My wife convinced me to buy the 'animal, ball' Dyson last year. It is an expensive vacuum, one that you COULD live without, but it is ridiculous how much dust/dirt that SOB sucks up. This brand really leives up to the hype the stale british guy on the commericals gives it.

If I didn't already own a Dyson, I'd seriously consider picking this one up. As someone with pets, I can say that I could probably vacuum them up if they got too close while I was cleaning. And I doubt it'd lose suction as fluffy rips through its innards!

My parents got me the DC15 for Xmas and it is amazing. You can see the dustbunnies clinging for dear life as they are sucked up from nearly a foot away.

The way the ball is a great feature as well.

Yeah, I love my Dyson Animal. Practical art...

Do they make a central vac model?

I'm in a committed relationship with my Dyson DC15, we're thinking of adopting a Dyson portable.

Where are the pics at? It says go to the gallery, but I don't see any linkage.

This has been out in the UK for a bit (It's called the DC18) and all I can say is go for the DC15 - they are identical except you have to empty this one more. I found this out the hard way!

Man, I must be the only person who got a bad Dyson. I picked up the Animal DC07 and have never been even moderately impressed with it. It reminds me of a Jaguar. It's nice to tell people you have one, it's ridiculously expensive and it's constantly needing repair.

Yep - Dyson rocks!

Hard to convince non-users to join the Dyson pod, as they seem way too expensive.

I converted my Mom by lending her the Dyson to try after she'd already used her Hoover Vac to vacuum her house as usual.

She did 10 mins round the house with the Dyson, sucked up a whole load of crud that the Hoover hadn't touched, then grabbed my Dad to go out and buy her one!

He's still not forgiven me!! LOL

fuzz - a central VAC version of a Dyson would TOTALLY rock!

We picked up a DC14 Dyson from Costco after going through 2 other vacuums and am so very glad we made the purchase. One of the best purchases we've ever made.

Just for kicks, we used vacuumed our carpet twice with our old vacuum...then brought in the Dyson. Immediately went over the same area and was totally amazed at how much dust and dog hair this thing picked up! Couldn't be happier!

I bought my Dyson a few years ago and never regretted the money spent. It always amazes me just how much more crud these things pull out of a carpet that other vacuums have already been over.

Mines a funky purple DC08, can't really justify upgrading something that works so well still!

I bought a Roomba a few weeks ago. Less money and it actually does the vacuuming for you. ;)

I bought a Dyson about 2 years ago, and my friends now routinely make fun of me for how much I sing it's praises. Best. Vacuum. Ever.

What I want to know is what the hell that UK tag line is all about. The same British guy talks about how it gets everything, not missing a bit, "Not a sausage?!!"

I usually just lean over and pick up the sausage by hand...

It's some weird English idiom, they don't mean sausage literally. Although it would be fun to see what would happen if you tried.

So are you all telling me that Dyson sucks?

lol...look i made a funny

No way I'm spending $500 on a plastic vacuum cleaner. For the money you can buy a Royal that works just as well, it built like a brick $h!# house and will last for the rest of your life.

Trojan - you missed the point of the Dyson Vs say a Royal.

Royal has paper bag that will clog as soon as you start to use the vacuum, and reduce the suction exponentially.

The Dyson has no bag, so never looses suction, so always has max suck to get up more of your crud.

Dyson beats any bag style vacuum all day long - that's why Dyson designed it.

He got pissed at how little the bag vacuums sucked, and that sucked!

Your Royal might be metal, but it's no match for a Dyson.

So how loud is it really? The Dirt Devil I've got now works wonderfully, but it's louder than sin on a Sunday. Every time I use it, I don't see the cats for hours and I usually find a gift under the bed too. That's the benchmark. Does it scare the crap literally out of cats? If it doesn't, then it may actually be worth that kinda coin.

dysons are known for both their suction power AND their noise...

I vacuum my dogs with my Dyson. They aren't really that loud. If you do have dogs, you'll need to take apart the top piece every couple of years to clean it out. The manual says not to, but it's really not that hard. The real fine dirt and pet hair oil starts to stick to the inside of the vortex cones. Little bit of hot soapy water and about an hour to dry and it's good as new!

Yes, yes, fanatics! I'm not alone!

@barry99705, how often do you cut your dogs hair from the beater bar? I have to everytime I use it.

BTW, I used to be an appliance salesperson, & the Dyson was the only thing that I have successfully sold, a woman came in to the store looking for a vac for the care home that she was the head of housekeeping for, she wanted a cheap one because they keep breaing due to the type of use that they get put through, whilst she walked out without purchasing anything that day, she boss came in the next day and purchased a DC07. I also sold one the same day to someone looking for a self-propelled unit for her elderly parents.

Stay away from these stupid bagless vacuums. After owning one for 6 months I really regretted getting rid of my old bag vac. First of all, bagless is not convenient because there are multiple filters that have to be removed and washed out in the sink and they get clogged up in no time. Its a dirty job that you never would have to do with a bag. Then after about 6 months part of the plastic cracked near a seal and dust started blowing out the front of it. I got so fed up I went looking for my another one of my 15 year old all metal Hoovers but they don't make them anymore. I did some searching online and I found and awesome all metal vacuum cleaner that is normally used for industrial use in hotels and casinos. It is made by Royal and it is the Everlast 8300 model. Here is a link on Amazon but don't buy it there, its too expensive:

http://www.amazon.com/Royal-RY8300-Everlast-Upright-Cleane...

I found some dude selling them on eBay for $325! The list price on this baby is around $900. The bags have built in Hepa filters and when they are full, which take a while since they are so large, you just toss'um. The unit is all metal with real ball bearings and its the type of thing you parents had that lasted for 25 years. Oh yeah, one more thing, it comes with a 7 year warantee whereas most units only come with a 1 year warantee except for expensive ones like the Dyson which give you a 5 year.

New is not always better!!!

Don't beelive what they say about the bag clogging either. The bag has lots of surface area when compared to the surface area of the filters in teh Dyson. As an owner of one I can swear to how badly they clog and how quickly.

Dyson has two things going for them, A slick looking product and a good marketing story that sounds good to the uninformed.

"Dyson has two things going for them, A slick looking product and a good marketing story that sounds good to the uninformed."

Exactly... When I compared the Dyson to the Royal, there really was not any difference. (Except for craftmanship.) Even when the bag was full. And my bag is a hell of a lot cheaper than any filter.

DYSON REALLY SUCKS!
I've had an Animal for about 2 years now. Best vacuum I have ever owned. When you look to see what an Electrolux or a Kirby costs,Dyson is a bargain!!

Geez. Nearly 30 comments on a VACUUUM CLEANER on GIZMODO!! Does it play FLAC? OGG? MP3? What about DIVX? XVID? HELP!! Release me from this Twilight Zone!!

Actually I didn't have the balls to buy one of these and bought a Hoover instead. I hate it.

Yeah, my parents got me a Dyson Animal DC07, the Big Purple Monster, because I have allergies, and I have 3 kids (boys) and pets.

Love.
It.

I had an expensive Hoover WindTunnel self-propelled model, and I had to replace the $40.00 paper filter every 6 months. Then the self-propel feature broke, some tiny widget I couldn't fix myself, and that thing, unpropelled, is like heaving an anvil around the room! There are so many little parts to the damned thing, and bits and pieces started breaking off and going missing. I looked online, and could not find many of them without buying the entire replacement component that contained the 50-cent widget I needed to replace. I had to empty the dirt cup and tap/sweep the filter cylinder 4-6 times in the course of vacuuming my entire 2000 sq ft house! If I didn't tap out the filter every time I emptied the dirt cup, the thing lost power immediately.

The Dyson's design and construction is simple, elegant, and functional. There are no traps I cannot reach to inspect for possible clogs (not that this ever happens, the damned thing is so strong), it picks up so much crap out of my carpet that I am ready to rip it all up and put down laminate. It's really disheartening.

It's very easy to empty, easy to clean, and there is only 1 end-stage HEPA filter that needs to be rinsed out every 6 months. Nothing to buy or replace, or clog.

We like it so much, my wife was actually ok with me dropping $150 on the Dyson handheld. I was out shopping to replace our third Dustbuster in 7 years, and we decided it would be worth it to just get something we wouldn't need to replace any time soon, and with no replaceable filters. I love it so far, it's totally worth it, and as an added bonus, next Halloween, I'm going as one of the Men In Black, with the Dyson handheld as my weapon. :)

Yeah, I'm a dork, and I love my vacuums.

I've had a dyson now for about three years. We got one after moving into a new home. The amount of carpet fuzz it sucked out of the new carpet was staggering. My wife is hot for cleaning and she was mad at me for buying a $300 vacuum cleaner. Then she used it.

She'd shoot me if I made her use another one now. That thing is teh awes0me. We also got their little battery powered hand held one recently for cleaning cars/little messes and it's just as good for its size.

Makes any other vacuum look like a huge waste of money.

Consumer Reports, which admittedly leaves a lot to be desired, does NOT like the Dyson. Their recent conclusion (Feb 2007) was that bagless vacuums, while convenient, are not as good as ones with bags.

I won't restate their entire findings, but two of the the top 3 rated models were Kenmore (Sears). The highest rated Dyson was the Animal, at #16 on the list. Even though this model is designed for pet hair, CR only gave it a "fair" rating (only "poor" is worse than fair).

We were going to get a Dyson, but instead picked up a Hoover that cost way less and cleans better than any vacuum we've ever had.

Even if you get one rated just beneath the Dyson you're still getting a superior vacuum!

my bag is a hell of a lot cheaper than any filter

Trojan, the filters are lifetime, and washable - so have zero renewable cost.

How are your bags cheaper than that?

Neumahn - washing the filters takes 2 minutes, and the fine particles they contain proves how efficient they are at removing it from your house.

It's a lot more healthy than a dusty old clogged bag - and you don't have to spend $$$ every week on a new bag.

The bags for the Royal are around $3 each and they last me about 8 weeks. We vacuum once a week (no pets) but the house is 5,000 sq ft. The bags have heps filters built in.

My experience has been that you had to clean the filters much more frequently on the bagless. If you don't you have to wonder how much it is catching.

I also prefer the all metal construction of the Royal. They are not disposable vacuum cleaners like the plastic ones. I'll have this Royal for ever.

Neumahn: Which bagless did you use? My house is DU---UH---STY, we live downwind of a major road. I clean my Dyson 1 HEPA filter 2 times a year. It takes me about 10 minutes to wash it and then wait for it to dry. It's a lifetime filter.

I pay for zero bags. My son has knocked over my plastic Dyson about 100 times for fun. He's 3 and it has no cracks. The components are all modular so if anything breaks it's easy to replace. I've had no failures and this vaccuum has more suction than any store bought bag model I've used or Rainbow Vacs and Kirby's. (Royal seems to be compared to Kirby's.)

My only complaint is based on the fact that the Dyson is heavy and my wife has to struggle to carry it up the stairs.

To each their own man but I'm never going back to a bag vacuum as long as I can buy a Dyson. It's not all marketing hype if you get a Dyson. If you get a knock off bag-less then your mileage may vary.

As for Consumer Reports, forget it I've seen far to many reviews in that RAG that were full of baloney.

BTW - I don't work for Dyson. Anyone else here affiliated with any other vacuum vendor please stand up. ;^)

I think you people are going to believe what you want to believe. Of course once you have spent over $400 on something its hard to not be any other way.

Neumahn, I have to disagree with you on that assumption. I bought a JVC hard drive video cam last year and spent around $500 on it. I'm more than happy to admit that I hate the thing and would gladly dump it. It's a total POS. For starters, the software it came with is miserable, the optics are mediocre, battery life is abysmal, and the file format it generates is bafflingly stupid. If the Dysons are just as bad bang for the buck, I really want to know.

DC14 Animal-owner here (and believe me, I need it with a pure-bred Maine Coon in the house). My DC07 Animal had a design flaw which kept the cover for the extension from closing properly (but didn't affect performance), and as soon as the DC14 came out (which corrected the particular flaw I had with the DC07), I exchanged it under my extended warranty. It's much more quiet than any other vacuum I've owned.

Before Dyson, I always relied on high-end Kenmore canister vacuums. Never again!

There's a Dyson Slim being raffled off here, if anyone's interested in entering: http://govacuum.com/dyson-slim-giveaway.html

I have a Royal RY8300 {best vacuum ever}, and I have used Dysons before, they are equal to most $300 vacs, but look interesting. IO not worth anyore than $300..
Get a Royal, there retro classic looking, about the same weight as the dyson, but will last forever.. No bs forever, evreypart is replaceable 7-10 year warrenty all metal and cleans very well..

Hi all. I own TWO Dysons - the All Floor upright model and the DC-11 canister. It does not require cahones to buy Dysons, it requires the cash and the motivation of severe allergies coupled with a delightful husband who tracks in all manner of debris as well as a couple of dogs and a rotating cat population. I have all hardwood floors - heck, I have an all hardwood house - walls, floors, ceilings (my husband hates sheetrock) - with two 9 x 10'8" Persian rugs in the dining area and the living area and Persian rugs in all bedrooms but the master, which has an Indian rug - all high quality and purchased during our travels. I prefer the canister's attachment for the hardwood floors and find the upright a bit gentler for the rugs, most of which involve silk, although I use the canister on th non-silk ones about once every three months. I am an unabashed perfectionist who cleans the filter each time I finish vacuuming and re-treat it with Micro-Ban, which I keep on hand. It's not a big deal and less disgusting than the air pollution of removing and placing a bag into a garbage bag to dispose of. Pricewise it wins over bagged. I can empty as much as I want and don't pay for the excess bags I used before plus the disposal bags. But I'm looking for a little help here: I have wanted to wash the vortex unit with hot soapy water and don't see a reason I can't do so as there's no motor there, but with nearly $1000 invested, I'd prefer not to do something girly and stupid. I should also let you know that I've owned Miele, Royal (returned that beast, it's unwieldy and far from easy to use when doing anything beyond vacuuming a carpet) and every other top end vacuum. I retired a Miele (3 months old) when I bought the first Dyson and saw what it pulled up that the Miele left behind and I consider Miele a good vacuum. So Barry99705, give me some notes here, can I suds it up in the sink or do I have to wipe it down (not as effective)?

@cmstormer:
Hi, I'm looking to give my dyson a good clean too, and I found the attached website....
[www.crazysquirrel.com]
I'm keen to give it a go....