At this point the floor was very clean and I just wanted to see the grabber, so I activated the manual mode that let me take direct control. The arm looks as youโd expect; a five-axis black robotic pincher on a pole, with neat cabling. Itโs impressive that it fits in the robot, but I hate to think what could happen if debris gets stuck in its hidey hole before it returns home.
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I pointed out where the sock was and asked the robot to collect it. It said there were no liftable items in view. I switched the arm to manual and controlled it to grab the sock in a surprisingly tight grip, then drove the robot to its bin to deposit it. A fun novelty, but more work for me than just picking up the sock.
It took some figuring out to get the robot to pick things up automatically. As it turns out, any socks, cloths or tissues need to be rolled up in a ball for the robot to grab them. Any slippers need to have their opening facing the middle of the room for the arm to scoop them up. It wonโt grab anything near a wall, or anything weighing more than 300 grams, and it wonโt attempt to grab anything on carpet.
With all that in mind, my revised test was to place a single sock, rolled into a ball, in the middle of the tiled hallway. The robot spotted it, picked it up with a somewhat unsettling mechanical squeal, and deposited it in the basket before returning to clean. A good demonstration, if a highly artificial one. It also passed tests with other objects placed on tiles โ all either slippers or rolled into balls. You can set it to put different objects in different places; slippers in front of the bed for example, socks in the bin, and it does so.
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But thatโs all in very deliberate testing. Not once has the robot picked something up and sorted it while carrying out its regular cleaning duties. Itโs just supremely unlikely that an object in its way would tick the required boxes to activate the arm. Thatโs not to say the feature is hopeless; Roborock says it will improve the grip in software updates, enabling it to pick up more objects in more situations. But right now, youโd be taking a gamble on that being useful.
Assuming you were interested in paying a premium for a robotic arm vacuum, youโd likely be very happy with the rest of the Z70โs features as well.
The robotโs a relatively compact unit that can squeeze under gaps of eight centimetres, its mop and side brush come out on little extenders to get into corners, itโs good at vacuuming up hair without getting its rollers tangled, and it integrates well with smart homes. The dock can remove and store the robotโs mop pads when not needed, clean them automatically in 80ยฐC hot water and dry them. It has a lifting chassis that can carry wet mop pads over short carpet, or hop over thresholds of around four centimetres. And it generally does a very good job of vacuuming and mopping.
The only problem is, you can get all of that in a robot that costs less than $3000, including the Dreame X50 Ultra and Roborockโs own Saros 10R. An extra $1000 for a mechanical arm, which is currently not much more than a novelty, is a steep ask.
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