GARDENA 15101-41 SILENO Life - Automatic Robotic Lawn Mower, with Bluetooth app and Boundary Wire, one of The quietest in its Class, for lawns up to 8100 Sq Ft, Made in Europe, Grey

This is an extremely convenient little device, if like me you absolutely hate mowing, don’t mind a little setup and prep, and don’t care about a “perfect” lawn. So let me preface this full review with: I absolutely loathe mowing. I tend to avoid it as much as possible and as such my yard frequently gets out of control very quickly in the Florida rain. That being said, this little guy is exactly what someone like me needs, something to make my yard look presentable without all the hours of manual work. And it’s probably the coolest thing I now own. Prep and Setup I definitely suggest watching the YouTube videos from the manufacturer on how to unbox and setup the mower, the included guide was quite lengthy and a little hard to follow but after watching the videos, setup was a breeze. Unboxing everything was also easy, everything was packed and labeled nicely, and I was actually surprised with how compact the mower was. You absolutely need to clear out your yard of any large branches or obstacles that the mower might catch on. I did see it get stuck on some branches that I missed cleaning up. The hardest and lengthiest part of setup is definitely setting up the boundary/guide wire. This process involves outlining your yard with the included wire. These wires connect back to the base station where I’m assuming it then gets power to tell the mower where the boundary limits are. There’s also a guide wire that runs from the base station to the boundary wire where they’re spliced together with an included coupler. If you’re not familiar with cutting and joining wires this might seem a little daunting but honestly after watching the videos it was very straightforward. The biggest thing is to absolutely make sure the wire is firmly in the ground. The instructions give 2 options: One using stakes and the other to bury the wire. I opted to use the stakes, but I made the initial mistake of not using more of them closer together and the mower got tangled in the wire, this was an easy fix by making sure about every 2 feet of wire a stake was put down to hold it down (they included a lot of stakes). Running the mower As soon as you power on the mower you go through a simple install wizard to set your preferences and schedule. You also can override the schedule to test it out and let it run. You should definitely watch it the first time to make sure it runs smoothly but after that it’s basically set it and forget it. I don’t know if it could handle large brush, but I had mowed my lawn a few weeks prior, so it didn’t have to work very hard. I watched it go for about 30 minutes before I went back inside where I continually checked on it, it didn't get stuck and after a couple hours made it's way back to the base station to charge up for the day. Setting up the App There's another review on here that mentioned not having the Bluetooth model and not being able to use the app, which got me thinking the one I had also didn't have Bluetooth. Turns out all their models have Bluetooth, you just need to have the app open and turn off the mower while it's in the station and turn it back on. It was listed as P0.2 on my phone, I renamed him to 'Fenton'. My Android phone picked it up almost immediately and I was pretty happy with the options, which allows you to better select your schedule or spot mow a specific area where you place it and of course manually start it for a set period. Charging Station Cover The weather is quite sporadic here in Florida, getting the charging station cover or "Garage" is a nice addition to not have to worry about it. It provides a nice little cover from the extreme heat and the Florida downpours. While the guide says the mower is built for all types of weather, I do recommend getting the cover if you'd like a little more peace of mind. Install takes all of 5 minutes and looks like it's built to last. Final thoughts The mower is insanely quiet, I only ever heard the blade when it hit a taller piece of grass. I was also very surprised with how maneuverable it is. I have very soft, leaf ridden soil and so my push mower constantly digs into the always wet soil, and it makes it pretty difficult sometimes to mow. This little guy I guess is light enough that it hasn’t gotten stuck. All that being said, this mower is not a “do it all” type of device, at least not for my yard. I set my boundaries to basically a large open area, I’ll have to touch up the areas where I thought it wouldn’t work very well because of large brush or just obstacles that would get in the way. I would highly recommend this mower to people with very “simple” yard layouts and those who hate mowing. For me it’s extremely convenient having a freshly kept yard without doing any of the work.

I like the design of the mower but it requires lots of manual intervention and check up. The gardena mower only connects to the phone via bluetooth but you will have to always open the app or check on the mower to know what is going on with the mower. Sometimes, the mower has stopped working for hours before I could realize that it needs manual help and sometimes the mower can't find it's way to the charger and the battery ran out so it is stuck somewhere in the lawn (Not sure if there is way to add more guide wires - still looking through the manual for that). The pros of the mower is that is looks prettier than the other mowers in the market and it is very quiet. However, the fact that there is no app notification, and no Wi-Fi connectivity tarnished the experience for me. I would recommend anyone wanting to buy this mower to consider the Worx Landroid which has these additional features for similar price. I could have returned my mower but unfortunately, the return window closed on me before I could make up my mind. To gardena, if the mower supports software update, the mower should be updated to communicate it's operating states to the owner via phone notifications since the mower has a controller app. Also, the mower cuts too low for my lawn which is basically killing my lawn by how low it cuts. The mower's maximum cut height is 2 inches. If your lawn is very thick, your lawn may fair well, but my lawn is not very thick, and the 2 inches max cut height exposes the lawn soil to the scorch of the sun thereby drying it out and in turn causing the lawn to suffer. I am considering going back to my traditional mower to allow my lawn to recover to its somewhat healthy state it was before I started using this mower. Overall, I am not happy with this mover at all, and would appreciate it if I can get my $1000+ back.

I really want to write a good review for this product, but I cannot, as I have been unable to reach Gardena support despite multiple attempts, both by email and telephone. At best, all I get is a notification that they will get back to me. While the mower worked as expected (the only things I would change is to increase the maximum height and add Wifi connectivity), the lack of support leaves me with an unusable product and one I can no longer recommend.

Mine, a Gardena SILENO Life 8100sq ft, installed as I expected, having install a robotic mower before. It took me a while to get the perimeter wire correct so that the mower would mow to the edges well, also not surprising, but now is ok. Two things that I disliked (and why only three stars) were: The cut height is very short, 0.78" (2cm)to 2" (5cm). My walk-behind mower will mow twice as high. And that you have to pick it up (and re-enter the code twice--once to move to a zone and once to move it back) to move it to secondary zone. Why doesn't the app have a function to direct the the mower to a different zone? It would be easy & convenient to control the mower by tilting the phone for left, right, forward and reverse, like some drones. My old (Irobot, many years ago) one had that capability with a joystick. You also have to re-enter the code if it gets stuck or *any* issue, why can't I enter the code with the app?

stakes are not a solid plastic and can break during placement, especially in Rocky soil

this thing only lasted a year and some it is impossible to file a warranty claim on it so it'll be a waste of your money do not buy it.

It is expensive and lacks functionality such as wifi, ultrasonic sensors, Lona application, parallel mowing, wire broken detection point, etc. I agree with some of the reviewers.

This Robotix lawn mower is way over priced for the technology the wire system is over convoluted and backward and doesn’t work, drones have had GPS for 10 years that know where they are with in a 5” square area. Wheel have no grip totally over sells it can climbs 30% slope, during testing found that it crossed stupid boundary wires and was outside the perimeter. No wireless or BLE... Will wait for GPS guaranteed pattern cutting, and manufactures aren’t scamming buyers with over exhaustionate pricing because this technology isn’t there.

I already installed a robot mower back in 2018. I had nothing but problems right from the get go with the robomow/cub cadet xr1000. The mower eventually was costing more money than it was worth. The customer service is garbage as well. Now, my new Gardena is amazing! Super quiet, mows like a champ, even on hills up to 35%. Better yet, made by Husqvarna so the customer service will be top notch. In my experience, don't cheap out on robot mower unless you have a very small lawn.

We bought this mower because we spend most of the summer traveling, and this would allow us to keep the lawn trimmed while we were gone. Setup was extremely difficult. Definitely watch the installation videos on YouTube. I literally had them running while I did some parts of the install. We have a LOT of foot traffic in our yard, so we didn't think simply staking it in the ground would survive our 3 dogs and 2 children running around. This meant first getting an edger and digging a trench. That was miserable, but I attribute that to the edger, which was cheap. Once the trench was dug, we had to lay the wire multiple times. You must follow the instructions IN EXACTING DETAIL or else you will end up with what initially happened to us. On multiple occasions, the mower managed to drive behind the base and chew up the cords that formed the boundary wire. Then we had a problem with a small tree root freaking it out whenever the mower tried to return to its base. This required moving the base to a less optimum spot. Finally, the guide wire must be placed absolutely perfectly, or you will get what we got: a mower driving onto its base at a slight angle and then bumping into the charging port, like your drunk uncle. Then it would back up, try again, and fail in exactly the same way. While it is mowing, the mower is virtually silent. It really is astonishing. Our dogs freaked out and barked at it for about 20 minutes, but then started ignoring it so completely that it occasionally would startle them by bumping into them while they were sleeping on the lawn. No injuries, but lots of hilarity. Our lawn has no incline whatsoever, but the ground is uneven, with lots of little dips and bumps. It would occasionally panic and back off from the divots, as if it had reached the edge of a cliff. Eventually it would approach it at a different angle and get the job done. We finally believed we had it working, and went away for a week. When we got back, the lawn looked OK, but the mowet had run out of battery at some point, and we found it dead in the middle of the yard. I picked it up and returned it to its base, but even after charging up, the only error message the app could give me was a "lifted" message, implying someone had picked it up. Presumably, that was when I rescued it after we got back. I could find no report from the mower how many times it successfully mowed while we were gone, nor could I determine why it eventually failed. Given the height of the lawn, however, it clearly had successfully mowed at least a couple of times. I wish it had Wi-Fi access instead of Bluetooth! This is a huge thing. First off, to communicate with the mower with the app, I have to be physically in my yard. Also, when we leave town, I can't get the peace of mind of checking in to see if it's still functioning. I also don't get push notifications if something goes wrong. Overall, this is a decent mower, now that the extensive installation is complete. I wish the process of setting it up were easier, It definitely could use Wi-Fi, and even now it occasionally needs rescuing, but it saves me from mowing the lawn, and that's not a small deal.

Cette machine fonctionne très bien. On devrais se servir d'internet pour le retour pour la charge des zones secondaires, On devrait avoir une ligne en craie wifi pour limiter le terrain. La compagnie qui fabrique l'appareil devrait avoir une personne pour répondre aux clients. Un robot y comprend rien. Cela prend une personne au téléphone serait meilleur. Autrement on n'achète on a pas assez de renseignements. JG

Très déçu de la hauteur de la tonte à peine 2 pouces la tondeuse retourne se charger alors qu’elle est à 37% si j’avais à en acheter une autre se serait sûrement pas ce modèle