PDFs printing Garbage Characters

Can you tell what application the PDF was created in? File > Properties > Description tab
Are the fonts embedded? File > Properties > Fonts tab

PDF Producer: DynamicPDF v4.0.3 for .NET
PDF Version: 1.4 (Acrobat 5.x)

Fonts used: Helvetica and Helvetica-Bold

The only thing we have found to to is to Print as Image.

It sounds as though the fonts haven't been encoded properly. Do you have a copy of Acrobat 9 Pro? If so, you can try re-embedding the fonts with the Preflight fixup.

I have seen a similar problem numerous times over the last year or so. I am using Acrobat 9 Pro.

I download a lot of PDFs of scientific papers from several journal publishers' sites. From time to time I get a paper that I want to print. This paper will look perfect on screen. When I print, the first page or two comes out fine and then it starts to produce gibberish. Note that this occurs when printing from Acrobat within Internet Explorer.

The gibberish actually follows a pattern: it is always printed in a sans-serif font, and ***each character is actually the next character up in the UNICODE sequence***.

The rest of the printout will be in this gibberish, except that from time to time it will revert for a line or two to the correct text. Also, all graphics and text within graphics remain unaltered.

If I print the document "as image" it works fine but is very slow.

If the PDF is saved and then opened in Acrobat 9, it will USUALLY print normally, but I recall in at least one case the saved version still printed garbled and I had to download another copy.

It appears that the PDF is getting garbled somehow during download, but why would it behave in this odd way rather than just being completely screwed up?

I have seen several reports of similar problems by Googling, and it does not seem to be dependent on a particular printer or driver. Any thoughts?

Have you tried to print the PDF "As an image"?

You will have to click on the 'Advance' button on the print UI window and select the option 'Print as Image'

Yes, I mentioned that printing "as image" works.

This is usually a conflict over Postscript fonts - not easy to fix and not always for a logical reason, but the issue is in where the font is coming from.

If the PDF contains an embedded non-base font which isn't installed in the operating system, Acrobat will attach that font data into the Postscript stream sent to your printer driver. If the driver likes what it's sent, it'll print using it - if not it'll substitute the "damaged" font for something else, usually Courier or Times. If a font with the same name is installed, the printer driver will either use the embedded one, or the installed one, depending on the settings in your printer software. However the embedded version in the PDF may look like the original, and may have the same name, but it can be encoded differently - this is why you see garbage.

Encoding fonts, especially Unicode, can use several methods - including non-standard lookup tables - and some printer drivers aren't able to read the more obscure encoding sequences, so will throw a bad font substitution. As a non-standard lookup table by definition doesn't put the glyphs in the same places in the Unicode sequence, the substitute font prints "correct" Unicode characters but it looks like garbage as it's printing a different glyph; but it'll always be a 1:1 correlation.

Printing to an image stops the printer driver from loading anything, as it's just being sent pixels. Acrobat handles the rasterization and it knows which is the right version of the font to use, as it's always the same one it used to render the screen image.

The "fix" is, I'm afraid, to track down where the confusion comes from, and either install, uninstall, embed or unembed the fonts in question so both Acrobat and your printer driver have only one option as to where to go get it from (one of the reasons we use PDF/X, as it embeds everything). Some printer drivers have controls for substitution that you can turn off, but not all. Remember that Acrobat comes with the base fonts (Helvetica etc.) built in, so even if you don't embed them, you can get conflicts with fonts on your system that have the same name but a different character set. An embedded font in the PDF should always have priority, unless the printer driver rejects it.

Thing is, I'm not using a Postscript printer, so why would Postscript cause this problem?

Also, note that the SAME PDF file prints properly if re-downloaded or if saved to the hard drive and re-opened in Acrobat. So it can't be an intrinsic issue of the particular fonts chosen.

I am just puzzled as to why a glitched file would do this Unicode incrementing rather than just being completely messed up from the get-go?

Brother MFC-8860DN printer drivers (CUPS and BRSCRIPT3) for MAC OS X 10.6.2 generate errors only with Acrobat Reader 9.3.x

Brother support knows about this but doesn't have a new driver.

This seems to be a new development since Mac OS X hit 10.6. CUPS generates an error producing the raster file and the postscript driver generates an endless stack of blank pages with error messages on them.

Apple Preview prints correctly. Does Adobe have an opinion - other than blame the printer company?

Hi Nick_R,

You will have to ask Adobe for their official opinion/view. This is a user to user forum. While sometimes employees from Adobe reply here, for the most part questions answered here are not by Adobe employees, nor is it an official way to contact Adobe.

Hope this helps,

Dimitri
WindJack Solutions
www.pdfscripting.com
www.windjack.com

Thanks, my initial attempt to send a message to Adobe transferred me out to this user website. Anyway I've gone back and sent them a message as well.

Try using the preflight function to run and inventory report. Look at the fonts section. There is a map of the characters in their native face. Just below the character is a listing of that the character is supposed to be. If the two do not match then there is your answer. As to how to fix it, you may want to try downloading a copy of Callas pdfToolbox (the big brother to Acrobat's preflight). In pdfToolbox there are fixups to try and fix font errors. If you'd like I can try fixing a document to see if that helps.

Regardless, the inventory report is the best place to start. There is a wealth of information in the report.

I'm operating at a more primitive level than that. Only using Adobe Acrobat Reader. Brother responded saying they do Postscript emulation on the MFC-8860DN, and therefore can't guarantee the proper functionality. Seems like a weak answer, but what can you do until the next driver release - if that ever comes. Other software prints fine, including the workaround of using Apple 'Preview' as my PDF printer software.

Has anybody found any further info on this?

I have this problem when:

1. Printing multiple page document embedded in a webpage
2. Printing a second embedded document while the first is still printing.

In this scenario, all of the characters on the first print job become the "character+1". It's not random gibberish, it's just next character up by UNICODE.

I can reproduce this problem on computers ranging from 2002 Pentium 4's with 384MB RAM all the way up to Core 2 Duos with 4GB of RAM. I can reproduce it on these systems using multiple models/brands of printer ranging from Deksjet 895cxi's connected with a parallel cable all the way up to Dell 5110cn color laser printers connected via network cable and everything in between.

It's a real problem for a lot of our staff because they need to frequently generate and print multiple reports quickly. Saving them to a file first, or printing them as images does work around the problem, but those are a lot more "hassle" than you would think for many people.

Any ideas at all about how I can correct this?

On the print preferences, try deselecting the box for "rely on system fonts only, do not use document fonts". You can only access print preferences if you select "print" from the file menue. If you hit the quick print button on the toolbar, you won't be able to see the print preferences button.

I have experienced several PDF creation and printing issues.

[1] "printing" a web page to "Adobe PDF" printer often results in garbage characters as noted in several comments above. I use "preview" to check the results, and often have to repeat the process, but instead chose "PDF995" printer, provided with H&R Block software - which always works properly. What's wrong with the "Adobe PDF" printer? Are some of the web pages "encripted" and Adobe can not handle, are some settings corrupt or incorrect, etc. Also, I know that "Adobe PDF" printer does not work with H&R Block - is the reason similar to the web page problem, and why H&R Block provide alternative software?[2] When I take a PDF document and "edit" with Adobe Pro Extended (adding text with the typewriter tool), and then try to fax the PDF file with "Windows Fax and Scan" (Win 7 Ultimate), the PDF pages have a "dark, screen-like" background when previewed and sent. This is not the case when viewing the PDF file in Adobe Reader or Acrobat, or printing to a HP printer, for example.

Any solutions or comments about these problems?

Thanks.

I get the same issues. Just printed out a long data sheet from the Altera company, and half printed in english, and half printed in jibberish.

I DO wish adobe would fix this. Heck, they try to do a software update every couple of days, why not actually FIX SOMETHING in one of those updates???

Two links to a document from Analog Devices Inc. One printed as an image, one printed just straight. Obviously, a big company like that would get their PDF document correct. There must be a glitch in acrobat X, especially in reading slightly older document?

http://i90.photobucket.com/albums/k254/thrunabulax/Printedasimage.jpg

http://i90.photobucket.com/albums/k254/thrunabulax/Pintednormally.jpg

I can see there's a lot of history here. Given the intermittent nature of the issue(s), I can also understand the difficulty Adobe is facing to replicate, then design the fix. However, it's worth the time/effort.

At any rate, I'm experiencing the problem in a much simpler environment. It only occurs on my system when printing multiple copies of a pdf. Once I see the "gibberish", I halt the print queue and can print individual copies of the pdf (one at a time) without further incident. I suspect it's a scripting issue, initiated from the multibox that carries the requested print count.

HP L7680
Dell Latitude E6420
Adobe Acrobat X

I am having this problem, but I am unable to fix it by printing as an image. That still prints as gibberish.

It has only cropped up in the last two weeks, but it seems to be a problem with printing all of my PDFs.

In many many instances, this is related to the program that created the actual PDF. Many 3rd party creation tools do not properly write to the PDF specification (which is an ISO standard). Then, as each version of Acrobat and/or Reader is updated and improved, the creation issues are exposed and lead to display and printing issues. So first, I would check what program created the PDF. To do this look under the File > Properties > Description tab to check what application created the PDF file. If it is a 3rd party tool you can try the following workarounds:
1. Use Print as Image in the Print menu.
2. Install an earlier version of Acrobat/Reader, such as Reader 9, that prints your file properly.
3. Use the Preflight tool in Acrobat Pro. (if you own this version) to embed the fonts.
4. Try re-printing your PDF to the Adobe PDF printer. Personally, I don't recommend this workaround because all sorts of issues can crop up with when you do this. You'll lose all sorts of interactive features and information that may have been in the original file. However, it might work in a pinch.