Customer Reviews

Dyson DC23 TurbineHead Canister Vacuum

5 star:		(44)
4 star:		(23)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(9)
1 star:		(15)

 

 

Despite the fact that the Dysons have never been a top pick on Consumer Reports (even though they consistently rate high for brand reliability), I went ahead and purchased the DC23 Turbinehead from Target for $399.

As people often find when purchasing a new vacuum, they pick up a lot of dust and dirt in the carpet that their old vacuum left behind. Mainly because most older vacuums just lose suction even if you replace the filters and maintain all the parts. I find that to be frustrating and disappointing, and that's mainly one of the reasons that I went with the Dyson -- I'm hoping it lives up to their tagline (Never Loses Suction).

The suction on the DC23 is good. The turbine head attachment spins quickly and pulls in cat litter and other little particles in the carpet. I was revolted by the giant thick dust ball I picked up in just one bedroom with the first use. The DC23 does it's job well. So here's the run down of what I like and don't like about this model:

Likes
-Excellent suction, vacuums well. Easily picks up all the cat hair and cat litter I throw at it.
-Small, light weight and portable
-Beautifully designed -- it's shocking to look at this model next to all the Hoovers, Dirt Devils, and Bissells of the world that look like something straight out of the 80's. Also glad they are moving away from the yellow plastic!
-Easy to empty dust bin, no bags
-Because of the small head, this vacuum can go where most uprights cannot -- under beds and tables.

Dislikes
-It's a little expensive, however, will be well worth it if it actually lasts a long time without losing suction
-Storage is a little flimsy -- the hose just sort of hangs out off of the vacuum and the head attachment very loosely attaches to the canister base.

I read a whole bunch of reviews prior to purchasing a DC23 last year because of the price difference, and was taken by the raves about how much the new vac picked up on purchase. The most negative stuff I found related to the quality of plastic used, the awkward wrapping of the hose for storage, maybe a few comments about the head not standing on its own, things I didn't think would be that big a deal. I paid the premium price based on the marketing of the unit (an engineer doing things properly), thinking that if it didn't live up to the hype it would've been noted online. I expected to be delighted by this vacuum. I wasn't.

After just about 6 months use:
Plus
- the canister does collect amazing volumes of stuff from floors, and it is cool to observe it doing so, but I note that it is now cleaning up after itself, so to speak, and so it isn't another brands shortcoming... Still, noteworthy performance.
- I find the power head and floor attachments to be pretty good.
- the power cord is really good at rewinding. No seriously, they got this much better than my last vacuum. Not too strong that it could be dangerous, but strong enough to be efficient. I like it a lot and I hope it works like this for the life of the product.
Overall does vacuuming like a vacuum.

Minus
- I empty the canister every single use, as it looks quite full which is not something I ever worried about previously. I can live with that, but I've never seen anyone comment on how awkward emptying the canister into a garbage can is. The entire base kinda flops down and usually releases a cloud of dust no matter how carefully you open it. I live in an apt with a light colored carpet so when I empty it I invariably reinstall the canister and re-vacuum the area I just did to clean up the dust.
- The clear plastic is kinda "cheap", as some have identified, being more lightweight than my last vacuum, but more troubling to me is that the hose is very lightweight too. I feel I have to be careful not to step on it lest I crush it permanently. This vacuum cost almost twice as much as lesser models with better hardware (@$600 in Canada, compared to @$300 for competitor sale models), so I'm not impressed with this level of quality.
- The power head doesn't stand on its own, as mentioned, and it turns out that this IS annoying to me. Canister vacuums have done this for more than 20 years that I've been aware of, and the dyson engineers dropped or forgot this because they didn't do analysis of how people would use the product...? Or dropping the handle to the ground was a perverse operational cost/benefit decision of some type? Also the lack of a power switch on the handle turns out to be ergonomically annoying too...
- The hose, as someone else mentioned here, comes off the unit clockwise instead of being centrally located. I imagine this improves the airflow, probably a good thing for suction. But, together with the narrow wheelbase, it is occasionally awkward to manoeuvre (counterclockwise in tight quarters) and sometimes makes the unit tippy compared to my last unit. I actually unhooked the hose from a support so it would manoeuvre better.
- I almost never do the wrapping of the hose on the base for storage as shown in the marketing pics because the hose is so rigid and time consuming to do "proply". And then if you try and move the unit with the hose wrapped and head on it is quite awkward. PITA ergonomically. I just put it away with the wand compressed (good feature) and power head on and the hose laying everywhere.
- This lead to my next beef, which is I bought some accessories including a "soft brush" to do blinds. Made of the same dyson plastic, functional but not impressive, and I observed at the time that storing these accessories was gonna be a nuisance, as they don't fit on the unit. They naturally ended up on the floor of my closet and a few times the lightweight hose was left on top of them. The bristles warped from the weight of the hose in a short time and can't be straightened. Again, reference the cost of these things, and I am disappointed that the nylon in the brush is cheap and insubstantial. I've never had accessories do this. I believe they have used the wrong brush material for accessories of this type.

Bottom line: an ok product for its core function, charging too much for the value provided in my view, and not nearly as substantive qualitatively as I would've thought a consumer good at this price point would be. I rate it a 3, by which I mean I might not buy another one of this vintage, quality and price; I wouldn't put it out of the running, but I'd look closely at alternatives. Dyson needs to address the ergonomics and quality values of this product to perform up to its marketing hype.

If you live in a residence that is predominantly hardwood floor, this is one of the better vacuums - no make, that the best. The turbine-powered airbrush works well for moderately shaggy rugs and floors, and while it is not a cheap canister, it is money well spent. I have never sucked out so much dust. Dyson has always scored a very high mark for design and this is no exception. It is quite easy to dump all the dust out from the bin, and I prefer canister vacuums since they're easy to put away.

Get the Motorhead if you have fully carpeted floors. For me the Turbinehead is more than enough.

Let me start off this review by saying that I came from using a 20 year old canister Hoover for the last 9 years. I bought it used and it's served me fairly well over that time. One night about two months ago I was using it and saw that it just wasn't sucking anything. No blockage. The motor was just plain tired. I needed a new vacuum. I like canister vacs because they're easier to use attachments with and I can get under furniture with them. Tugging them along can be a pain but, for me, it's a fair trade off. I was tired of changing bags and Dyson's bagless design peaked my interest. Also, it's cleanable filter meant no need to purchase filters in the future as long as I kept up with washing it every three months or so.

First off, I live in a small house with medium pile carpeting, linoleum and hard wood floors. No dogs or cats. My old Hoover had a rotating brush head powered by a motor which was, of course, nice for the carpets. Dyson does make a canister vac with a motor powered rotating head but, at 600 bucks, that was a little too pricey for me. The recent DC 23 Turbinehead, at about 200 bucks less, sounded more attractive. Like the Vacuum title says, its a "turbinehead." Meaning its powered by air circulation. I was a little worried that it wouldn't be powerful enough but, as I discovered, my worries were unfounded. The Dyson has plenty of suction to get that head spinning fast enough that it ripped out some of the worn areas of my carpet.

I'm getting a little ahead of myself here, though. Lets start with unboxing. Upon getting the Dyson home it was time to open up that very attractive packaging. The vac and it's accessories were easy enough to get out of the box. It did require a little assembly and the very limited instructions weren't as easy to follow as many would like. Nonetheless, with a little fiddling around I figured out the minimal assembly and was ready to go in about ten minutes. The first thing I noticed was how light the head is. Very easy and manueverable. Note that the head does turn and rotate (as does the hose) which is one nice thing my old Hoover did not. The tube length is adjustable too and being 5'09" I did need to extend it a little. To turn the brush on and off there is large push/pull button on the head. It is a little annoying to have to bend over to do this but not a deal breaker for me. I found using the Dyson on hard surfaces to be super easy and smooth. The canister does have some weight to it and feels solid despite the large amount of plastic construction. Use on my medium to low pile carpet was fine with just one minor hitch. I sometimes would find that if I pulled the head back too close to my standing position when vacuuming the "push" forward could get snagged for a second. Another minor annoyance that I'll just have to get used to. Attachements include a crevice tool and a smaller brush for furniture. All attachments use snap lock buttons which is nice and the attachments from my Dyson portable vac work too.

Emptying the Dyson is a simple matter of pressing a button to remove the canister from the vacuum base and pressing another to drop open the bottom for discarding the contents. Now, I live in a fairly rural area so all my emptying (hair, dirt and dust) has been outside but I would say that, if you have a big trash can, it wouldn't be much of pain to do it inside. Storage is pretty easy since this is a canister. I do agree with the other reviewer that the head's storage "hook" on the canister is pretty flimsy but works once the canister is stowed away. I wouldn't trust moving it around though while its on there. I'll try and give an update in a year to let you know how things are going but, so far, I really like my Dyson DC 23 Canister Vacuum and look forward to many years of use.

I had an older generation animal upright... it worked perfectly and the only reason I didn't keep it is that I moved from a country that didn't have the same voltage so it wouldn't have worked here. I was skeptical about a cannister vac since I'd only had uprights. I deliberated for about six weeks after we moved, using a borrowed hoover, which in my opinion just pushes the dirt around a little. I read lots of reviews online and eventually was deliberating between the dc17 animal and the dc23 turbinehead. I didn't want the motorhead because one of my issues is that I didn't want the noisy head - I have a bulldog who goes ballistic about vacuum cleaners.

I'm an ebay gal so got it there for $300, shipping included. It still has the 5 year warranty from dyson, so no risk. I unpacked it on a Friday afternoon and vacuumed the whole house. Bear in mind I've always had a dyson. I LOVED it. Much lighter than the upright and so manoeuverable... and it sits on the stairs! In my opinion way better than the one I had before. And the thing can suck... we emptied the cannister twice. Note that it didn't lose any suction when it was full. The motor was not particularly loud - again, much quieter than my upright.

As far as the criticism I've seen here, I can't relate. The power button is near the floor - give it a push with your toe, for heaven's sake. Also the head slots neatly into the front of the dyson, so storage is no issue. Quite honestly it's an attractive machine. Also, for the person who complained that it spits dirt... I didn't find that at all as long as you keep the head flat on the floor and don't tilt up the back of it (duh).

In short, amazing. I imagine I'll be keeping it till it falls apart, which will hopefully be a long time from now!

Length:: 0:50 Mins

I bought the Dyson DC23 a few months ago and have been having a major problem with it. On one of my carpets, it WILL NOT pick up cat hair. My old $50 hoover would. So when I spent over $300 on this vaccum, I would EXPECT it would do at least as good of a job as the Hoover. The vaccum itself is made well, and works well in most other areas. So I called Dyson to find out what could be done. I first spoke to a service rep named Marcus Z. who gave ma an email address, so I could send him a video of how bad a job this Dyson was doing. I sent it off, and never heard back. So I called back a week later. I had to drop it off at a Dyson dealer (repair shop) to get tested. It tested fine, but the owner of the show, knew it was not pickeing up cat hair because of the "turbine head", AKA not powered.

So I call back again today (after still no response from Dyson), and spoke to Sheila. WOW. I can't believe this woman has a job. She was yelling and changing my story around, so I asked to speak to a supervisor. Finally Tracy called me back and told me that basically I'm S.O.L. Which I am.

I was suckered into a new fancy vaccum, by the ad's on TV and the promise of how much suction this thing had. When in reality, My $50 Hoover did a better job. Today I'm going to pull out that old vaccum, and get my carpets clean again. I can't comment on other models, but my advice is to stay away from the turbine head models. I was told there is no, "trade in trade up", program offered.

I will try to upload my video so you can all see, that this does not work properly. I Just Think Things Should Work Properly too, Mr. Dyson.

I just took the Dyson vacuum cleaner on its maiden trip. And I am very impressed. I grew up with canister cleaners, and have long wanted one again. Never liked those uprights, heavy and hard to get in under furniture etc. The Dyson is easy to handle, cleans really well. A detail, perhaps, but I appreciate that the additional tools (furniture brush etc) are securely fastened. On my old machines they constantly fell off.
This almost made vacuuming fun. One possible downside - the canister seems perhaps a little on the small side. It didn't take long for me to fill it up - unless, of course, that is more a statement of what my place looked like before I brought the Dyson home. If it keeps it up - it's surely a five-star!

Wow! I rarely review things on Amazon and give them five stars, but in this case I really wanted to give five stars to this product. First of all, the suction is unbelievable; I think it could suck the design off of the dinner plates. I have a long-hair cat and a Golden Retriever, both hairy beasts. I used to use one of those 'rubber brooms' to go over the rugs first to get up most of the cat and dog hair; then I would vacuum with the old canister (the Royal I paid $650 for), and then I would use a lint roller to get the rest..

Tangent:
Here's something I found out by accident about Crocs (and other shoes like them). If you have short-nap carpet you can drag your feet around on the carpet, and the Crocs will ball up the dog and cat hair; I often did that prior to vacuuming with the expensive Royal canister vacuum.

With the new Dyson canister vacuum there is no need for any of the extra steps. My carpet is short nap and dense, and the Dyson has so much suction that I use the relase switch to cut down on the suction when I'm moving the vacuum back and forth. I'm so impressed with this thing. I paid around $400 for it, and compared with two others, each over $600, it's unbelievably cheap.

It seems sturdier than the other canisters, and it's very easy to put the attachments on, and to empty the canister. The clear plastic canister is great and you can see exactly when it's time to empty it, and you can empty it in seconds; no bag to carefully pull out while dirt fall out onto the floor, and no bag to try and wrangle back into the vacuum, and no bags to track down and buy. It's short and fat, and doesn't seem to tip neary as much as some other others. It's also a lot shorter and narrower than the old one and can easily be maneuvered around. I will most likely buy the small power-head for furniture in the near future as well.

Clearly I'm impressed with this vacuum, and have already recommended it to others.

I just got the unit today and so far I have to say I'm impressed. This thing sucks like a son-of-a-gun. And, after all, at the end of the day, isn't that what a vacuum cleaner is all about? I know from others that this thing will be sucking just as powerfully five years from now as today. And for me, that's what seals the deal. I've been thru three Kenmore canisters in the past 15 or so years and they all lose suction after a few months. Here's a quick run-down of my initial impressions...
Pro's:
*Really pretty unit...very high tech
*Suction that will put all other vacs to shame...and it's going to stay that way over time
*Very easy to empty
*Never have to worry about having a spare bag
*Lifetime filter that you just have to rinse out every three months or so
*Effective tool storage right on the unit
*Very ingenous telescoping wand...easy to adjust
*Great cord retraction
Cons:
*An "instuction manual" from hell...ridiculously inadequate pictures only...no text...UTTERLY WORTHLESS
*Awkward hose attachment to the front of the unit...pulling the canister around makes you feel like you might damage the connection
*Very awkward control to turn the tubine head on and off...you have to bend down and yank a red disk in and out
*I would have preferred a separate floor head in addition to the turbine head
*The turbine head is terrific on some carpets but can become "suck" on others making it hard to push
*There is no way to effectively wrap the hose around this little unit so you have to put it away completely 'unfurled'
*I would have preferred the on/off switch to be on the hand grip rather than a button you have to press with your foot

So, while the unit is not an ergonomic delight it does excel at what it's ultimately designed to do - suck. And it's nice knowing this comes with a complete five year warranty. Were it not for a few of the nit-picky ergonomic oddities, I would have given this a solid 5 stars.

This is the worst vacuum ever. I reviewed customer comments and am disappointed that people said this has good suction. It only has good suction without any heads attached to it. Previous to purchasing, I called Dyson directly and discussed my needs (which is 99% hardwood floors and 2 area rugs). She suggested this canister version. This model has the "turbine head" which means it can be used for both the floor and carpet. You have to push in/pull out a large knob which is on the side of the tool at the bottom. Yes, it's inconvenient as stated by other reviewers, but figured I could live with it if it had good suction. The suction is so poor that I have to roll over an unpopped corn kernal and make sure that the kernal was directly over the suction hole in order for it to be picked up. So, I called Dyson customer service. She had me go through everything, taking apart the head, then doing a "paper test" while on the phone. She had me tear small strips of paper up and then vacuum over them. Four pieces of paper, got sucked up, but remained in the turbine head, and 3 strips did make it to the canister. She said this wasn't right and did send me to a repair place near my home. They did a test and told me there was nothing wrong with the turbine head and it was sucking at the rated capacity as stated. When I told him about the popcorn kernal, he shrugged his shoulders and said it's working properly. When I stated that I was surprised that it seems they had a good reputation, he stated that they have a great media blitz/marketing campaign. He also said to remember that since the turbine had does not have power to the head itself, the suction is less than other vacuums that have power to the head. I'm also a bit perturbed that I had to buy the "hard floor tool". The suction is slightly better using this, but I had to pay $30 extra (plus shipping). If this is the model they recommend for floors, why not include the darn piece with the vacuum rather than make the customer buy another piece? As with other reviewers, this vacuum is awkward to use. The hose does not come out of the center of the canister, so when you pull it, it's goes sideways. When you try and unlatch the hose from the floor piece, it's awkward as well and takes both hands. The button to change from carpet to floor is on the turbine head, so you have to lean down or flip the turbine head up - again bad design. I could have lived with these issues if the suction were great, but it's not. Don't waste your money on this vacuum. I wish I had my old Sears Kenmore vacuum back. The repair place said the best sucking vacuum is a Miele, but they are double the price.