Shark Cordless Hand Vac SV736

February 2009. In informal testing at The Wall Street Journal, the Shark SV736 beat out both the Black & Decker PHV1800 18 Volt Pivot Vac (*est. $70) and the pricey Dyson DC16 Root 6 (*est. $150) in the holiday debris cleanup challenge. Owners posting to Amazon.com, Epinions and Target.com like the Shark too, although user ratings on all three sites fall short of the higher-priced Black & Decker's near-perfect scores. We found more complaints about durability for the Shark hand vacuum than for the Black & Decker model. The Shark Hand Vac's detachable motorized brush head gives it an advantage on carpet and upholstery.

The most useful review of the Shark Cordless Hand Vac SV736 comes from The Wall Street Journal, where the Shark is compared against four other handheld vacuums on their ability to pick up a ‘holiday dirt mix' of potato chips, wrapping paper bits and other debris. Amazon.com is an excellent source of owner-written reviews of the Shark, with enough posts to provide a good picture of how it stands up in daily use. Epinions and Target.com have only a few user reviews each, but posts on both include a good balance of positive and negative. There's also an "Expert Review" of the Shark SV736 hand vacuum on ConsumerGuide.com, but the apparent lack of product testing makes it little more than a description of features.