If you’re done watching The Last Jedi and everyone you know is tired of hearing you talk about it, you might be interested in geeking out with a Star Wars-themed robotic vacuum. Samsung, which most people associate with smart phones and humongous TVs, has also been branching out into high-end robot cleaners. Like everyone else, they also wanted a piece of the Star Wars pie, and recently released two themed robots: the POWERbot Darth Vader, which we reviewed this week, and the Samsung POWERbot Star Wars Limited Edition – Stormtrooper, which we’ll review today and compared to the Darth Vader along the way. If we had to summarize our review in ten seconds, we’d suggest buying the Darth Vader for Wi-Fi and smart phone control and sticking with the Stormtrooper if you don’t mind needing to control the robot directly from the onboard buttons. We fully review it below, and you can buy the Stormtrooper here.
Pros, Cons, and Key Features of the Samsung POWERbot Stormtrooper Robot Vacuum
The POWERbot Stormtrooper, like the Darth Vader, is a Star Wars-themed limited release version of one of Samsung’s existing robotic vacuums. While the Vader is based on the POWERbot R7040, the Stormtrooper is a modified R7010. Both were pushed out to celebrate (or profit from, depending on your perspective) The Last Jedi, which broke records left and right upon its release. When you buy the Stormtrooper, you’ll get a programmable and schedulable robotic vacuum with a serious Stormtrooper resemblance, movie-inspired sound effects (that can be disabled or enabled depending on how annoyed your loved ones become), and a number of additional features we’ll take a look at below.
Besides the ability to set cleaning schedules that the vacuum will follow independently (e.g., cleaning while you go to work), the Stormtrooper’s key features include an ability to navigate through a camera system that maps its cleaning environment to assure an accurate and efficient path through your home. It can generate up to 10 airwatts of suction and has a 60 minute runtime thanks to its Lithium-ion battery. The dust bin holds 300 mL and the cleaning path is 11 and 3/8 inches wide.
The Stormtrooper, which carries an official model code of VR1AM7010U5/AA, weighs 8.8 pounds on our scale and is 3.8 inches tall. It won’t fit beneath every bit of furniture in every home, but it will fit beneath most of them in the average household. Like a Neato Botvac Connected or D5 Connected, the Stormtrooper uses a D-shaped body and reversing technology to back its way into corners to clean edges more efficiently than a disk-shaped vacuum (e.g., a Roomba 890).
Unboxing the POWERbot, you’ll find the Stormtrooper ready to follow orders as well as a user manual (which you can also download here) and the typical one year warranty found in the robotic vacuum industry. We can only hope it’ll be more reliable than the Stormtroopers in the Star Wars universe.
What’s the difference between the POWERbot Star Wars Stormtrooper and Darth Vader?
The Stormtrooper and Darth Vader are internally based on very similar vacuums (the R7010 and R7040), which means they don’t differ much in functionality aside from the clear aesthetic variations (one resembles a Stormtrooper helmet and the other that of a fallen Jedi). They share battery life, suction levels, and navigational systems, and both are equally capable of cleaning bare floors and low-pile carpets.
The only significant difference to be aware of is that the Stormtrooper can only be programmed directly from the buttons on the robot. The Darth Vader, in contrast, includes a remote control as well as Wi-Fi compatibility, allowing you to program cleaning schedules and check on its progress from a smart phone, tablet, or Alexa/Google Assistant-type device. Practically speaking, while we’d like a remote, it’s not necessary, and in a way, it’s kind of freeing to have one fewer accessory to keep track of.
How well does the POWERbot Stormtrooper clean on carpets and bare floors?
When choosing a robotic vacuum, even one in service of the Empire, you need to keep your expectations realistic. You’re not going to get full-sized cleaning power from an 8-pound, battery-powered robot. This isn’t a Dyson Ball Animal 2 upright, and it’s not a Miele C1 Cat & Dog or Electro+ canister, meaning you’re not going to be able to clean high-pile carpets as if they were hardwood floors. You might have the force with you, but it’s not going to do everything for you.
That said, a good robotic vacuum should clean hardwood floors and other bare floors easily while making quick work of low-pile carpeting. Ideally, it’ll have enough of a battery runtime to clean at least one room fully and enough of a brain to clean that room in a somewhat orderly fashion instead of zigzagging left and right and repeatedly sweeping the same sections. When finished or when battery charge drops, it should find its way back to its charging station without fuss, and if it’s made decently, it should last for a number of years beyond its warranty.
While we can’t say if the Stormtrooper will fulfill the last qualification as it was just released this fall, we can say that it’s likely to do all of the other tasks we mentioned and without much trouble. While the camera-guided brain isn’t nearly as smart or efficient as that in a laser-guided (yes, really!) Botvac Connected, it’s easily as effective as the camera system in a Roomba 960. While we thought we’d miss Wi-Fi, we actually didn’t, and it was nice to simply program the robot and not worry about connectivity issues. We got an acceptable amount of battery life on bare flooring (around 60 minutes) and carpeting (around 45), although we’d always like more (e.g, the 100 minutes in the Roomba 980). And even though our teenagers found the sound effects cheesy, we enjoyed them.
Why buy the POWERbot Stormtrooper?
Overall, we’re pretty happy with the Stormtrooper. Despite being an obvious cash grab by Samsung, it combines cool looks with under-the-hood functionality and is a perfectly reasonable robotic vacuum. Compared to the Darth Vader, we’d recommend the Vader, as mentioned earlier, if you want to steer and program it from your smart phone or a separate remote, and we’d stick to the Stormtrooper if you want a more minimal, but just as effective approach. The Stormtrooper is also cheaper, which means more money left for other things in life, which we always appreciate.
You can buy the POWERbot Darth Vader here on Amazon. Alternatively, if you don’t want to pay for Wi-Fi, you can save money and buy the Stormtrooper here instead.
Canadians can buy the POWERBbot Darth Vader here or spend a bit less for the Stormtrooper here.
If you find our research on PMC helpful, you can follow our efforts to keep maniacally reviewing home cleaning tools by shopping through our links above. We promise to keep fighting the good fight against every horror children, animals, and grown, yet messy humans can inflict upon a clean home.