For a change of scenery, the Vax was sent on holiday to a basement flat in St Leonards-on-Sea, where a mix of light-coloured carpets, laminate floors and rather tatty rugs gave it some new challenges. First, we tackled the rather dim and lifeless cream carpet in the living room. Starting the test on Deep Clean mode, we followed Vax’s instruction and applied the solution by pressing the trigger on the forward stroke and released on the backward to pick up the water and solution.

Given the weight, suck-down caused by the vacuum and the aggressive spin scrub brushes, this Vax takes some pushing and pulling. Over a big room, expect a good physical workout.

We can live with that, though, as after one pass the results were already pleasing. Following a couple of passes for a proper deep clean, the carpet was left looking fresh and lovely once again. An impressive start. The carpet was left remarkably dry after use, too; it was dry to the touch in around an hour.

Proceeding onto a stubborn red wine spill test on our cream carpet, we used the pre-treatment wand to soak the area before running over the area in Deep Clean mode. With a few forward and back motions, we’d already achieved good if not perfect results, as the red wine had been given some time to dry-in. With a recent spill, this action might have done the trick on its own.

Attaching the hose and SpinScrub tool, we set to work on the stained area again – spraying, scrubbing and then vacuuming up the dirty (pink) fluid. This isn’t a fully automatic process, so some elbow grease is required. Not too much, though, as it’s mighty easy to over-flood the area with fluid or scrub so much that the carpet surface begins to fluff up.

Yet the results are top-notch; the carpet was left spotless after a little work. If it’s possible to remove the stain, we’re fairly sure the Vax Platinum Power Max will do the job.

While we were on detail-cleaning duty, we fitted the Upholstery tool and set about the sofa. It’s quite difficult to see the general dirt that builds evenly across the cream surface – until you start cleaning with the Vax. The spray is a little more copious than ideal, so only a gentle squeeze of the trigger is required. Yet there’s no criticising the efficacy of Vax’s cleaning fluid, the stiff-bristled brush or the ability of the tool to vacuum up moisture.

The result was a clean line on the one cushion we tried… leading to having to clean the entire sofa.

Over a few weeks of general use, the Vax didn’t fail to impress with its robust stance on cleaning. One slight niggle is that if you stand it upright for a couple of minutes between cleaning areas it dripped a fair bit of water, leaving pools beneath where it was parked. This isn’t a deal-breaker, but something to be aware of on moisture-sensitive floors.

Having the ability to clean hard floors is a great feature. By simply adding the hard floor adapter to the floor plate, the brushes are raised so they wipe the surface as opposed to scrub into it.

On the mucky laminate kitchen floor, the Platinum Power Max did a fine job of mopping and cleaning, with the added bonus of the brushes agitating seriously sticky stains (dried-on jam spill) without having to go over the same area repeatedly. The Vax exceeded our expectations, leaving us a vibrant and clean floor. Again, it was barely wet afterwards, and completely bone dry in 15 minutes.

As a final test before we packed the unit back up, we tried the machine on the Marvel rug used as a doormat for the front entrance. Ten minutes with the Platinum Power Max and the rug had real punch and vibrancy again, with Hulk’s once mouldy yellow teeth being given the whitening treatment. A proper beast for tough carpet cleaning? You bet.

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