I have both the Polaris 380 and the Poolbuster, and I love 'em both.

If you get the Polaris, you're going to have to get the booster pump for it to run correctly. It does a great job on leaves, twigs, goggles, toys, etc that the kids leave in the bottom of the pool, but it's not great with really fine stuff, like sand or algae. I sometimes add a handfull of cottonballs in the bag and that helps, but it still doesn't get it all. It does do a good job, though, of stirring the stuff up so my filter can get it (we have a real problem with pollen and airborne stuff around here). It does not run well in cold water, however--when the water gets into the mid 60s or lower it really doesn't work well at all. Can't tell you why, but it won't. I only have to check the bag after it's been running for several hours, unless you have a lot of stuff on the floor of your pool--the bag is fairly big and will hold quite a bit of stuff before it starts bogging the unit down.

The Poolbuster does a slightly better job of picking up the really fine stuff, especially once you add the cottonballs. It also does well on the bigger stuff, but the bag is much, much smaller so the bag has to be checked and emptied pretty often. It's awesome for spot cleaning, but I don't think I'd use it for general, everyday, pool-wide cleaning. Others on this forum have had issues with the rechargeable battery pack in their units, but I've not had that trouble. Mine charges right up and works like a champ.

Seems to me that the easiest way to deal with the algae is prevent it to start with, or else kill whatever is currently in the pool, then you won't have to worry about anything but the bigger leaves and sticks in the pool.

Janet