Pet Zone Smart Scoop Automatic Cat Litter Box - Self Cleaning Litter Box for 1-2 Cats (6-15 lbs) | Odor Control & Low Maintenance for Small Spaces & Busy Pet Owners

I like many others writing reviews have experienced the pluses and minuses of automatic litter boxes. I like many started many years ago with Litter Maid. I had 3 different models over the years, each lasting less time with each subsequent generation. The last I literally had replace 5 times under the 1 year warranty. The Litter Maid has several design flaws that guarantee failure. Thus the search and research to find something that worked better.Let me be honest. We have two male cats 20+ lbs each. Any litter box will be tested. I looked at every make and quickly came to the conclusion I would not spend $500 for any litter box. I was looking for something < $150 that addressed the design flaws of the Litter Maid. The two top candidates were this one and the Pet Safe Scoop Free. I read every review. Watched youtube videos. The Pet Safe clearly had more reviews than the Pet Zone and many positive reviews. In the end I really could not live with the thought of spending an additional $40 for a reusable plastic litter pan for the Scoop Free. Between the price of the disposable litter pans or having to spend $40 for something that should be part of the base unit seemed a bit to predatory to me. After seeing a well done YouTube video on the Pet Zone I decided to give this one a try. I have had it now for about a month.The Pluses:The design corrects defects in the Litter Maid.1.The rake and motor move as a single unit. No electronic components are exposed to kitty pee. Male cats tend to pee back, or spray. The rake on the Litter Maid has the stop switch contacts on the back of the rake. A major source of issues on the 6 units I had.2. The rake gear and track mechanism are outside the litter box. This keeps them dry and clean. The Litter Maid the gear and track are inside the litter box. Subject to urine, and eventually caking of litter in the gear and gear track. This eventually leads to the rake mechanism jumping off track on one side or the other and it jams.3. With the drive motor and litter basket moving as a unit, there are no wire harnesses and ribbon cables that have to track with the movement of the rake. The Litter Maid has both and both are document sources of failure. Especially the ribbon cable.. Search YouTube videos. Very common problem.4. Extended delay after use. This unit waits 15 minutes. The Litter Maid 12 Minutes. This does not sound like much but I have seen much less problems with the litter clumps breaking up during raking. I'd really like to see an option to delay up to 30 mins.5. Much quieter than the Litter Maid6. Plastic bag liners. We use the plastic grocery bags rather than the supplied bags. They fit better and are free.7. I have not verified, but one of the YouTube reviews indicated that the drive motor can be replace. If the cost is not crazy, that could be very helpfulThe Minuses:1. With the way in which the rake must scoop the waste to empty into the bin, the L shaped rake must lift up and over to deposit behind itself. There are times #2 waste get left at the front of the litter box.2. This box seems to use a motion sensor rather than an IR sensor. This causes the system to trigger a cleaning even if you are simply filling the box with new litter.3. The cleaning cycle does not reset the timer if another cat uses the box while it is in the countdown. With two cats we have had the clean trigger when the kitty was in the box. Good thing for us, our cats are not scaredy cats:-04. Like I mention above, it would be great if the delay could be adjusted to accommodate longer or shorter periods. Different clumping litters behave differently, and change over time after the box has been opened. Yes the Scoop Free does have a time selection.We will see how durable this unit is, but over all, we are very pleased with the design and function. We have minimal manual intervention. Much less than the Litter Maid. About every other day we clean the rake when we empty the waste bin and put a new plastic bag in. We usually have to lift the rake and hand scoop where the kittys pee behind it.. Not much you can do about that. I love the fact that I can pull the bag out and tie it shut to seal the waste and smell. The house smells much better these days.Update 6/2022I had to replace the original unit this month. The motion detector had stopped functioning. I believe it is because the cats, male, have pee'd over the motor / motion detector enough to damage the motion detector. No I did not reach out the manufacturer. I felt that given the price and how long I have used the system that purchasing a new one was not unreasonable. All of my previous observations are still true with the new litter box. Still, my overall satisfaction is good.