In September of 2002, iRobot introduced the world's first consumer priced robotic vacuum cleaner – the original silver Roomba floorvac, for just under $200. It quickly sold over 100,000 units in its first year. In September of 2003, iRobot expanded the Roomba line with two new models – the Roomba Pro and the Roomba Pro Elite. Although the new models added a few new features as well as a few other bells and whistles, the basic design remained virtually unchanged.

All together, the Roomba family of vacuums has sold almost 500,000 units since the original Roomba launched in 2002. This is more than a bit surprising when you consider that prior to launching the Roomba, the relatively unknown iRobot's only other foray into the consumer market was in creating the Artificial Intelligence for the somewhat creepy “My Real Baby” doll in partnership with Hasbro back in 1998.

For nearly a year and a half, iRobot had the robotic vacuum consumer market almost entirely to itself. The only competition to the Roombas throne came from either $1,500 high end niche products from Electrolux, Karcher and Friendly Robotics, or laughably useless knockoffs like the $30 RoboSweep. Early adopters loved the promise of a truly useful consumer robotic appliance but many quickly became frustrated by its many quirks and somewhat questionable reliability.

Attack of the Clones
In April 2004, Applica (Parent company of Black & Decker) quietly released the $100 Zoombot in large retail chains such as Walmart and Target. The Sharper Image soon followed with its own release of the $200 eVac. iRobot finally had some real competition. Both vacuums offered faster charging times, less required maintenance and longer warranties. Suddenly, the market had become allot more crowded, but it wasn't over yet...

In early July, iRobot announced the totally redesigned Discovery line of Roomba vacuums. iRobot claims to have addressed all of the issues that their customers had with the original generation of Roomba vacs, but can any of these robotic dirt devils truly deliver on the promise of finally banishing your vacuum cleaner to the closet once and for all?

We decided to find out.