Just like the previous generation of high-end Roombas, the i7+ uses a top-mounted camera that collects feature data about your home to generate a map through VSLAM (visual simultaneous localization and mapping). While the Clean Base was a total surprise, what wasn’t a total surprise is that the i7+ now features persistent maps. The Clean Base is cool enough that we’ve written a separate article about it that you can read here, but essentially, it’s a drive-on dock with an internal vacuum that can access the i7+’s dustbin through a special port underneath, and then transfer the contents of the dustbin into the dock’s own bin, which is large enough to hold about 30 Roombafuls.
And the i7+ can autonomously recharge on a new Clean Base dock that has its own large dustbin and vacuum system, and can suck the dirt out of the robot’s bin so that you don’t have to. The Roomba i7+ can do two big things that no other Roomba can do: The navigation maps that it makes persist between cleaning sessions, meaning that the robot “remembers” the layout of your home and can use that data to clean in a smarter and more efficient way.
Today, iRobot is announcing the fanciest, most amazing, and most expensive addition to its line of Roomba robot vacuums.
