Our In-Depth Review
Performance: Using The Dirt Devil Ultra Power MO8230
We had high hopes for this vacuum, but quickly found upon using it that it fell short of our expectations.
The Dirt Devil’s brushroll did a decent job on cleaning small particles from hard surface and carpeted flooring, but struggled with medium and large particles, requiring us the laborious job of cleaning those up with the small attached hose.
The suction strength on this machine is very weak. It is very noisy.
It is not easy to use to clean vehicles. On the plus side, it is easy to store, has a decent filtration system and doesn’t lose power.
Performance on Carpets
Messes come in all sizes. To test how this vacuum would perform on various debris, we spread flour on our carpet. With its high powered brushroll, the flour was quickly sucked up.
Next we tested the vacuums ability to handle medium particles using rice. The Dirt Devil Ultra Power vacuum did a poor job sucking up the rice. It spit it across the floor and broke up the grains.
We switched to using the hose. The hose got most of the rice off the floor, but it was a painstaking task. Last we used dried white beans for large particle testing.
The powerhead didn’t work at all. Again, we switched to the hose again and the machine did a decent job of grabbing the beans.
Performance on Hard Floors
This vacuum handles fine particles on hard surface flooring without a problem. Using the brushroll, the machine quickly and easily captured all of our flour. Likewise, the vacuums hose was able to clean up our medium rice particles and large white bean particles.
Automobiles
We felt very limited in our ability to clean our car’s floor mats with the boxy design of this machine. The long crevice tool on this machine is a nice device to have in a car.
However, the suction on this vacuum is pretty weak making it ineffective in picking up much of the debris stuck in the crevices and contours of our car’s carpeted floors.
Additionally, we had to run an extension cord to plug this vacuum in while cleaning our car. This was less than convenient.
The upside of this is that we would have been able to clean our whole car without running out of battery power, that is, if the vacuum had worked to clean our vehicle.
Pet Hair
We rubbed pet fur into our upholstered chair to test how well the Ultra Power performed cleaning up this often challenging mess.
It took several passes, but eventually it sucked up all the fur. Because it didn’t get the hair on the first or second try, we do not recommend this machine for someone who has shedding pets.
Filtration
This Dirt Devil uses type G bags. These small paper bags are less than a dollar a piece to purchase. The filtration on this machine was decent.
Our particle scanner reading jumped when we first turned on the machine, but it slowly went down. We found that this vacuum smelled poorly within a few seconds of turning it on, even with a brand new bag.
Suction Strength
We tested the suction strength of the Dirt Devil Ultra Power MO8230 handheld using our water lift gauge. A water lift gauge measures the strength of the suction produced by the motor. Your average upright vacuum has a water lift of seventy. This Dirt Devil has a water lift of ten. It confirmed our observation that this vacuum is lacking in the suction strength department.
Attachments / Onboard Tools
We really liked that all the attachments are on board. The power brush is the permanent nozzle. The hose is stored on the side of the vacuum and attaches onto the power brush.
A crevice tool is stored inside the hose. To switch between the power brush and the hose, you slide a cover over the power brush and flip the hose forward.
One of the design flaws with this system is that when you slide the cover up to reengage the power brush, debris that was not fully sucked into the bag falls out creating a mess. We missed having a dusting brush to use on our baseboards and furnishings.
Ease of Use
Style
The style of the machine reminded us of our grandmother’s handheld from thirty years ago. It is simple and vintage. The weight of this machine is well balanced and didn’t cause strain on our wrists.
Getting Started
One of the advantages of having a power cord is that there is no charge time required before being able to use this machine. It comes already assembled and is as simple to get started as taking it out of the box and plugging it in.
Noise
This vacuum is loud! It is so loud that you can’t communicate over the noise even when you scream.
It averaged in the low nineties which puts this vacuum in VacuumWizard’s loud category. We would have needed ear plugs if we used this vacuums fore more than a few minutes at a time.
Ease of Use on Stairs
We are fortunate to have a power outlet close to our stairs and found that the sixteen foot power cord was more than long enough to reach from the top to bottom of our stairway.
As we mentioned before, the suction strength on this machine is not very strong and we felt that it didn’t do a great job of thoroughly cleaning our stairs.
Storage
With all attachments on board and no battery to charge, this vacuum is incredibly neat and easy to store.
There is no cord storage on the machine itself, so you will need to find a creative way to keep the cord corralled.
Value For Money
The Dirt Devil Ultra Power MO8230 handheld vacuum is available to purchase for between thirty and forty-five dollars. Even though this machine is a good price, we felt it didn’t deliver on the promise.
Final Vacuum Verdict
Many consumers desire to add a handheld vacuum to their cleaning crew so they can quickly clean up small messes, and to use on their stairs or in their vehicle. The Dirt Devil Ultra Power MO8230 handheld isn’t versatile enough to do a good job on those tasks.
The suction strength was too weak and it was very noisy. However, we did like that this machine is bagged, has a continuous power supply and is easy to store.
