Nuance PaperPort 11 Review

Overall Rating

1. It has an image auto-straightening feature that is awesome.

2. It creates PDFs seamlessly.

3. File organization is very strong as is the ability to save in multiple formats.

Here are the reasons NOT to buy PaperPort:

1. Nuance is a horrible company. It takes a lot for me to say this as I work for a technology company as well, but their activation policy (you get three activations and thereafter must convince them you are not violating the license you paid for) is insulting, frustrating, invasive and incredibly time consuming. If you install PaperPort more than three times (I've installed it probably 10 times because I rebuild/reload numerous times per year) you are automatically assigned criminal status and have to beg to get reactivation.

2. Poor backward compatibility. I have hundreds of files I created in version 7 that I had archived that I cannot access now. A real nightmare.

3. Very unstable. I currently am only able to access my master PaperPort folder from inside PaperPort, which renders it useless unless I move the document I want to view/manipulate into the main folder. This defeats the main purpose of the program - document management. I have been over this with Nuance tech support and reloaded (incurring the wrath of the activation god) to no avail.

4. Poor tech support. First you have to pay for every incident after your first, and second the advise you get comes from someone reading from a scripted manual, i.e."The first time the customer calls, tell them to re-install the software. This will cause them to use up another activation and have to purchase a new copy of PaperPort sooner." or some such nonsense. You get the idea.

5. PDF create will crash Word every time you open it. There is a workaround but it is a pain in the backside.

6. Just plain dumb. I had to again go before the emperor of activation and beg for another yesterday. I was "generously" given another activation. Sadly, the activation did not work because it was not for my serial number. So they gave me another activation on someone else's product key and even then, I could not activate.

Steer clear of Nuance until it is purchased by a company not run by lawyers. I have used PaperPort since version 7 and until version 10, I loved it. Now I am at version 11 and cursing the day I bought it. Feature-wise I like the program, but there are so many gotchas I would strongly advise someone looking for a document imaging solution to look elsewhere. Sohodocs and DocsVault are reasonable alternatives.