I didn't experience all the horrors I've read about here. I rather had a good experience with the vacuum cleaner. As long as we fill the water to the minimum level, it works great. If we skimp out on the water it begins with… It will seem to do nothing. As a wet vac when the water level goes above the maximum line, it's pretty much useless until we drain out some water back down to the minimum level. My only two complaints is the stupidly designed hose and attachment heads. No locks, no twisting. It simply pushes together. The trouble with that is while vacuuming, it becomes loose and simply falls off either the hose from the handle or the head from the extension tube. That gets tiring real fast. The other complaint is how long it takes to clean the damn thing.
As for power… It's pretty darn good. I vac'd once with my regular bag-less Bissell vac, then a second time with the H20 vac to see what the first one missed. OMG water was black and dirty. I tried a second run and though dirty the second time, it wasn't so black. Mainly murky. After a few months of loving it is when I noticed the head, hose or handle coming loose because of the push-in fittings. I opted for duct tape to lock the darn thing in place. P.S. I got two for the price of one. All I had to pay was $58.99 for the second vac's shipping. Overall good vacuum cleaner with poor push-in fittings. Oh the colour on the commercial showed white or red. They sent me pink!!!