Around The Home

iRobot has fixed a couple of glaring issues with its robot vacuum range – but are the latest Roombas enough to save the company? We spent a couple of months with the affordable, midrange Roomba Plus 505 Combo Robot + AutoWash dock.

Some tools are made to be admired and fondled as much as they're made to actually be used. Such certainly seems to be the case with the sandblasted titanium GripNGo 2.0 ratcheting bit driver, which is currently the subject of a Kickstarter campaign.

Not that long ago, most of us didn't even know what a fractal vise was. Now, however, we're hearing about the fourth one in six months. That said, the Titaner TiFractal Vise still manages to pack in a few unique selling points of its own.

Precision milling used to mean giant, pricey shop machines out of reach for most makers. You could design the "next big thing," but could you actually build it? Now you can.

A new chef's knife with sophisticated vibration tech built in promises to cut the effort you put into chopping ingredients in half. It won't buzz loudly, it'll charge wirelessly with an optional accessory, and it'll even prevent foods sticking to it.

Roborock is best known for its futuristic and forward-thinking robovacs – but it's out to prove it can be just as innovative in the world of hand-held stick vacuums. The H60 Hub Ultra brings robovac tech to the stick world, to excellent effect.

It's 2025, and we have AI. We have humanoid robots that can do front flips. We have autonomous delivery vans and taxis. And yet, the craziest thing to me is having a little autonomous robot doing my yard work.

There are folks who get genuine pleasure from tending a colorful garden. But if – like me – you'd rather sit back and let a robot do the work, NexLawn is developing a robo-mower with a retractable arm capable of performing numerous garden tasks.

Lymow, a Chinese lawnmower maker, has just launched its One Robot Mower, which previously raised more than US$7.5 million on Kickstarter, claiming the first spot in the lawnmower category. Now, it's getting a global commercial launch.

Want an induction stove that plugs into a standard 120-V power socket? After a gradual rollout this spring, the Copper Charlie is now available across the US.

If you're trying to firmly clamp small irregular-shaped objects, utilizing an adaptable desktop fractal vise is certainly one option. The K-One offers an interesting alternative however, plus it's reportedly the first of its kind to pack an electric motor.

It's fun to watch how quickly things are improving in home robotics right now. Sunseeker's new X5 robo-mower isn't perfect, but it does an impressive job with complex, multi-zone lawns thanks to its RTK-GNSS positioning system.

This portable dental blaster should probably be called a vapor flosser, as it fires surprisingly forceful bursts of up to 98% air through the gaps in your teeth, making efficient use of water as it blasts out debris.

Let's be honest: vacuuming is not the bulk of the work. Vacuuming is a victory lap that can only be performed after somebody's gone around picking up all the junk off the floor – a task that Roborock's flagship Saros Z70 is starting to take over.

In a perfect world, everything you try to clamp in a vise would have straight sides. The world isn't perfect, though, which is where the Tivise comes in. It's a fractal vise with jaws that adapt to the unique shape of whatever's placed inside it.