iRobot Roomba 530 – Your shiny white vacuum cleaning robot

I always wanted one of these. When will these things become affordable and widespread?

The Roomba 530 is a white vacuum cleaning robot. It is smart enough to actually return to its charging station itself and will detect stairs so it doesn’t fall over. It even comes with a sensor to assess the cleanness of a certain area. The Roomba will continue to clean the specific area until it’s clean. It also claims that it costs 1 yen (about 1 cent) in electricity costs per hour of cleaning.

You can get it for $329.99 at the iRobot website.

It’d be nice if you could rent this and give it a try before a purchase to see how well this works. It's certain a cool gadget though!

Source:
Roomba 500 series pamphlet (Japanese)
Roomba website