UPDATED AT THE END OF REVIEW!! IMPORTANT POSSIBLE SAFETY CONCERNS. Let's really answer the big question: Is this thing work the hefty asking price? My response is: heck yeah! I read and read and watched all kinds of videos comparing this carpet cleaner to the other leading manufacturers' offerings in this price category and settled on this Hoover. After three uses in my average sized apartment in a month, I feel that this lives up to it's rather stellar reputation. Here's why: First, it really does clean the carpets deep down. So much so that I was disgusted by the color of the water being sucked out of the carpets. I consider myself a very clean person and I don't track my shoes around my home nor do I have a constant stream of people in and out, especially with the COVID crisis still lurking. So I didn't expect to see such filth coming out of my carpets and rugs. The scrubber truly delivered on its promise to deep clean and extract the dirt and grime leaving a brighter, pleasant smelling and barely damp result. Second, it is dummy proof. I have never owned one of these before but remember my mom fighting with her old monster carpet cleaner and it taking hours upon hours for these two huge scrubbing pads to clean the carpet leaving behind these weird crop circles patterns and the floor so wet, one would be concerned about growing black mold or worse! Not my Hoover. I actually read the directions cover to cover, watched a couple Youtube vids again and went to work. I loaded up the solution tank with the Pet Concentrate made by Hoover that I scored on sale for $12. I filled the fresh water tank with warm to hot tap water. Plugged it in, reclined the handle and stepped on the power pedal. I moved at a slow to medium pace. When moving forward the indicator light on the base illuminates "Wash" and when it's pulled backward, the light changes to "Dry". And that's it. For stubborn areas I went over it a couple times or a bit slower. If you go too slow it stops the water flow and just goes into dry mode. So if that happens, pick up the pace. Remember to pull back on the dry pass in the same line that you just washed. That's where it's not like just vacuuming with a traditional vacuum. There's no trigger to pull since the cleaner feeds the right amount of solution to get the job done. Now I will say, I read somewhere or watched a clip that said when you are all done to push the "Dry Only" button by the fresh water tank and go over the whole area a couple times. That is the key to making sure you don't have to wait hours for your carpets to dry. That extra extraction makes all the difference. A must do. And supposedly there's some assistance from a blow dry type of mechanism in the dry mode but I couldn't tell if it was working or not, so I trust that it is. Sounds a little gimmicky. My living room is 18ftx15ft and I got through more than half of it before I had to refill the fresh water tank. So that's not bad at all. There's nothing that tell you that the fresh water tank is empty and you are not washing anymore. The only indicator is the sound of the unit that changes to a higher, faster tone. Like a shop vac that has a clogged hose. It's a little startling at first but completely normal from what I read. And so far, no malfunctions. I didn't feel that the machine ate up too much solution as some people have said. It used maybe 3/4 of the solution I put in the tank to do the whole living room. Maybe even just 2/3. The tank holds about half of the solution bottle that I bought. So you do the math. I'm guessing about a quarter to a third of the entire purchased solution was used in this medium sized living room. Whatever it was, it wasn't enough to make me think that this is going to have an extremely high cost of ownership. However, when using the hand attachment, the solution sprayer attached to it does throw out a large amount of solution that I think is unnecessary. So I mixed some up in a spray bottle with one part solution to 3 parts water and just sprayed the sofa and chairs. Looked reasonable to me. It seems to have done a pretty good job. Sofas get that weird dark spot where either you or your pet sits (a natural by product of oils in skin and hair absorbed by fabric over time). It got rid of those spots without a whole lot of fuss, so I'm pleased. Basically, if you can vacuum your floor, you can use this machine. Oh, speaking of vacuuming, be sure to vacuum your carpets very well before you wash and then after you dry. It keeps the machine from getting clogged too much and softens the carpet after cleaning and also removes debris that was pulled up. I used a window fan and ceiling fans to help the drying process and I could easily say that they were dry in about 45 minutes. And that includes my shag area rug which turned out beautifully. A word to the wise: Keep your machine clean. I can see where plugged filters and debris wrapped around the brushes would easily cause performance issues or a break down over time. It is clearly stated to clean the machine and empty the reservoirs after every use. I suspect that if this wasn't done and the machine malfunctioned, then the first thing a repairman would look at is the regular maintenance of the product. Just like a mechanic at a car dealership would check if you changed your car's oil etc before covering a repair under warranty. Remember, failure due to lack of maintenance is not covered for anything you probably own that I'm aware of. Cars, appliances, and carpet cleaners included. That being said, it's very easy to dump the reservoirs and rinse out the dirty tank well, pop the top cover off of the brushes, remove the brushes to de-tangle any hairs or fibers and reassemble. It adds ten minutes, if that, onto the whole process but will hopefully save you a lot of grief in the future. Plus it's just sanitary. It does come with a five year warranty against defects I believe so that's pretty darn good in anyone's book. I almost forgot, this really doesn't take up much more of a footprint in the closet than an ordinary upright vacuum. Now it is significantly heavier than my shark but surprisingly it's easier to push in the thicker carpets. The only small (and I mean small) gripe I have is that the front doesn't have guide wheels or little skis or some kind of solution for going from carpeted to non carpet area. Let me explain. You certainly wouldn't use this for hard surfaces. But if your home is like mine, in a couple areas the carpet of the great room meets the hard floor of the kitchen. In order to properly clean that threshold it sometimes happens that the front of the cleaner drops off of the carpeting and onto the hard floor. In order to get it back into the carpeting, you must not lift it up by the handle. It's not designed for that according to the instructions. You must lock it into the upright position, then tip it back to lift the front up. Place it back on the carpet and then recline the handle and start cleaning again. I dunno. It should have little guide wheels at the front corners like a lawn tractor deck or something to make it easier to go from one level to another higher level. Instead, because the nozzle is flush to the floor, it just dead stops when it meets an obstacle like that. It would be an easy fix I would think. And again, this is very minor. Not enough to detract from the 5 star rating I gave. So hopefully this long winded review has helped someone. If you're like me, then you would appreciate the details, especially since $269 isn't all that easy to come by these days. Side note: I like the performance so much on this unit that I went on to buy the handheld, portable spot cleaner by Hoover and am very happy with that purchase as well. It's a nice companion to have for taking care of everyday spills or pet accidents. And with two Yorkie puppies now in our home, there's plenty of those. :) Enjoy and happy cleaning. UPDATE ALMOST 2 YRS LATER: Well, it's still going s
