I've been delighted with the Dyson Absolute. I have hardwood floors, oriental rugs and a flat weave carpet on the stairs to the basement. It works well on all of them, There are heads for floors, carpet, etc. I don't know how it would do on shag. It doesn't have a large dirt reservoir, but that's ok for me. It's kind of satifying to see how much cat fur it picks up.

I have the Dyson 11. I probably would not buy it again. Yes, it is awesome for fur and fine dirt, but it doesn't really pick up solid items, like the leaves and twiggy bits that my dogs track in. The Dyson shreds (and scatters) the leaf and then you can sweep up the fine leaf pieces. My hibiscus plant drops its empty flower buds and it can't pick those up. You know, the little green bottle cap size things.

But, as I said, it is awesome for dog hairs. But it doesn't hold a candle to my old Electrolux for overall performance.

Jojo——in the 40’s and 50’s my dad sold Electrolux vacuums door to door for 15 years——-and supported a wife and 4 kids on his salary! Electrolux was the only vacuum my mom ever had.

Marti——I have the Dyson Absolute V8 and like it. Cleans the area rug much better than my low end Miele.

I have a Dyson v8 - actually I have two, one at each house. The first one was the Animal but it didn't come with the soft attachment for wood floors and though it worked fine on wood I didn't want to scratch up my relatively new wood floor. So I bought a second one that had both carpet and wood attachments and I use that at home where I have the newer wood floor. As far as I can tell the only difference between the two models was which attachments were included.

I absolutely love this thing. It has far exceeded my expectations and I doubt I would have continued without finding a new housecleaner if I hadn't bought it. I don't have the problem jojo describes but I don't have that kind of debris - no pets that go outside and bring stuff in.

I hesitated at first because of the price but I got both of them deeply discounted around Thanksgiving. And since I never reinstated a housecleaner it's paid for itself many times over.

Dyson. I have the V8 because cordless is important to me. I have a V7 but would get the V8 if I could justify a new one. I have had mine many years. I have customer service a couple of times when things were off and they have walked me through fixing it myself. Very good!

It's funny you should post this, I was thinking the same thing. Now that I'm cleaning we have already upgraded some supplies and tools. Our vacuum works well (like everything else of that ilk, our housekeeper selected it), but I like the idea of a cordless. But in several places I read they were good for small homes. Our home is very large. It is just that you would have to keep stopping and recharging?

Mtn, my house is large. I can vacuum it all on one charge, on “auto” setting. Using the “turbo” setting eats up the battery very quickly. The other issue that I have is that the dustbin container fills up very quickly. I have to empty it several times during the course of vacuuming my house. That probably says more about me and life with two dogs than anything else…YMMV.

I LOVE my Dyson Absolute! Every time I use it, I think, "God I love this machine!"

I like this one. It is versatile and powerful. DD, her MIL, my sister, and I all have one. My only advice would be to buy extra filters when you buy it.

I never run out of power but my house isn’t huge and I usually vacuum one floor at a time which is probably 1500 sq feet. I empty the bin a couple times. The bin is a more a limiting factor than the battery power in my experience. The maneuverability and lack of cord far outweigh the limitations in my opinion.

Even if you want to use a full service vac sometimes this is capable of a pretty robust quick interim cleanup.

so which one?

I think the 10 has longer run time and larger dust bin than the 8 but you would have to verify that to be sure. I also think it's the Absolute that has both heads - one for hard surface and one for rugs vs the Animal that has only the rug head.

Very tempting that Amazon has the V10 for less than the V8. Only thing is I think ours is pretty new. I think I might text our housekeeper and ask her opinion.

Thanks everyone, Looks like Dyson Is best, maybe the 10 . Hopefully Costco will have it. I’ll pay more to have the ease of returning if necessary. just curious: how often do you vac unused guest rooms?

Rarely and before I have guests. I keep the doors closed so they don’t get full of cat hair and I don’t have those windows open unless guests are coming to stay.

I have a persian cat who thinks every room is hers, so all rooms get vacuumed a couple of times a week. Also, I am amazed at the dust! Is it normal to be able to write your name on the nightstands?

I actually spoke to my housekeeper. She likes the product but tells me in her experience it runs less than an hour and then take a few hours to charge. She can't vacuum everything in an hour. Plus she reminded me that ours is less than 2 years old. Too bad, looks like a fun toy. (tho why such ugly colors?)

I have the Dyson V8 animal and have been very pleased with it. Our upstairs is mostly wood and downstairs is mostly carpet, so we keep the Miele Cat and Dog upright down there. I do t use either very often but when I use the Miele I am struck with how heavy it is. I wish Miele would come out with a cordless model but until they do we will use the dyson.

Mtnrd the answer to your situation is to buy two. We were going to put a second dyson cordless in our downstairs level in the old house because the it did a better job on brick than the Miele, but the house sold unexpectedly.

My cleaning lady vacuums the whole place each time. Buying two seems wasteful ...when she prefers what we have! And I have to say, it is a monster. If I were petite, I think it would drag me down.

You could always save the monster and give it To the first kid who has an apartment or house. I’ve used that strategy with some success 😎 but you may be too far away from that stage.

Mtn - I was thinking you were without cleaning help and looking for a handy DIY vacuum in the meantime. If you aren’t DIY then no need for the Dyson if the housecleaner wouldn’t use it.