Impressed by a vacuum cleaner? Now this is a first.

Let me start off by stating that I know a thing or two about vacuuming.

For two years when I was in high school, I worked as a maintenance guy for a health/racquetball club, and my main duty, obviously, was to keep the place clean. This involved vacuuming.

Miles and miles of vacuuming.

One of my duties was to vacuum about 20,000 square feet of carpet each and every day. To make things interesting, the management purchased a vacuum that would not look out of place in the 1908 Sears Roebuck catalog. Ah, those were the days.

15 years and several vacuums later, my hatred for all things vacuum-related was still strong, so when my wife began shopping for another vacuum, I promptly distanced myself from the entire process. It was not until she brought it home that I really took notice.

I was impressed. Seriously impressed.

It is not often these days that you come across a product that actually lives up to its marketing hype. The Dyson DC-17 is one of those products. Even though our carpet is brand new (less than 6 months old), has been vacuumed daily, and has never felt the tread of a shoe upon its surface, the first pass with the Dyson was able to fill 3 containers with dust, dirt, hair, and...other stuff I've never seen pulled out of a carpet before. It made me feel as though we had never cleaned the place. I was disgusted and amazed at the same time.

One thing that struck me was the design: most other uprights with hose attachments require you to wind a bulky, hose around and around the back of the unit and somehow clip it in place. To use it you have to unwind and untangle it before it's ready to go. The Dyson hides the hose right in the handle - an ingenious solution that makes switching from carpet to couch a 3 second affair. Just pull the tube up and it detaches itself. No unclipping, unwinding, and attaching of extension tubes, as required by our old vacuum.

This thing is able to transfer from carpet to hardwood or tile with the push of a button. Our old vacuum had an annoying slider, way down by the agitator brush. In order to set it for our tile floors, I would need to turn it off, lean down, and wiggle this thing for 3 minutes until it was in the right position before turning it back on. With the Dyson, I press a button and the agitator brush turns off while the suction remains on. That's it. It automatically adjusts the height to whatever type of carpet or floor you're on.

Emptying the collector bin is a snap. Literally. Press one button and it pops right off. But the bottom on your trash can, then press another button. The *bottom* opens up and everything falls out. It's one of those 'eureka' moments in vacuum design. How many times have you had to reach your hand down inside the collection bin of your current vacuum in order to dislodge some disgusting hair/dust/dirt combination? With the Dyson, gravity does all the work.

We have a small dog that, somehow, manages to shed its body weight in hair each and every day. The DC-17 makes short work of these piles of hair in just one pass. With the attachments, it's fairly easy to clean the hair off the couch as well.

The weight is not a problem as it is with other high-end vacuums. My wife has no trouble carrying it up and down the stairs or storing it in the closet. Suction is very impressive and, true to claims, does not diminish with use, even with the bin becomes full. Oddly, even with all of that suction, the sound is less than that of most other vacuums. It sounds as if the acoustical properties have been tuned by the engineers to make a sound that is not like the harsh high-pitched whine of other vacuum motors. It is more of a low whooshing hum.

Strangest of all, this thing makes me want to vacuum now. Now that's a wonder.

--UPDATE 2/12/2008--

Thanks to everyone for the positive feedback and reviews! Here is my 1-year update on this unit.

Ok, so now, we have owned this Dyson DC17 vacuum for a year and it has seen plenty of use.

About three months after our original purchase, my wife accidentally vacuumed up my cell phone charger cable, which promptly wrapped itself around the agitator brush at least 30 times. When the brush stopped rotating, the geared belt stopped being able to move, and the engine gear (made of metal) that drives the belt (made of rubber) quickly burned right through the gearing on the belt.

Uh oh.

I called Dyson, waited on hold for maybe 30 seconds, and dealt with a very friendly and helpful customer service rep. She told me they had had reports of similar occurrences and had actually made a design change - they were now sending out new agitator brushes and belts that are a bit wider and less prone to slipping, which causes the belt to become stripped. Great news, that!

So they sent me a new agitator brush and a new belt, free of charge, no shipping, nothing. I had it in about 5 days and was very happy with the service on the phone and the speed in which the parts were shipped. I give the support folks 5 stars for this call.

A few other things I've noticed...

- Routine maintenance: Dyson makes it easy to remove parts of the vacuum for cleaning. All you need is a penny to turn the plastic locking mechanisms 90 degrees, and you can remove the bottom plate to get at the agitator brush and cut out tangles of hair and string. I do this once a month or so.

- Sucking up large items, such as pencils and pens, will (no surprise here!) plug up your vacuum and reduce your suction to nothing. You can tell something is wrong because the pitch of the vacuum changes. If you suspect something like this has occurred, use a penny to remove the U-shaped junction at the bottom rear of the vacuum. Once you turn the lock 90 degrees, it should pull out a little and then straight down. Any large items will be caught in this sharp U-turn before they can get into the collection bin and cause any damage. Fortunately, this is easy to diagnose and fix. Total time: 5 minutes.

- Suction is still as powerful as the day we brought it home, even though the vacuum has been run several times with the hoses almost completely blocked by pens, pencils, or small toys. I worry that this may have caused some long-term damage to the motor, but have not yet seen any indication of this.

Nothing has gone wrong with this thing in the year we have owned it, and for that I am very grateful. I empty the collection bin after every use, clean the tangles from the agitator brush once a month, wash the hepa filter once every few months...and that's it. No maintenance, no bag replacement, no filter replacement, but nice clean floors and carpets. You can't really beat that.

Final verdict? Still worth every penny.