Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

This was my first Cricut and I *really* wanted to love it. I’m very comfortable using technology, so I was pretty confident I’d be able to pick up the technical aspects fairly quickly. Unfortunately, the product is still essentially in beta and product support is almost non-existent. The machine I ordered from Amazon just flat out didn’t work- after it miscut the fabric half a dozen times, I went to a local store and bought another machine. First, I tried a new rotary blade in the Maker from Amazon, with no luck. Then, I tried the new Maker, and that fixed it- the one from Amazon wasn’t working because the rotary blade didn’t move up and down. I could write that off as a mishap, but it was made far worse by the fact that the software kept freezing, or hanging up, every time I tried to restart the machine while trouble shooting. I literally spent 5 hours today cycling through restarts because the iOS (iPhone / iPad) software is so buggy (and I’m using an iPhone X and the most recent iPad model, so it’s not me). I did find the software to be more stable on my laptop, but since the Maker is specifically marketed for use with mobile devices, it should work with them. Even worse, I couldn’t reach anyone in tech support, and I spent hours trying. The transcript of my chat session is hilarious- hours and hours of me asking no one why the cue kept getting longer and why there was no one available to help me (this was 4:00-7:00 on a Friday, well within chat center hours). I never made it to the front of the line- after the third hour, I just took off and went to the craft store for a new machine. Finally, after all of that, when I finally got a working machine and set it up to my laptop, I couldn’t even finish a project because I didn’t buy the blades for the older machines. I would have, had there been any indication they’d be needed, but there wasn’t. I’ve invested about $1,200 in the Cricut at this point, for two machines, and $300 in attachments and materials (and sales tax). At least one maker will go back, but still, this is a huge price for a machine that doesn’t work. I also hate to think of people who aren’t tech savvy trying to work through these issues. I also suspect that most of these rave reviews came from people paid, or who got free Makers, to promote them. I can not believe people who spent their own money on this machine would be so rapturous over software this buggy. I mean, I mean, it’s great that Cricut included a slot to hold my iPad, but I would have been a lot happier with software that reliably connects to my iPad. ****** Update: two weeks after I contacted Cricut the connection to my iPhone and iPad has not been resolved. I’ve spoken to three people and each conversation ends with them saying it’s a known issue and a suggestion I use my laptop instead. There is no indication Cricut actually intends to fix the problem, and I am beyond frustrated that the employees have all suggested using my laptop is a great fix. If the Maker had not been so aggressively marketed as mobile device compatible, I would be more understanding, but it’s reprehensible Cricut isn’t supporting two of the three major updates it advertised (no mobile device integration and still no knife blade as of mid-January) and even more frustrating that it takes customer service so long to respond.