meet (potentially) Alfred

After a long debate with myself and the bank account I decided to hire Alfred. Alfred is a robotic vacuum cleaner by KOIOS. The advertising as well as the description puts many claims forward. One of them is that the noise the robot makes during vacuuming is less than 65dB, the other claims state that the suction is 80% higher than the competition, and boasts an infrared-sensor for evading obstacles. The main factor for me was, of course, the price, $199 on Amazon.
Scheduled delivery was Monday, but it showed up two days early - excellent delivery service. Of course I had to check it out right away although it was past 9 PM.

The package

Expecting an overnight charge like my previous robot vacuum, I positioned the machine (it has to prove itself before it gets a name) in the docking station and started fiddling with the remote control. To my surprise the machine was already fully charged which I discovered after I hit the clean button on the remote and the robot zoomed off. It turns out that the first claim about the noise was completely right, in contrast to the previous one (the machine aka Nigel) this vacuum robot only emitted a low humming sound while scuttling at various speeds throughout the house.

Day 1

I programmed the machine to start at 10 AM although it was Sunday. The predecessor was not allowed to work on the weekend due to the noise.
The robot started right on time under my watchful eyes. First thing I noticed that the machine did not run into objects, instead it stopped short if it was within the infrared-sensor. My second observation was the fact that the vacuum did not get as easily tangled up in the fringes of the carpet. However, the brushes on the right and left side skidded under the carpet when the robot was trying to switch from the hardwood floor to the carpet and caused the machine to back off or, in some cases, get stuck. Although the cleaning result was adequate, I still had thoughts; a long term employment might not be in the cards for now.

Day 2

How time flies, it is 10 AM again and the KOIOS vacuum has started its round. I set the program for a full house cleaning, in an relentless effort and multiple passes through the rooms the robot finished the work and docked for reloading for the next day. It seemed that the hardwood to carpet transition was resolved for whatever reason. I got the feeling that it did not depend on how much the machine cleaned, since it does multiple passes for each room, but how low the battery is. Also it seems that the cleaning pattern is somewhat erratic. For short periods of time it covers an area in a parallel back and forth pattern, then it rolls somewhere besides the end of the area which was just cleaned and repeats the pattern. I don't think it tracks what areas have been covered and which ones have not been treated.

Day 3

Today was the first day when the robotic vacuum was on its own. I left all the areas open to see what the robot can do. Occasionally I peeked through the surveillance camera to see how the machine performs. Sure enough the wheels were spinning and a little black dot was going back and forth. I returned late in the afternoon just to find the little guy tangled up in the fringes of the carpet. After I freed the machine it continued with the cleaning without hesitation - for two and a half hours. That is either dedication or bad programming. 

Day 4 

I moved the docking station to the same position the previous vacuum (Nigel) was in anticipation of a different route and/or behavior in cleaning.
The usual start 10 AM on the dot. However, after 2 hours and 45 minutes I finally had enough of the humming and the occasional cry for help. I stopped the vacuuming and send the cleaning robot to its room aka recharging station, which did not work. After guiding it with the remote close enough so it can sense the recharging station it was incapable of docking, instead, it ran into it several times and backed out. The machine does not have any guidance system whatsoever to know if it was in the room or not. I'm all for cleanliness but if you work from home it would be preferable to endure the humming for an hour or so (the place is not that big) and not 3 hours with repeated visits. Yes indeed it cleans, very well I must say, largely due to the pattern. The first one is sort of straight, the second and third cross wise. The latter leads the bot into other room openings and it starts the pattern or continues the pattern again until the forward movement leads it out the door again.

Ricochet Pattern (bouncing off the wall)

This is the auto clean setting which is completely annoying because the gizmo does not know when to stop. Tomorrow I'll try the one room setting, according to KOIOS the pattern is only up and down and not cross wise as shown above. On second thought what good does that if you have more than one room? One more feature I miss from the Nigel bot is the scheduling of the cleaning, KOIOS does not have that, it is a 24/7 operation. If I have a machine like that I would like to be able to program it to my needs. I don't really care for somebody else to think that this is what I need or that this is the right way to do things. To answer the invisible question: "yes, I can return it", "yes, I should have read their thoughts behind the machine" ...

Rethinking the concept here