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Acrobat won't convert Word docs to pdf. Why?

Forum Index > PDF Creation > Acrobat won't convert Word docs to pdf. Why?
2007-09-17 13:04:42
edrew
Registered: Sep 17 2007
Posts: 6

My copy of Acrobat won't convert word documents to pdf.

Acrobat WILL convert MS Excel docs and webpages to pdf. But when I click "Create pdf from file" and select a word file, it opens the file in MS Word, then stops all further action- the Acrobat page remains blank.

It DID convert them two months ago, on the same computer (Dell, with Microsoft XP Professional), same Acrobat program (6.0 Standard). I've made no major changes to the computer since then. Is an automatic Microsoft update the culprit, perhaps?

I have tried:
-Detect and Repair
-Removing and reinstalling Acrobat
-Searched for and installed all available updates
-Full virus scan on my computer

Any clues why Acrobat will only ignore MS Word docs?

Thanks!

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2007-09-17 13:05:34
#1
daxcastro
Registered: Sep 17 2007
Posts: 10
try print.. to pdf from inside word instead and see if that works.
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2007-09-17 14:12:04
#2
edrew
Registered: Sep 17 2007
Posts: 6
Thank you! It works to go to Word and print a doc as a pdf. I can settle for this round-about way if necessary.

I'm still baffled why I can no longer just use Acrobat, however. And I'm often lumping lots of single-page documents into 1 big pdf. . .easy with Adobe's "create pdf from multiple files" feature, but a bit more tedious if having to open each one in Word first.

I spent the last hour with Dell's tech support phoneline - the fellow there was baffled as well. He worked through my computer's files remotely, and didn't immediately see a fix. He may call tomorrow with further ideas.
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2007-09-17 15:38:16
#3
edrew
Registered: Sep 17 2007
Posts: 6
Problem solved! (for now!)

Office safe mode had disabled a file named "PDFMaddin." I reactivated it by going to MS Word (2003) and clicking "About Microsoft Word", then "Disabled Items". The only file lurking there was "PDFMaddin."

I reenabled it, closed & reopened Word, and now Word creates PDFs again! PDF options have also reappeared on the toolbar.I'm now wondering if there are any practical reasons that Office disabled this file. . . .
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2008-12-16 20:59:42
#4
kweimer
Registered: Oct 26 2007
Posts: 21
Going to Word 2003 Help and checking in the Disabled Items list found PDFMaker... who knew???
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