I like the Roomba, I do, but my biggest issue with iRobot's signature product has long been the ability to actually control the thing. You charge it up, press a button and then let it go to work. When it's done, it's done.
But this is 2015. What we really need is a robotic vacuum we can control with our smartphones. Neato beat the Massachusetts company to the punch on that one with the Neato Botvac Connected. The 'bot has Wi-Fi built-in, making it possible to do a whole slew of different things with a phone or tablet.
Users can adjust settings, schedule cleanings, perform a spot cleaning and, arguably best of all, manually control the robot. I took the robot for a spin and found it reasonably intuitive - there are two buttons for reorienting the vacuum and two directional buttons.
Perhaps its the old-school gamer in me, but a joystick would have been nice. The more I think about it, the more I realize that what I'm really looking for is a remote control car with a vacuum attached - but hey, this will do for now.
There's also a small screen built into the robot itself for navigating around the menu, but those tasks are much easier to perform on the phone.
The Neato Botvac Connected will run $699 when it arrives here in the States.
