She had a Bosch cordless one previously, that was better. It's supposed to be capable of replacing your corded one, but it's simply not up to the task - any corded vacuum I've had was better - a £30 LG was -way- better than the Dyson it replaced (when the motor failed, it was BER), and lasted a lot longer. If I need to clean the car, I'd do it with my old Henry that I found by the side of the road.

ahh ok. I have the v11. Seems to work fine, I clean my house car ect. But I haven't really compared it against others.

I'm not the op but my wife bought a Dyson. It was a piece of crap and and suffered all the problems and more the op mentioned. Broke after a couple years and we ditched it.

I went back to using my 20 year old Dirt Devil. That thing is awesome and will suck up anything. Emptying it is slightly annoying but it's way better than the Dyson ever was.