabulous and accurate room scanning
- Avoids obstacles
- Keeps floors looking clean
Cons:
- App could be more user-friendly
Setting it up
The £249 device is simple enough to set-up. You start by plugging in the base station in an appropriate location, downloading the accompanying app to control the machine and connecting it to your Wi-Fi. It’s all pretty straightforward and it felt like it was ready to go in no time.
After that, you set the robot off to map your rooms, and I was blown away by how impressive this is. The device works its way around, drawing a floorplan map on the app. Within a few minutes it had accurately worked out the various rooms downstairs and was ready to get to work.
Time to start cleaning
Listen, it isn’t the same as doing a thorough vacuum and mop yourself with a bit of elbow grease. But it does a really good job of keeping on top of crumbs, dust and muddy marks.
The other day I noticed the floor looked a bit mucky, so I sat down and let the robot get to work – bliss. Around half an hour later the whole of the downstairs flooring was sparkling once more – and I hadn’t had to lift a finger, it feels like magic at times.
The robot is fairly quiet and doesn’t make a racket – although my dog wasn’t sure what to make of it at first. It begins by working its way around the edge of each room, with a genius sweeping brush thats wingspan reaches slightly wider than the machine itself doing a great job of brushing the crumbs into the path of the suction part. Meanwhile, the mopping pad drags along at the back, cleaning the surface after the crumbs have been vacuumed up.
Once the edges are done, the robot begins making passes in a straight line up and down the room, which I find unbelievably satisfying to watch. It works on one room at a time before moving onto the next, in my case the front room, kitchen and then hallway, before returning to its base station to recharge.
I like the function on the app where you can instruct it to simply do one room if you wish. It’s handy if most of the downstairs is fine but you spot there’s a mess in, say, the front room. The battery life is solid, I find it can comfortably do the downstairs of the house and still have some charge left, while filling up the water tank is also enough to cover mopping the downstairs.
The machine doesn’t hold loads of liquid but that’s to be expected considering the size of it. If it were to hold more it would need to be bigger and would get in the way more, so the size of the water tank is an acceptable compromise.
I’ve been especially impressed with the way it deals with unexpected obstacles, say a dining chair that hasn’t been pushed under the table fully. Obviously that obstacle has moved since the room was originally mapped, but it’s no issue for the robot which simply taps its way gently around the chair leg, before continuing on.
It really is quite fascinating to watch and very clever. You do have to do a few maintenance tasks yourself (oh the horror!) like clearing the brush of wheels of hairs that get tangled, and emptying the dirt, but it only takes a couple of minutes.
What’s not so great?
The app has all manner of fancy features, but I can’t help but feel some of it could do with simplifying a bit. I’m pretty tech savvy but find some of it tricky to navigate, while doing things like setting no-go zones for the hoover on the room map feels a bit clunky.
I was trying to set it up to avoid going near the radiator so it didn’t bash into any of the valves, but found this a bit tricky. The minimum size of the no-go zone seemed needlessly big, meaning the vacuum misses a larger than desired zone near the radiator which is a bit annoying.
It’s nothing drastic but I’ve definitely used smoother apps that feel easier to navigate. It has also got stuck once or twice, so I had to rescue it from a baby bouncer and a lamp it had managed to get tangled in. Again, nothing terrible, but I prefer to use the robot while I’m in the house in case of issues like that. If it does get stuck the hoover simply shuts itself off and notifies you on the app.
What else is out there?
The Lubluelu Robot Vacuum Cleaner with Mop on Amazon is in a similar sort of price range at £189.99. That model has had lots of five-star reviews, including from one buyer who said: “Love this! It’s been fantastic, it’s not going to replace a proper hoover but it brilliant for everyday bits. For example, we run it each evening and it picks up a whole bucket full of cat hair and dust. Our house is considerably less dusty and much less fur from cats around too. The mop setting it’s worth noting only uses water so it’s not going to disinfect/deep clear but it is good for a quick wipe up like muddy cat prints etc.”
However, one of the less-impressed reviewers of that model did say: “I bought this for daily use for my home. The UI is horrible- sometimes it connects to the internet, sometimes it doesn’t, which means half the time I can’t set it to go where I want it to.”
Shark has also launched a snazzy-looking robot vacuum, though it’s a bit more expensive at £399.99 , but does boast a self-emptying feature that holds up to 60 days of dirt and debris.
Overall
I’ve been very impressed with Hoover’s HG4 Hydro that’s packed with fabulously intelligent technology for the price. It undoubtedly makes life a lot easier while, crucially, retailing at a sensible price point.
There are a couple of little flaws, particularly around the app, which I think some less tech-savvy people might struggle with a bit, but overall I think it’s excellent for the price point.
It isn’t going to fully replace the need for a vacuum and mop, but it means you have to do it far less often and with much less effort. If you have no need for the mop function then Hoover also makes a model that simply vacuums – the HG4 – priced at £249.
Where to buy the HG4 Hydro
Pros:
- Fabulous and accurate room scanning
- Avoids obstacles
- Keeps floors looking clean
Cons:
- App could be more user-friendly
The HG4 Hydro costs £249 directly from Hoover and £249 on Amazon.