Acrobat Distiller 5 hangs during creation of pdf file from Powerpoint 2001
Ken Hamburg
Have very slow perfomance during creation of a pdf from
Powerpoint 2001. Am using Adobe Acrobat 5 and the print to
file - pdf option.
Actually, Powerpoint seems to hang and Distiller only
completes after Powepoint has been force quitted.
If option to save file as PS is used, the ps file creation
is fine, but conversion of the ps file to pdf file takes
ages.
Does anyone have any info to offer?
Steve Rindsberg
> If option to save file as PS is used, the ps file creation
> is fine, but conversion of the ps file to pdf file takes
> ages.
What's in the PPT file and what are your Distiller options set to?
Try Screen as the Distiller job options setting and look for things like
transparency of any sort in the PPT file; it's a surefile way to slow
everything down; printing, distilling and display of the PDF.
Ken Hamburg
Thanks for the response Steve.
The ppt file does have a few rare fonts and a custom
setting for background colour changes but nothing too
spectacular.
Distiller is using the default setup for "Press" job.
Sorry to be a bit vague, am posting from home system, will
try to give more exact settings early in the week.
One thing is od though, same distiller settings and ppt
work much faster if the method of saving to ps file and
then distilling the ps file are used. Only the direct
print to pdf is so slow.
>.
>
Steve Rindsberg
No problem, happy to help. Now ... let's see if I really can. ;-)
> The ppt file does have a few rare fonts and a custom
> setting for background colour changes but nothing too
> spectacular.
>
> Distiller is using the default setup for "Press" job.
The Press job option settings attempt to preserve as much as possible of the
original on the assumption that the job will be output to a high resolution
imagesetter and printed on press. In other words, file size (and by
extension, time to distill) are not a priority.
If the idea is to have a PDF that somebody can view on screen and maybe
print, try the desktop printer or screen settings.
> One thing is od though, same distiller settings and ppt
> work much faster if the method of saving to ps file and
> then distilling the ps file are used. Only the direct
> print to pdf is so slow.
By direct print to pdf, do you mean using File, Print, (pick the distiller
printer), click OK, or are you using one of the buttons that Acrobat
installs? The latter do more by way of converting links and other things,
so printing will definitely take longer.
Ken Hamburg
keyboard (at my end).
Your comment regarding "Direct print to pdf" gave me the clue.
I was actually doing the pdf creation by using File->Print-> then in
destination box "File" then under the printer settings "Save as File"
- and for file type pdf.
This was taking an awfully long time. The initial "Print" is ok, it's
the "spooling" that was taking so long (this is the distiller in
action I think).
I just tried with activation of PDFWriter as active printer, then
using File -> Print straight to the pdf. Hey presto, whole job done in
a fraction of the time.
Note however that Distiller settings for Press or Screen make no
difference using this method. (I believe this is correct since the
PDFWriter settings are used. Correct me if I am wrong here)
If I use the classic method - Print document to a PostScript file and
then use distiller on the PS file to create the pdf - then the
different settings used in Distiller for Press, Screen etc do make a
difference in speed and file size.
It looks like I need more coffee :-(
"Steve Rindsberg" <ab...@localhost.com> wrote in message news:<#jYPBUVxCHA.640@TK2MSFTNGP12>...
Steve Rindsberg
> Your comment regarding "Direct print to pdf" gave me the clue.
> I was actually doing the pdf creation by using File->Print-> then in
> destination box "File" then under the printer settings "Save as File"
> - and for file type pdf.
AHA. Distiller he no like that. The Distiller printer should automatically
spool PS to file then fire off Distiller to proceess it. When you manually
force the print to file, it confuses things (same happens on the PC, by the
way).
> Note however that Distiller settings for Press or Screen make no
> difference using this method. (I believe this is correct since the
> PDFWriter settings are used. Correct me if I am wrong here)
That's correct ... PDFWriter and Distiller are two totally different
programs/drivers.
> If I use the classic method - Print document to a PostScript file and
> then use distiller on the PS file to create the pdf - then the
> different settings used in Distiller for Press, Screen etc do make a
> difference in speed and file size.
Let's go back to Distiller .. try printing to it directly but don't use
PPT's File option.
Does that help?
> It looks like I need more coffee :-(
This is my answer to most things as well. Insomnia excepted.
Ken Hamburg
Could you explain what you mean by
"Let's go back to Distiller .. try printing to it directly but don't
use PPT's File option." ??
"Steve Rindsberg" <ab...@localhost.com> wrote in message news:<O01$1GixCHA.1288@TK2MSFTNGP11>...
Steve Rindsberg
> Could you explain what you mean by
> "Let's go back to Distiller .. try printing to it directly but don't
> use PPT's File option." ??
Sure. Here's the thing: Adobe will probably phase out PDFWriter soon and
it just doesn't *generally* work as well as Distiller (though as you've seen
there are exceptions). For the long term, it's probably best to get any
Distiller issues worked out so you're covered when Adobe finally says
"PDFWriter? What's that?" ;-)
So the first step: try printing to Distiller again but this time don't
choose the To File option. It shouldn't be necessary to do that.
Ken Hamburg
According to Adobe, the PDFWriter is actually unsupported as of
Acrobat 5.
Actually, the option to print directly to Distiller or Adobeas if it
were a printer is missing. I have done some further checking (and
fiddling) and found the likely cause.
Some printer driver plug-ins, add-ons and extensions to enable this
function, such as "pdfmaker" and the Distiller PPD are actually not in
place or enabled.
(More info and add on info at
http://www.adobe.com/support/downloads/product.jsp?product=pdrv&platform=mac
The likely cause for this is that our systems are installed via
FileWave and when the Acrobat package was created simple defaults were
used. Some files were not transferred to end locations by actually
activating such items as the default PS printer.
I tested this morning by popping the extensions etc into the correct
locations and hey presto, a PS Printer appears in the chooser and the
normal print to pdf can work bay calling the distiller with last
default job options set.
This is what it was supposed to have being able to do all along -
right?
All making sense so far? It looks like I have further work to do
cleaning up the installation packages under FileWave.
Thanks again for your patient help with this.
k_ha...@excite.com (Ken Hamburg) wrote in message news:<4d1e6ed5.03012...@posting.google.com>...
Steve Rindsberg
> Ahhhh, now it's getting clearer.
So it's time for me to start explaining things again, see if I can muddy the
waters some? ;-)
> According to Adobe, the PDFWriter is actually unsupported as of
> Acrobat 5.
I didn't realize they'd taken that harsh a stance, but on PC, you have to
select a custom install just to get it. They really do want to leave it
behind them, I expect.
> I tested this morning by popping the extensions etc into the correct
> locations and hey presto, a PS Printer appears in the chooser and the
> normal print to pdf can work bay calling the distiller with last
> default job options set.
> This is what it was supposed to have being able to do all along -
> right?
We have a "Bingo" in the front row. Jim, tell us what Ken's won! ;-)
Yes, exactly so.
Nice detective work. I'm not familiar with FileWave, but it sounds like you
can straighten 'em out.