Why does font change when converting to PDF?

[vonbook]

The weirdest thing is happening when I convert Word documents to PDF files. If the document is in Times New Roman, for example, the font shows up as Courier (like this font here) once it converts to PDF--with lines cut off, everything--my PDF files wind up looking really crazy.

I'm working with an older version, Acrobat 5.0, that I purchased used--I'm wondering if it has bugs. It worked fine until last week.

Has this happened to anyone before? If so, how did you solve the problem? It may be a case of me having to re-install the software perhaps, but I don't know. Thanks!

 

[Eggles]

There's nothing wrong with Acrobat 5.

The reason why your PDFs end up with the fonts looking weird is probably because you aren't embedding your fonts when you make the PDF.

Just to check the method you are using to make the PDFs... In Word, go to the Print menu and choose Distiller as your printer. In the Properties button that appears, click on the Adobe PDF tab (in my version of Word, the last tab). Here you will see the various options available for making the PDF. Make sure you check the 'Embed fonts' and 'Subset fonts' to 100%. Depending on the destination of the PDF (print, screen, etc) choose the job options for the right amount of graphics compression. The higher the compression the smaller the PDF but the lower the quality. If destined for in-house printing, then use the 'Print' setting for the compression, or you may be able to get acceptable quality with the eBook setting (more compression, smaller size). Try both and see.

Your version of Word may come with an Adobe PDF button on the toolbar. I don't trust it to do the best job.

 

[vonbook]

Thanks for responding!

In following your instructions, I opened the Print dialog box in Word, switched the printer to Acrobat Distiller, then clicked the Properties button on the right. Then I clicked the Adobe PDF Settings tab (last one on the right), and clicked "Edit Conversion Settings."

But neither on that page or the previous Adobe PDF Settings tab did I see the 'Embed fonts' or 'Subset fonts' options. On the "Edit Conversion Settings" page, I only saw "Embed Thumbnails", which I checked, and in the "Compatibility" drop-down menu, I selected "Adobe 5.0 (PDF 1.4)" because it was originally set to "Adobe 4.0."

HOWEVER...when I selected these and clicked "Ok," I got a "Save Job Options As" window. I'm not sure what that meant, but I just clicked Save and closed the window.

It didn't work, unfortunately. After all that, I still got the same results.

Are there any other options? Thanks again.

 

[Eggles]

I think you're going to have to try the 'two-step' process. That is:

(1) create a postscript file from Word
(2) convert the postscript to PDF.

To do (1) - go to the Print menu, choose Distiller as your printer and somewhere there will be a checkbox that says 'Print to File'. This will generate a postscript file that has the extension .PRN - this is a postscript file. (Note that postscript files from Adobe apps have the extension .PS).

To do (2) - launch Distiller. It may take a while to get ready if you have a lot of fonts installed. You will see the Progress bar saying 'Preparing Font Table'; once you see the Progress bar says 'Ready' then you are set to go. You will see another bar labelled 'Job Options'. These are a number of pre-set combinations of compression. Choose 'Print' from the dropdown list. If you want to see what options have actually been selected, then go to the menu item 'Settings>Job Options'. Here you will see a number of tabs showing the various combinations of compression and font embedding. Click 'Cancel' if you don't want to change anything. Then go to the menu item 'Open'. Browse to where you stored your postscript file (make sure the 'Files of Type' box is set to 'All' and you should see your PRN file. Click on it to select it, and then hit OK. You will be asked where to store the PDF and the PDF will be generated.

Although this is a longer method than any other, it is the most sure way of getting what you want. Let me know if there is anything you don't follow.