I'd say the Roll-Easy an under-rated machine. It, and the other G.E. canisters of that period, never fared particularly well in Consumer Reports testing; and it seems that not very many collectors are interested in them other than for the "WOW" factor - especially in terms of the Roll Easy.
But when I pulled mine out the other day to shoot the video of it, I was absolutely amazed at how much dog fluff it pulled up out of the living room rug. We have two Pekenese -- as anyone with long-haired dogs knows, this time of year means "doggie tumbleweeds" all over the place. Well, the rug nozzle of the Roll-Easy dispatched all the surface hair on the rugs in no time. Granted, it did not do the same kind of job that a revolving-brush upright would do, but it got up more hair than I expected.
The suction power is, I'd say, pretty much average for machines of that era. I've never tested the Roll-Easy but I'd say, offhand, that it has about as much power as an Electrolux LX. It is a much quieter machine than it seems in the video -- it has a very pleasant muffled sort of sound.
