Just as an aside to the years ago discussion - Royal uprights were never meant to be use in or sold to a residential home. They were meant to be tough and brutal to take care of industrial and office messes. Paper clips, toner dust, well-trampled dirt and lint, hand truck wheel marks, and who knows what else. Likewise residential carpet was not made to be beat on by commercial vacuums. So the CR testing on them is kind of a null topic unless you install office carpeting in your house, then sure.
Now on the flip coin, a Kirby was not meant to be used in an office environment, they are too weak to handle that. The fans will chip and crack or break, and the brushroll will wear faster as well as the motor. The quick change tool system is also a burden to and useless for office cleaning.
I have a lightweight industrial vacuum I made the mistake of using on my living room rug (which is wool). It ripped a lot of the fibers apart and left the rug thinned in spots. Luckily I noticed it in time (and because it was spitting up little short fibers all over). I tried the same vacuum in my basement (40 years old industrial grade glue-down low pile carpet my father installed himself) and the vacuum performed nicely and the carpet was happy and clean (although the agitation did bust up the ancient decaying glue so there's a crunchy sound when walking over it now).
Both are vacuums made for totally different environments as well as completely different carpets - so that needs to be factored into the equation - and sadly Consumer Reports does not do that. They need to have a separate section for residential and industrial vacuums.
