Gizmo Watch: The vacuuming artillery to win the war on dust

There are two uncomfortable things that I learnt while using the Dyson Gen5 Detect vacuum cleaner: The first is that there are, on an average day, around 68 million allergens, 1.8 million skin flakes, 950,000 dust mites and 50,000 coarse grains such as sugar, salt or sand in my living room.

Admittedly, that does not sound very clean when you look at the numbers, but a little online research tells me that those are about the average numbers the Dyson Gen5 Detect detects every day in the typical living room, so I have as much to be ashamed of as perhaps you would if you ran the Gen5 Detect in your living room.

However, if this is a bit of an uncomfortable realisation, then the second learning from using the device is even more of an indictment: I learnt that the world can be neatly parcelled into two categories of people – those that can instinctively assemble a Dyson Gen5 Detect from its pack after purchasing it, and those that cannot. To my great chagrin, I fall in the second category.

And that is even more damning than the gazillion particles that this very capable vacuum cleaner sucks up from my place. At least the numbers that I stated above are a measure of how much cleaner my room is after the Dyson removes all those offending things from the place. It’s seemingly a cure for dirt, dust, pollution and impurities. As for the second realisation — there is no cure for stupid. If you have trouble assembling a state-of-the-art vacuum cleaner in this day and age, then you can only wonder how much trouble you will have when everything goes super hi-tech!

On the manual of the Gen5 Detect vacuum cleaner, Dyson declares that for this latest and most advanced dust-buster, “Our mission is simple. Solve the problems others ignore”. And create problems others haven’t imagined, I might add — like make the assembly of the device, using all the various parts and attachments in the box, so complicated that it seems like you’re assembling weapons of mass destruction to go to war.

And well you might, for with this innovative vacuum cleaner, Dyson has declared war on household dirt like no other cleaning gadget ever did before, to the best of my knowledge.

To begin with, then, let’s see what’s in the Gen5 Detect’s arsenal before we join the battle with its firepower by our side. Opening the package the device comes in is like unboxing the future of cleaning. The Dyson Gen5 Detect vacuum cleaner comes in a sleek, sturdy box, reminiscent of an Apple product unboxing experience. Inside, you'll find an array of attachments that might make you feel like a secret agent with a high-tech gadget arsenal. There's the High Torque cleaner head, Laser Slim Fluffy cleaner head, Hair Screw tool and more — all designed to tackle different cleaning challenges.

But a good stock of ammo is of no use if there is no capable gun to fire it with, which in this case is the motor. And in this department, the Gen5 Detect stays true to Dyson’s reputation of powerful motors and suction. In fact, it takes this reputation to new heights: This vacuum cleaner boasts a supercharged, new fifth-generation Hyperdymium motor, which delivers 262 air watts of suction power, enough to give you the sensation that your floors are being vacuumed by a miniature tornado.

The motor spins at up to 135,000 RPM – up to nine times faster than a Formula One engine. If you think this makes for a speedy cleaning experience, you are right. But saving time is where the similarity with a Formula 1 engine ends. While the motor is powerful, unlike a Formula 1 car, it’s actually really quiet. So, unlike any other vacuum cleaner I have ever used, I could actually carry on a conversation over the sound of the Gen5 Detect and even listen to some music while doing the cleaning.

Ever since it cemented its claim to fame by springing the bladeless fan on a world that didn’t know it needed any such thing, Dyson has also become synonymous with the latest technological innovations. The Gen5 Detect comes loaded with heaps of it, all visible on its LCD display, which shows you real-time battery life and performance data, as well as all the information about the composition of the gunk it has cleaned out of your now near-sanitised room. In fact, it was this LCD screen that read out the data of the analysis of my room’s collection that the Dyson had sucked into its innards.

Gone are the days when vacuum cleaners were basically just noisy air pumps with brush-tipped hoses and pipes attached. The Gen5 Detect adds the smart to the world of vacuum cleaners. The LCD screen displays real-time battery life and performance data, including filter maintenance reminders. It even tells you if there's a blockage and guides you on how to clear it, so you can maintain peak performance with minimal effort. It's like having a virtual, hi-tech cleaning butler at your disposal.

And that virtual butler has more hi-tech tricks up its sleeve, like a fully-sealed, whole-machine HEPA filtration system, which Dyson reckons can capture 99.99 per cent of particles down to 0.1 microns. And a super-charged battery life. There's nothing worse than your vacuum running out of power in the middle of a cleaning session, leaving half your house squeaky clean and the other half dirty. Dyson bills the Gen5 Detect as a portable, hand-held vacuum cleaner and equips it with a formidable nickel-cobalt-aluminium battery that provides around 60-70 minutes of fade-free power for your cleaning marathons. Plus, it charges quickly, so you can get back to the cleaning spree without missing a beat.

However, all of this tech and battery wizardry does add to the weight. And while we did not have a home scale that the device could fit on, you’ll have to take it from the fatigue that I felt in my arms that this Dyson is a hefty bit of kit. It’s like the rocket launcher of vacuum cleaners, both in the devastating effect it has on the dirt in your home and in its weight. It’s just as well, then, that the single on/off button is in a great spot — on top of the LCD screen right at the back panel of the device — and thankfully you don’t have to hold the trigger down of this rocket-launcher vacuum cleaner while you go about using it. That may have led to sorer arms and perhaps even sore fingers.

But while the heart of this vacuum cleaner is a smart and hi-tech one, its main attraction is the attachments. Fix the long pipe to the nozzle of the main unit and you feel like a WW-II sniper — waging war against dirt and dust, picking your enemy off particle by particle. Fix another attachment and you could be Schwarzenegger in one of the Terminator movies, lugging around a machine gun to drill holes in the dust mites’ defence, arms all pumped up with the weight of the thing that is decimating the dust bunnies. Using the Dyson Gen5 Detect is like taking a hand-held howitzer to the house-cleaning gun fight. It’s an overkill that actually works.

As the battle front changes and the enemy morphs and responds, becoming ever so stubborn to clean and retreating to well-entrenched crevices and fortified, hard-to-storm nooks and corners, the various attachments in the Gen5 Detect’s arsenal come into their own, digging up the dirt with laser-guided precision — quite literally.

If you thought your old vacuum's spinning brush was the pinnacle of cleaning technology, you're in for a shock — literally! The Gen5 Detect's Laser Slim Fluffy cleaner head features a precisely angled laser that illuminates the microscopic dirt particles you didn't even know were there. It's like a spotlight for dust, and trust me, you won't believe the gunk you've been missing. Plus, the slim design lets you reach all the cracks, crevices and undersides of low furniture with ease, like no other vacuum cleaner out there lets you.

Then there is the Tangle-Free Hair Screw Tool. If you have long hair or live with someone who does, you're no stranger to the horrors of hair getting tangled in your vacuum's brush roll. But Dyson has you covered with the Hair Screw Tool. It's specially designed to pick up long hair without getting clogged or tangled.

If you are a pet owner, a mini motorised tool eases your struggle of keeping your home clean with furry companions around. This attachment is like a mini vacuum for your upholstery, pet beds and car seats. Say goodbye to stubborn pet hair and hello to a spotless home.

Among a lot of other attachments, there is also a built-in dusting and crevice tool in the stick. It’s kind of like a Matryoshka Doll that makes you feel like you go from sniper mode to shotgun mode when you remove the long pole and reveal this specialist tool that can reach the remotest corners, cobwebs, cracks and crevices.

In case you’re not satisfied with the arms and armaments that the Gen5 Detect ships with and need more specialist attachments in your cleaning battle, the Dyson site has more you can purchase.

Rating: 4.5-stars