Nuance Announces Update to its Dragon Dictate Voice Recognition Software

Don't Buy It

I bought it, hoping it would be an improvement over 2.0, which is worthless, and for which I can get no support. I was lured in by the 90 day guarantee.

After downloading, I was advised I need iOS 10.7 or higher, which I don't have on my networked computer. So I tried to cancel with online help, and was told that I needed to call. Seeing as how the World will end in 3 months, I decided against that, since I don't want to spend the rest of my life on Nuance customer service.

Bottom line: they'll make it very difficult to get a refund.

Here's my chat with the so called "customer service" representative:

Please wait while we find an agent to assist you...
Hello, welcome to Nuance Chat. Please briefly describe your goal or question and I will connect you with the best resource to meet your objectives.
Thomas Green: Hi, how may I help you today?
Customer: i need a refund. just tried to update, and am told, after I download, that I need iOS 10.7 or greater. It would have been nice if that was somewhere in the advertising
Thomas Green: Our support department will be able to help you. In North America, you can reach our customer service team anytime between 9 AM and 6 PM Eastern Time, Monday to Friday. They can be reached by calling 1-800-654-1187
Customer: oh for God's sake. I don't want to call
Customer: and hold
Customer: i've tried using your so-called customer service before
Thomas Green: I understand what you are telling me, however, my role is to direct you to the best resource for your situation. The Customer Service Team will be best able to resolve your issue and they will be happy to assist you. You can contact them through the channels listed above.
Customer: I'll just cancel it through my credit card.
Customer: and review the product online, wherever I can
Customer: that would be a better use of my time
Customer: I almost didn;t buy due to prior bad customer service, but decided to do so based upon the 30 day guarantee
Thomas Green: I understand your concern however as I mentioned I above, my role is to direct you to the best resource for your situation. The Customer Service Team will be best able to resolve your issue and they will be happy to assist you. You can contact them through the channels listed above.
Customer: thanks for your help. they ought to change the box that says you can get help through chat, since it appears you probably only can help to sell
Customer: Is there anything you can do besides sell?
Thomas Green: As I mentioned above my role is to direct you to the best resource for your situation, I am only the operator.
Thomas Green: Our customer service department will be glad to assist you with your original inquiry
Customer: "I only work here?" Sorry to be an ass; I realize it's the company you work for, and not you, that I should complain about.
Thomas Green: Is there anything else I can help you with?
Customer: Apparently not, but thanks for asking
Thomas Green: Thank you for taking the time to chat with Nuance and have a great day!
Customer: i suppose you can pass on my disdain to your supervisor, for what that's worth

lwhobbs said:

snipped

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Well, geez, you didn't, as you said yourself, have to be an ass. I feel sorry for the poor guy on the other side.

stiligFox said:

Well, geez, you didn't, as you said yourself, have to be an ass. I feel sorry for the poor guy on the other side.

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It is pretty funny considering his sig. Talk about stereotypes being true

$99 to upgrade a 6-month-old program?

In March of 2012, I purchased Dragon Dictate 2.5. When I updated my OS in September, Dragon Dictate quit working.

Nuance's recommended "solution" was for me to buy the "upgrade" to version 3.0 for $99. This is not the kind of longevity or support I expected for a $200 program.

Dan H.

Terrible customer service / policies

Agreed with this experience. I also purchased about 6 months ago and now they want $99 to upgrade? They offered to bring it down to $79 but not worth it for a package I don't use enough and where there's no guarantee they won't do the same thing again.

One of the things that I really like about the Mac is that generally speaking, software upgrades are usually free. Dragon is just doing a cash grab. I won't be giving them any more.

Buyer beware

I had the previous version of dictate, running on both snow leopard and Lion. When it worked, it worked well.

But, it started freezing Pages whenever I tried to dictate directly into a pages document. I'd be "typing" along (dictating), and when I look up, in mid sentence the dictation would have stopped, the cursor not blinking and Pages frozen. One of the processor cores maxed out at 100%. The only way to fix it was to FORCE quit pages and relaunch it. then, I'd dictate for a short while before it did it again.

So then I upgraded to Mountain Lion, and the behavior continued. I got a nice notice from Nuance that I could get dragon 3.0 which is compatible with Mountain lion (ya. sure it is...) for $99. So, being the sucker that I am, I bought and downloaded dictate 3.0... and it does the same exact behavior, locking up pages. I'm pissed.....

The only workable solution I've found so far is to dictate into the Dictate text box, and then cut and paste into my pages document... another level of hassle, since I cannot format the dictate text box... but at least it does not freeze the computer!

I've been on Nuance's forums and there are a lot of people having the same problem.

And it isn't just one machine. It is doing it on both my 2011 iMac and my 2012 macbook pro! I plan on having an unproductive session with Nuance support very soon.....

God, I hate that company and that program... If only there was a true alternative. The Mountain lion built in speech recognition is pretty good, but not quite good enough for my purposes...

mmaxcan said:

Agreed with this experience. I also purchased about 6 months ago and now they want $99 to upgrade? They offered to bring it down to $79 but not worth it for a package I don't use enough and where there's no guarantee they won't do the same thing again.

One of the things that I really like about the Mac is that generally speaking, software upgrades are usually free. Dragon is just doing a cash grab. I won't be giving them any more.

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Apple owns Bento and they do this kind of stuff all the time. Bento always charged to go from 2.0 to 3.0 to 4.0. They don't charge for upgrades with a version, but they always charge from one version to the next. I seem to remember they charged full price for the upgrade, but I could be wrong on that. Bento just upgraded their iOS app and charged full price for that too

Upgrades

class77 said:

Apple owns Bento and they do this kind of stuff all the time. Bento always charged to go from 2.0 to 3.0 to 4.0. They don't charge for upgrades with a version, but they always charge from one version to the next. I seem to remember they charged full price for the upgrade, but I could be wrong on that. Bento just upgraded their iOS app and charged full price for that too

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...yes, but should there not be some guarantee if the major upgrade happens within only a few months of purchase?

Check out DEVONthink...

class77 said:

Apple owns Bento and they do this kind of stuff all the time. Bento always charged to go from 2.0 to 3.0 to 4.0. They don't charge for upgrades with a version, but they always charge from one version to the next. I seem to remember they charged full price for the upgrade, but I could be wrong on that. Bento just upgraded their iOS app and charged full price for that too

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It is much more powerful than Bento. DEVONthink Personal is fine for most folks. The free demo is good for up to 150 hours. I've been using DEVONthink for years. I have never had a problem with it and Devon Technologies keeps paid upgrades few and far between... And the upgrade pricing for the DT Pro and Pro Office versions is very reasonable.

DT is usually available with a 25-30% discount on Black Friday after Thanksgiving; it also shows up in Mac software bundles. The ebook "Take Control of DEVONthink 2" is worth every penny and it is currently available at a 50% discount through 9/30/12.

DEVONthink http://www.devontechnologies.com/products/devonthink/

Take Control Book http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/devonthink-2

Discount Info http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/news/save-50-on-all-take-control-ebooks-in-our-september-sale

Mojo1 said:

It is much more powerful than Bento. DEVONthink Personal is fine for most folks. The free demo is good for up to 150 hours. I've been using DEVONthink for years. I have never had a problem with it and Devon Technologies keeps paid upgrades few and far between... And the upgrade pricing for the DT Pro and Pro Office versions is very reasonable.

DT is usually available with a 25-30% discount on Black Friday after Thanksgiving; it also shows up in Mac software bundles. The ebook "Take Control of DEVONthink 2" is worth every penny and it is currently available at a 50% discount through 9/30/12.

DEVONthink http://www.devontechnologies.com/products/devonthink/


Take Control Book http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/devonthink-2

Discount Info http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/news/save-50-on-all-take-control-ebooks-in-our-september-sale

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This wasn't about the Bento product. It was about Apple giving better(read free) upgrades if they owned Nuance. Bento is just an example of an Apple owned company and they don't follow any kind of free upgrades

class77 said:

This wasn't about the Bento product. It was about Apple giving better(read free) upgrades if they owned Nuance. Bento is just an example of an Apple owned company and they don't follow any kind of free upgrades

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I understand. I was merely suggesting an alternative to Bento from a company with an excellent history of offering free upgrades as well as reasonable fees for major upgrades. And the software is much better than Bento too...

I agree with the overall disdain of others regarding this exorbitant upgrade pricing.

I actually just bought version 2 in July 2012. When I asked customer support for a reduced upgrade fee for this reason, he essentially said no and "it's unfortunate that you bought it in July." LOL

Anyway, has anyone who has upgraded noticed any appreciable improvements that would make it worth the upgrade? Version 2.5 was a major pain in the ass for training words and correcting errors (relative to Naturally Speaking 11.5 on Windows). Plus, the program never really felt very Mac like. It was often pretty clumsy to use and always has that god-awful microphone window on top of everything (why doesn't it just live in the menu bar?).

If there are no major improvements, I might just stick with Mt. Lion dictation because its user interface is a lot less obtrusive, it can be brought up at any time without having to launch a standalone memory-hog dictation application, and does not have any conflicts with TextExpander like Dragon does.

I am seriously curious to hear the experience of those who have upgraded.

It doesn't matter how good the new version is...

pruppert said:

I agree with the overall disdain of others regarding this exorbitant upgrade pricing.

I actually just bought version 2 in July 2012. When I asked customer support for a reduced upgrade fee for this reason, he essentially said no and "it's unfortunate that you bought it in July." LOL

Anyway, has anyone who has upgraded noticed any appreciable improvements that would make it worth the upgrade? Version 2.5 was a major pain in the ass for training words and correcting errors (relative to Naturally Speaking 11.5 on Windows). Plus, the program never really felt very Mac like. It was often pretty clumsy to use and always has that god-awful microphone window on top of everything (why doesn't it just live in the menu bar?).

If there are no major improvements, I might just stick with Mt. Lion dictation because its user interface is a lot less obtrusive, it can be brought up at any time without having to launch a standalone memory-hog dictation application, and does not have any conflicts with TextExpander like Dragon does.

I am seriously curious to hear the experience of those who have upgraded.

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I refuse to give this company one more cent. I'm only setting myself up for the same treatment when Apple upgrades to the next "N" version of the OS. It's time to make this a more public complaint. What's the best way to do it?

mmaxcan said:

I refuse to give this company one more cent. I'm only setting myself up for the same treatment when Apple upgrades to the next "N" version of the OS. It's time to make this a more public complaint. What's the best way to do it?

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Don't take no for an answer from the first person you speak with. Always ask to speak with a supervisor. At least, if you are not successful, management will be aware they are creating a lot of unsatisfied customers.

lwhobbs said:

Seeing as how the World will end in 3 months, I decided against that, since I don't want to spend the rest of my life on Nuance customer service.

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I just found your post. Honestly I would gladly buy the software from you if you still have it. This is one of those programs I'd love to have but haven't been able to afford it yet even with a student discount. I could put it to good use instead of it just collecting dust at your place. Let me know if we can work something out.

I was tempted to buy the Mac version of Dragon Naturally Speaking, as my wife is frequently preparing reports and lesson plans (and can't type as well as me).

In the UK, the price for the Mac version is typically £120 ($192). However, I received a mailing from Amazon recently offering the latest Windows version for just £40 ($64).

So, I installed BootCamp and Windows 7 on my 2009 Mac Mini and bought Dragon Naturally Speaking 12 for Windows.

I had read several negative reports on the Mac version compared to the Windows version. All I can report is that the Windows version operates exactly as one would expect, and delivers accurate dictation.