Ive never had a full bag in my Miele stick vac yet and I've owned it for a few good years. Infact when I come to think about it, it only required a new box of bags because in the last FIVE years it has only been used once upon a blue moon!
As others have noted, I do like the longer cord that has been added to it. It is no way a rival to SEBO's Felix though which is a far heavier, more substantial unit with better versatility at the time of cleaning.. one of the reasons to why the Felix has a PN as standard compared to the "Kombi" units where upon certain markets only apply, some Felix models only come with a suction only 2 way pedal floor head.
The Quick Step/Miele stick vac is a good idea if you require an upright stick vac just to do hard floors and ocassional soft rugs, but I find using my older Electrolux Superlite to be a far more capable unit and one that doesn't involve so much time or effort.
You can use the small cleaning tools supplied too, but I find it a struggle to use the main body of the machine as a large hand held - certainly isn't as light as using a Dirt Devil Handy dust buster with a motorised brush roll on stairs or as small. The SEBO Felix is exactly the same. Miele and SEBO both like to compete with other brands and it is most obvious through the years that both German companies wanted to make a product that could possibly steer buyers away from the likes of Vorwerk.
However, my main gripe with the Miele is the weight of the thing! A Miele S2 or older S4 is far more versatile as well as having a larger dust bag capacity. When it comes to actual cleaning beyond carpet or hard floor cleaning, I have to take off the main handle, then the spine in which the cord usually gets connected to, allow that to drop to the floor, store the handle somewhere or the pipe where the handle is connected to, choose a tool, jam it on the end and then try and get into areas to use the machine. The Miele stick vac by its body alone is quite heavy due to its build, and certainly isn't as light to lift when cleaning high up - compared to Miele's cylinder/canister vacs with their far lighter hoses and to a point, the twin piece telescopic tubes.
To get under beds is quite novel though - Miele suggest that apart from the conventional method of just swerving the upright left or right and downwards to clean under low furnitures at angles, you can swap over the main pipe at the top that normally acts as the secondary part between the handle and the main body. Here is where the top pipe instantly serves up as long tapered suction channel between the main floor head and the bottom of the machine. I've only tried this a couple of times though as I end up having to using the main plastic handle locked into the top of the machine for better steerage as opposed to resting my hand on the main carry handle of the body to get the machine under beds.
With pets, the Super Air clean filter isn't a good filter to rely on - I find the AAC version far better as it is purpose made. Overall I think the stick vac in the UK could have been made better had it featured Miele's PN, rather than the standard floor head, and the one that came with mine is made for this stick vac and lacks the park position normally equipped for the canister vacs.
When all things considered though, the Miele stick vac is alright at what it promises - but I much prefer the more modern canister units - as previously mentioned, even the older S4000/Carina units are far lighter and easier to manage - plus over time you can get a far wider range of spares and a far lighter cleaning experience that is also more powerful, faster and ultimately gets through the process of cleaning. Evidently for those markets that still sell the stick upright, Miele purposefully fit their canisters with shorter length of cords for the upright to sneak in as an alternative purchase.
[this post was last edited: 1/20/2013-23:14]
