Saturday 15 August 2015

Update on my Neato XV Signature Pro problems

Yes, I know. I can't leave this. My brain will not leave this problem alone and delete it from my mind until I get a good understanding of what is wrong. I have to either fix the problem, or find out if it really is a broken unit.

There are two options:

  1. I want to get my money back and get the Neato BotVac D85 and see how much better it is. But in that case I want it now! Not in 1 week, not in 2 weeks. But ASAP, preferably instantly. Because at any time, some day during next week, I might be hospitalized for some serious thing happening with my cancer situation. And then I can't enjoy having a new shiny vacuum cleaner to get happy over. And they don't have the D85 at NetOnNet, I have to order it in another store. I like NetOnNet, they have good customer service. Maybe they can order it, even if it is not in their line of products, I can't see that they have it on their homepage. They have the BotVac 85, but I don't know what the difference is other that it is white.

  2. I find out that there is no problem with my current Neato XV Signature Pro. It is I that have been doing something wrong. Or it is a overheating problem, like I have read online. Some people say that it does random errors because of overheating, and that they have fixed it by installing heatsinks. And that does sound plausible infact, because it has been very warm weather recently. And my apartment got windows all around so that it's almost like a greenhouse in here. But I'm not going to install heatsinks, because I do not want to break my warranty.

This morning it started it's scheduled cleaning at 07:00. I was sleeping in the couch. And it sounded like it was cleaning the house normally. I could hear it go over the doorsteps and into other rooms etc. It also conveniently stopped right below me where I was lying in the couch. It had stopped on a bottle that had fell on the floor, and the Neato had the message "clear my path". Nothing really wrong with that, it was stuck with good cause. So I fixed that and resumed it's cleaning cycle.

After some time it needed to go back and charge, it was at this point it started going crazy. It went straight into walls, in the opposite direction of where the charging unit really is located. It seemed confused, it's sense of where it was located seemed to be off.

It was going around randomly, bumping around, getting "clear my path" messages. It stopped occasionally with the message that it was trying to figure out it's location. I don't remember what that message is exactly. But it does this normally, it's rotating slowly kind of examining the environment. It did this often, more often than usual. But it kept going straight into things.

I didn't want to wait for it to go around randomly like this until it found the charger. I could have done that, maybe I should have, but I didn't have patience. When it had stopped randomly at some place with a "clear my path" message, I moved it by hand closer to the charger. And pressed "okay". And it did find the charger station and went back to charging.

This was an in-the-middle-of-cleaning charging. So it would resume cleaning later.

When it had finished charging. It was at this point it started going this crazy.


It was just going round and round like this until it's battery was low. But surprisingly enough found it's way back to the charger to charge again. And when it had finished charging it just went back to do this thing again... Like in it's little brain, it doesn't know where it is located or where it is supposed to go.

If the Neato program builds up a map of the apartment, which I have understood that it is supposed to do. I think of it as a video game glitch where you get outside the map. Or activating noclip in Quake. Is this what has happened here?

I do not know. But I can go back to the store and tell them that I think this unit is faulty as well. It acts weird, it doesn't find the charger, it goes around and around on one spot (Not spot cleaning! this is scheduled normal house cleaning).

Anyway, what I have done now is that I have power cycled it. I disconnected the battery for a while and then reconnected it again. So it should have been reset, I think.

In the beginning my replacement unit had the problem that it was stopping often with the message, "House cleaning - paused". It was actually doing that less and less, the more I used it. And it did complete a few cleaning cycles without any errors.

But after the reset, this problem is now back.

2 comments:

  1. Hi there,
    I have the exact same problem on my brand new Neato Signature. Most of the times it just stops somewhere in the middle of the floor, without obstacles and with still half a battery left. Just saying "paused". If I click resume, it resumes without issue. Guess this is a bug, but cannot find any resolutions online.

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    Replies
    1. I never found a solution, or why there was a problem with it. I got insurance for it. So I left it in for repair and just got a new one. There seems to be no difference in the software versions on them though.

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