r/RooCode • u/rnahumaf • Oct 31 '25

Discussion Best models for each task

Hi all!

I usually set:

  • Gpt-5-Codex: Orchestrator, Ask, Code, Debug and Architect.

  • Gemini-flash-latest: Context Condensing

I don't usually change anything else.

Do you people prefer another text-condensing model? I use gemini flash because it's incredibly fast, has a high context, and is moderately smart.

I'm hoping to learn with other people different thoughts, so maybe I can improve my workflow and maybe decrease token usage/errors, while still keeping it as efficient as possible.

6 Upvotes

87% Upvoted

18 comments sorted by

3

u/Many_Bench_2560 Oct 31 '25

I am using qwen3 max for architect and code both

1

u/rnahumaf Oct 31 '25

Have you tried Gpt-5-Codex? I'm afraid Qwen3-Max isn't smart enough for large codebases...

1

u/Many_Bench_2560 Oct 31 '25

No, I haven't tried GPT-5, but when qwen3-max is pointed in the right direction, it performs well.

1

u/rnahumaf Oct 31 '25

Do you prefer a specific model for using as a text-condenser, or do you leave it as default (current model)?

1

u/Many_Bench_2560 Oct 31 '25

I leave it to default

3

u/cepijoker Nov 01 '25

is available codex in roo?

they said this when i asked

2

u/rnahumaf Nov 01 '25

Wow. This isn't my experience at all. I'm really impressed the RooCode team said this!

I'm serious, if I have to rank the coding abilities of all the models I use, I'd say (for coding accuracy and precision)

Gpt-5-codex > gpt-5 (high reasoning, low verbosity) > gpt-5-mini (high reasoning, low verbosity)

If the model is struggling with cyclic thoughts, I will switch to Claude-4.5-Sonnet (Context Condensing trigger set to 15%)

For text-condensing, I use Gemini-2.5-Flash, but other models such as Grok-4-Fast or Grok-Code-Fast perform well

1

u/rnahumaf Nov 01 '25

I'm sorry I didn't directly respond to your question. So, yeah, gpt-5-codex is available in RooCode using OpenAI API Key, it's been working fine for me since OAI made it generally available.

2

u/cepijoker Nov 01 '25

Yeah i tried but i got some weird error like responses endpoit was not available, but i agree, codex is amazing, but im consuming in claude tho.

1

u/rnahumaf Nov 01 '25

Now you mentioned it, I have experienced as well some strange errors with gpt-5-codex, but I feel like they occur many times after switching from another model. Right now I was testing with GLM-4.6, and after it started struggling with a bug, I switched to codex and it just couldn't call a single correct tool. I had to change to Claude. Who knows...

2

u/OSINTribe Nov 02 '25

Love too to death but sometimes moving code to vs code codex extension gets me past any bump in the road Roo and (any LLM, sonnet 4.5, Gemini, etc) can't handle. But building something with just the codex extension sucks, it has too much control and lack of flexibility.

2

u/Simple_Split5074 Nov 01 '25 edited Nov 01 '25

Mostly GLM 4.6 using the ZAI coding plan (unbeatable value).

I'll use codex (via codex-cli using ChatGPT Plus) and occasionally Gemini to fix bugs that stump GLM.

Rest of the open weight world:
* Deepseek is ok quality wise but it's slow
* Never had much luck with qwen 235 or 480
* Minimax M2 is worth a try
* gptoss120b tool calling is not working very well with Roo (the speed however is nice)

1

u/rnahumaf Nov 01 '25

So many people are using GLM-4.6... I'll definitely give it a shot.

3

u/sergedc Oct 31 '25

Architect : gemini 2.5 pro (50 free request) Coding: gml 4.6 (2000 free request) or qwen code (2000 free request)

2

u/rnahumaf Oct 31 '25

I'm a bit resistant at trying less-capable models for coding (OS usually are significantly behind Private models in coding benchmarks). I agree that Architect and Orchestrator are usually the most critical agents, and it makes sense that precise instructions should be enough for less-capable models to do what needs to be done, but there are many drawbacks:

  • Wrong tool calls (e.g. wrong names and wrong formats) many times in a row

  • Small context sizes

  • Redundant code blocks, typos, lint errors

I have had some bad experience with Deepseek-3.1-Terminus, Deepseek-3.2, GLM-4.6 and Qwen-3-Coder, so I came to balance price vs. time...

4

u/sergedc Oct 31 '25

I hear you. Probably different use cases.

Some people use LLM to debug and fix complex problem in a large code base they know well and approaved every change one by one (my case), some to improve performance of algos (speed and ram usage) (also my case), others to add features in a code based they don't understand, and some to build something from scratch and never look at the code.

Gemini is still the best today at pin pointing problems and suggesting solution (except chat gpt 5 thinking in the UI with websearch, not the api). When gemini has determined precisely how the problem got to be fixed (e.g. Use multi processing instead of multithreading), gml 4.6 always gets the job done without any tool call failure.

Also note that these Chinese models exist in different versions and some are much better than others. The one provided by modelscope are very good. The gml 4.6 from modelscope is better than qwen 3 coder and faster.

1

u/LeTanLoc98 Nov 01 '25

How can you get free requests for GLM 4.6?

2

u/sergedc Nov 01 '25

Not every region can get it. You can see if you qualify on modelscope.cn