Well, dog my cats! I guess I won’t be trading my old one in any time soon. 
It’s a Stowaway. I wanted something very compact, to haul up and down stairs, and it seemed sufficient for the hardwood floors throughout the house.
Man, I wanted to like the wretched thing. A defective part was replaced shortly after I bought it so hope sprang eternal that the problem was solved. No such luck. Anything, even a modest drift of dog hair, will clog in the bend just above the roller/floor thingy. It comes apart easily but taking it apart constantly and removing small clumps of stuff gets really old really fast.
No exaggeration, my Dyson requires several stop-and-unclog sessions per room. And that’s on hardwood, so basically all it’s picking up is the loosest possible stuff that collects in a week. When it works, it does a great job whooshing the slightest dust from between floorboards. But the damned thing chokes and clogs on even small amounts of dog fur. Or sometimes on none at all. For example, I wouldn’t even try to vacuum up, say, confetti-size paper. Instant clog. It jammed up on a postage stamp that had fallen under the desk. I have to sweep the floors with a broom and dust pan first, then follow up with the Dyson to get dusty stuff left because my Dyson will not handle anything more.
I dunno. Maybe it’s just a lemon. Damned expensive lemon, though.
:eek: That would really, really piss me off. And I’m really surprised. I had never heard of the ‘Stowaway’. But like Mr Bus Guy, and gotpasswords we’ve not had any problems. I treat the thing like a shop-vac more often than I should, and it has never clogged. I try not to vacuum up dry wall screws and such, but it happens. No problems. Never been clogged. Though I do cut fur and such from the roller brush about once a year. I’ve owned it for 3 years, and have done a full clean out on the filters twice.
Just FYI, for those who aren’t familiar with Dyson Stowaways, here’s what they look like. Very cool lookin’, compact and relatively light.
I’m sure this has been asked and answered somewhere; but anyway…
I acknowledge that the dyson is awesome… what I have a hard time getting past is this: If it sucks up pet hair so well; isn’t it also thinning your carpet by sucking up carpet threads too?
On the contrary, it can actually lengthen the life of your carpets; if you have grit/sand/dirt under your carpet, then every time you walk on it, it’s as if you have sandpaper underneath it, wearing it down. If you can vacuum that grit/sand/dirt out, your carpet will actually last longer.
One cat, cheap carpet, Dyson does the job. Well, I do the job with the dyson, it’s doesn’t do squat when I just sit on my butt.
It’s all about the Dyson, man. First time I vaccumed with that thing, I pulled up enough cat hair to make a whole new cat. Best investment I ever made.
Okay, so we just tried it out and man that sucker is HEAVY!!! We have a small house and I just did a quick vacuum and my arm is sore and so is my back.
Plus I hate that cord - I’m so used to a canister vac with a retractable cord - this long one is a pain in the butt.
sigh.
It seemed to do a great job but I’m not sure if my back can handle it.
The other model we considered is the DC-21 - the Stowaway. But if TVeblen has had so many problems with it, it makes me nervous to go to the trouble of returning the DC-17, getting the DC-21, and STILL not being happy.
I had a Dyson that would slip gears and constantly clog up. We finally got the retailer we bought it from to replace it with another Dyson - it had spent two months out of four in the shop - and they could never find anything wrong with it, so I assume they are support to not have suction and slip gears. Then, for the next six months I had a second Dyson that would slip gears and clog up - same issues as the first one (even a different model as they’d stopped making the first model.
I now have a Meile and am in love with it. And discourage everyone I know from ever buying a Dyson. The Meile is not a cheap vaccuum, but its a good vaccuum.
Like Veb, I really wanted to like the Dyson, I’d even asked for it as a birthday present. But a vaccuum has to work, this one didn’t - not the first one, nor the second one.
Consumer Reports rated the Dyson fairly low in pet hair pick up.
They also used Maine Coon Cat fur, which was very cool as it’s truely the worst .
We have a pug. Pugs shed once a year, from January 1 to December 31. In other words, a pug will shed every day of its life. In an average week, she probably sheds enough to construct a whole 'nother pug. So, we have hair issues.
What has helped us keep it under control is a two-stage attack: first, we have a Roomba Scheduler that runs five days a week while we’re away from the house. The Roomba is more like a sweeper than a true vacuum, but the sweeping action of the brush and roller picks up a LOT of pet hair from the carpet. So, that keeps things down to a tolerable level during the week, as long as we empty it diligently so it can pick up more the next day.
For more intense cleanings, we have a Hoover Mach 5, which said on the box, “cleans carpets better than Dyson!” I’m not certain about that, but I do know that the carpet actually feels better underfoot after using it, which is enough to impress me. And it sucks up a heroic quantity of hair and dirt. Other pluses: it was about $170, compared to $500 or so for a Dyson; it’s relatively light and easy to move around; and, it’s pretty quiet, so you can actually hold a conversation while using it.
So, a Roomba to keep it under control, and a Hoover to do actual intensive cleaning. That’s my recipe.
I have a $300 Panasonic and it does an excellent job with 2 shedding cats. The nap of the rug gets fluffed up after every use. When the bag gets full theres a pop-off valve that tells you change it out. I can’t imagine what a $600 vacuum could do to improve upon things.