Transcription
Sweat and tears in search of the answer to the question of whether a robotic lawnmower manufacturer can simply take over the lawn. In recent years, Roborock has made itself comfortable in our homes, and now they are leaving the safe indoors and venturing out into the rough wilderness of the garden. With the new Rockmo series, Roborock wants to give established robotic lawnmower manufacturers a run for their money. But will they succeed, and right out of the gate, how well can robotic lawnmower software for indoors mow the garden? And that's exactly what I've been testing over the past few months. The top model, the Rock Mode Z1 in the lidar variant, had to go through all the settings and weather conditions at my home. Today, I'll tell you how living together went, what was good, what caused pain, and whether Roborock has truly mastered the step to the other side of the fence, and how closely it mows to this metaphorical fence with the optional attachment module. At first glance, it mows like any other robotic lawnmower. And I've said it a few times before, in the end, they all swing more or less razor blades in a circle. That's why the mowing result depends primarily on the sharpness of the blades. Ouch. The Z1 here has six cutting blades, which is quite decent. It cuts 24 cm wide in one pass and can be electrically adjusted between 2 and 7 cm mowing height, and also differently per lawn area because it can be adjusted electrically. It has independently rotating wheels at the front. This allows it to navigate my garden like a ballerina despite its size and weight, and especially very smoothly. Such a tank turn, where the wheels turn in opposite directions, can sometimes tear up the ground. It's not the first robotic lawnmower to have this type of steering, but it's the first in my garden and my new favorite design. Realistically, many of you will likely buy the Q1 or S1. As it stands here, this colleague costs €2700. However, €700 of that is for this little lidar module. Without it, it costs €2000. RRP respectively. The Q1, the entry-level model, starts at €800, and in between, there's the S1 for €1400. The Q1 and S1 steer more classically. I haven't had the opportunity to try them out here yet. The hardware is otherwise almost flawless for me. So, it can handle all realistic slopes of a realistic garden. Uh, the suspension can't be thrown off course by our moon-like terrain here, and it doesn't break down further on bumps. I deliberately created such a rough patch here so that it wouldn't be too easy. Where it gets easy, however, is on the desk. You see, I'm back to collecting receipts and invoices, and as always, accounting is just incredibly annoying. Fortunately, there's SFDK, which makes exactly that more pleasant and automates a lot of it, like a robotic lawnmower. Sefdesk is software that keeps everything in one place. Store your receipts, write invoices and quotes, or handle all your accounting, either on your own or together with your tax advisor. I'm not doing all this because I enjoy accounting or sorting my files, but because I enjoy playing with technology. And Safdesk has been helping me keep the business running for years. Sfdesk allows you to write invoices or quotes in seconds, synchronize bank data, and automatically assign receipts. No matter where you are, here in the garden or when I'm on the go, I've made it a habit to scan every bill, every receipt directly with the app at the checkout. But try it out for yourself. 14 days free and without obligation. And if it works just as well for you, you can save 60% with the code soz 2026 and focus on what you really want to do. [music] Thanks, Safdesk. And now back to mowing. The Roborock navigates without a boundary wire and without an RTK station. There isn't even an optional one anymore. It navigates either with cameras or, in the lidar variant, with lidar and cameras together. Roborock calls this Vision Lidar Fusion, and it's supposed to make it more attentive than an average meerkat, which it really does well. So, the navigation is excellent. The mapping, the driving, the obstacle detection and avoidance work fantastically. It passes the hedgehog test as well as the child test. My children still have all their limbs after this thing has been around for a while. Years of practice with robotic vacuums apparently pay off. However, the attentiveness of a meerkat makes this robot equipped with blades, despite its armament, the biggest coward I've ever had run through my garden. In my opinion, this is actually the biggest criticism of the Rock Mode Z1, even though it doesn't even pretend to be able to do what I'm primarily accusing it of now. During setup, it pleaded with me to please ensure the lawn was mowed to 6 cm beforehand. And I know this from other robotic lawnmowers; they all want to start with a well-maintained lawn for optimal results and simply keep it well-maintained. And I constantly ignore this. I release them into the wild, let the lawn grow longer in May or even in between, partly because the children are splashing in the water and I don't want to let a little blade fighter near their inflated bathing fun. Especially when we talk about the attachment for edge cutting. I can't mow long grass with it because the camera and the environmental detection always say: "Nope, there's something here, I'm not mowing that." And this doesn't just apply to overgrown lawns like before its mowing-free May, but even a few days of not mowing will leave out spots where there might be a few too-long blades of grass or a clover flower. It mows according to the motto, "Caution is the mother of the porcelain box," and then simply recognizes objects on the lawn everywhere, like, for example, a paddling pool now. There are settings for the sensitivity of obstacle avoidance, but it currently only has two levels. Sensitive and balanced. And the latter is supposed to improve mowing performance, but this more aggressive mode, in my opinion, deserves the name sensitive, while sensitive could actually be called mimosa. What I'm missing is a bulldozer mode that flattens everything in its path. Plants, tree trunks, children's legs. Even if it's just a one-time thing that you have to actively switch on, and then it switches back to a socially acceptable mode. But in spring, doing the first mow, or after letting it grow, it's simply not suitable for that. I thought I was clever and just used the manual mode and chased it into the weeds with the virtual gamepad. But even there, after a few centimeters, its fear of long grass kicks in. It's simply more of a diva than Cristiano Ronaldo right now. Of course, it does now. Apparently, there was some update in the meantime that allows it to generally dare to go into the tall grass when controlled manually. You just have to stay very close. So, from 2 meters or not. Yes, just about 2 meters, it says here, blood is lost. Forget my other grumbling about it not going into the weeds. With force, it does now. Of course, this also means that I would have to walk around the entire garden, meaning I would have to walk alongside the mower and steer it as if I were pushing a normal lawnmower. That's also not the idea, is it? I mean, what I have are other robotic lawnmowers with fewer scruples, which may have to pre-mow in doubt. And especially in beta, its fear also led to it not wanting to drive properly under hooks or low trees or plants. But that's actually the only real criticism I've found in everyday use. Although, that's not entirely true. Something else is coming, but this is just a software update away from a new mode or the AI detection being deactivated or able to be deactivated during manual operation, and then the other flaws are very academic, and software updates are constantly coming, especially now before sales begin, and it's always wild to read what has been added. Most recently, it received an automatic parking brake for starting on slopes. The earlier problems with falling off cliffs or mowing too close to the hedge have definitely been significantly improved. Even though the slopes here have been partially eliminated and I deliberately leave a strip in front of the hedge for the local fauna, I have to say that it theoretically has a relatively easy time here now, apart from the ground undulations, which it compensates for fantastically, and because the lawn is then pulled a bit smoother, it doesn't look as hilly as it actually is. However, the area sometimes seems to shrink a bit. So, if long plants stick out at the edge or it doesn't dare to mow to the edge, I think in the long run it would simply push itself out of the garden by nature. Then, from time to time, the brush cutter has to come and clear it. The lidar variant here is designed for areas up to 2000, but even the smallest, smallest variant of the largest model has a cellular chip installed so that you can always reach it at the edge of your garden, and otherwise via WiFi or Bluetooth directly, for example, for mapping. [music] That brings us to the app or the software, and the mapping is really easy to do, and adjusting the map is already much better than with many other wireless mowers that have been on the market for a long time. After that, you can get started right away. You can divide your garden into several zones and also create driving paths over driveways or paths. All of that works reliably too. When mowing itself, you can then have one of the zones, the entire area, or the edges mowed. Unfortunately, it doesn't have the option to say, "Here's an area I'd like to have mowed," because a zone, in this case, unlike robotic vacuums, is already a part of the garden or something. Uh, I've actually missed that a few times, even with other robotic lawnmowers. Probably mainly when I wanted to film them, maybe it's not an important feature. A big advantage for someone who has a Roborock on all floors is, of course, that you only need one app if you use it with the app. You can set the mowing efficiency between standard and efficient, and it seems to have learned that from my children brushing their teeth. When no one is watching, you can somehow botch it. Then you can set the cutting height and direction, and there's the option uh, to set it to auto, then it drives in long lines and rotates it over time so that there are no tracks. With user-defined, you can set exactly the angle you want, or you can let it optimize how it divides the area so that it's as efficient as possible. And actually, my standards for the appearance of my lawn, and therefore for robotic lawnmowers, have changed a lot in recent years. From trying to make everything into an English lawn, I'm now happy if it's reasonably green, mowed short in the areas where my children play or where a paddling pool needs to be set up. If clover settles in the gaps, or thyme, or whatever else, then that's just how it is. I also like to leave it unmowed for 2 weeks. Now, during heatwaves, I simply don't mow it anyway, unless I have to record a video, so that it stays green and I don't have to water it. In general, not just with Roborock, but with all robotic lawnmowers, I would wish for a few more functions for nature lovers, such as being able to pause mowing in an area, but perhaps define a path that should always be kept clear so that you can walk there. But this one is out of the question anyway. If I were to let it grow partially for a few weeks, it would, in the worst case, be scared to death by a few mother flowers again. On the smart home integration front, there's not much to report yet. Unlike current Roborock vacuums, it doesn't have Matter because Matter doesn't know robotic lawnmowers yet, and the Roborock integration in Home Assistant, for example, doesn't provide it yet. Work is apparently already being done on that, and uh, with the luck I usually have, a version in which it works will appear on the evening before this video goes live. And then, of course, we still need to talk about the edge module. Mowing is one thing, but a problem that many robotic lawnmowers are currently struggling with is edge cutting. And different manufacturers have different concepts for this. I've just installed a software update that said it improved edge cutting with the normal robotic lawnmower. But there's also a small attachment module here, where unfortunately the uh shipping label is stuck over it. Let's just take a look directly. Uh, that's made for precise edge cutting. It looks like it has more or less the same blades. Yes, it's a small robotic lawnmower on the robotic lawnmower, but even that will only be able to cut up to the edge. 20 minutes later. So, that was relatively easy, both the assembly and letting it drive, because in the app, nothing really changes, and then it drives around and cuts the edge. Except it also gets scared of the blades of grass at the edge. With the edge cutting module, it can mow 3 cm to the edge. Before, it was more like ten. This naturally makes it a bit better and means less rework is needed. However, it also depends a bit on the edge you have to cut. Whether it's a house wall or, like here, a terrace edge, does it make such a big difference? You definitely have to re-cut it somehow, either with scissors, a string trimmer, or I don't know, with shears. But if there are any other things or narrow mowing edges, then it's definitely an upgrade. And what I find very nice is that attachment modules are available for all Roborock Rockmo robotic lawnmowers. Even the cheaper entry-level models have the option of attaching this edge cutting module. And unfortunately, with robotic lawnmowers, many things are often only available for the higher-priced models, which are also always for huge gardens. So, this one here, the lidar version, is currently only available for mowing areas of 2000 square meters or more, and if someone wants to mow a 500 square meter garden, they have to put this giant ship somewhere. But the edge cutting module is available for all. My biggest disappointment with the Roborock Rocke Z120 lidar is that it's simply a relatively solid mower. So, the hardware is good and can't be thrown off course by all the uneven surfaces in our garden. The software works reasonably well by now. If it also got a bulldozer mode, then I would be happy. At least as soon as Home Assistant can handle it, but I don't see why that shouldn't happen soon. In my opinion, it lacks a bit of distinction. I mean, other models have this front-wheel steering in similar models. The mowing result is basically the same for every mower. I mean, here it's nicely suspended and compensates for a lot of things. I would have wished that it would stir up a bit more dust or, uh, grass clippings that it brought in with it in the robotic lawnmower establishment. In itself, it's not that far from the Navimo X4 in terms of steering, suspension, and specifications. However, it is definitely a solid robot, and I personally like it very much, and hopefully, in the future, with more competition in robotic lawnmowers, it will lead to more progress on both the software and hardware fronts. Even though I haven't tested the smaller siblings, based on this experience, I would assume that they will also work well. The software is largely polished, and due to the lack of lidar, they might be even bigger cowards, right? Or they're just a bit more indifferent to everything. If you're looking for something at the other end of the price range, here's my test of the best-selling mower on Amazon. Or here you can see how I reclaimed our garden area with the help of a robotic lawnmower in the first place. Thanks for watching and see you next time.