Does PDF freeze your computer?
My otherwise quickly functioning computer freezes up almost every time I try to access a pdf file online.
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I've had computers do that until I got a new computer with a Gig of RAM and high speed internet. Are you using dialup? 0 -
I'm piggy-backing (with permission) on someone else's high speed connection - it's great. I used to always skip the links here to movies and songs.
I only have 512 megs of RAM and 2.8 gig processor.
I'll check to see if I have the latest Adobe program, thanks.0 -
My also freezes, AT&T dsl tells me I have to take out my dsl and reload it. I haven't had time yet. 0 -
512 MB of ram is the problem. Wait a few minutes, the PDF is just loading.
Merc0 -
do what i did, build one with anti-freeze 
haven't found a program yet that could make it blip or even studder0 -
Here ya go Henry..and everyone..you'll never need Adobe again...Set it as your default reader..Don't forget to uncheck Adobe in msconfig so it doesn't load on start-up...Foxit's free and FAST!!!!
http://www.foxitsoftware.com/pdf/rd_intro.php0 -
I would say you really need to increase your RAM memory as 515MB just isn't enough for any of the newer applications as well as pictures and movie files. Your processor is having to do a lot of page swapping between RAM and Virtual Memory (Hard Drive Space). 0 -
Yep, i too try to avoid pdf files... 0 -
No, but they will not open online. I have to say them to the hard drive and then open them.
DSM0 -
what version are you guys running?
my lap top only has 256 megs of ram, opens version 8 just fine, i remember when computers only had about 8 megs of ram, never had a problem then ether0 -
I downloaded a huge program, version 8 something of acrobat.
It seemed to help a little.0 -
PDFs aren't web-appropriate files (various text based markup languages/standards and a few different image types are spec, everything else is extensions), so browsers don't display them. A plugin is used, usually Acrobat Reader (yes, there are others), either loaded as the plugin in the browser window or with the full application lauched in a new process/window. Either way, a lot of new code has to be loaded into ram, so disk access time comes in, then it is usually scanned by your AV (you do run AV if you have Windows don't you?), then the code is read, processed, and executed by your CPU. Then your CPU sends the info back to the video subsystem, which may or may not require more processing and possibly new apps loading to do it. Next thing you know you may be low on real RAM (Windows is bad at memory management) so your swapfile starts going, which is more disk access and competes for disk I/O instances with all those apps loading, etc. to display your PDF file.
All that being said, PDF is great for its inteded purpose - a complete cross platform spec with multiple implementations that guarantees documents will look and print the exact same on *many* different platforms.
If you are still with me, just for giggles, I'll mention that a PDF file is nothing more than a bunch of PostScript information, just like what is sent to most printers... To create them non-programmatically, you typically install a driver, script, etc. that will appear to you as a printer, but when you print to it, it will capture the PostScript stream and redirect it into a file with a few minor modifications. The "leader" is Adobe Acrobat (reader is free, creator is expen$ive), but there are many free (as in cost) and/or Free (as in speech) ways of creating them - for Windows, CutePDF works good. On Mac, it is a "native" thing since you have a nice Unix subsytem going for you, and for everyone else (various Unices and Linux, etc.) there are lots of utilities, and there are even ways of creating a network printing system that emails the PDF back to you...0 -
quote:Originally posted by iwannausername
PDFs aren't web-appropriate files (various text based markup languages/standards and a few different image types are spec, everything else is extensions), so browsers don't display them. A plugin is used, usually Acrobat Reader (yes, there are others), either loaded as the plugin in the browser window or with the full application lauched in a new process/window. Either way, a lot of new code has to be loaded into ram, so disk access time comes in, then it is usually scanned by your AV (you do run AV if you have Windows don't you?), then the code is read, processed, and executed by your CPU. Then your CPU sends the info back to the video subsystem, which may or may not require more processing and possibly new apps loading to do it. Next thing you know you may be low on real RAM (Windows is bad at memory management) so your swapfile starts going, which is more disk access and competes for disk I/O instances with all those apps loading, etc. to display your PDF file.
All that being said, PDF is great for its inteded purpose - a complete cross platform spec with multiple implementations that guarantees documents will look and print the exact same on *many* different platforms.
If you are still with me, just for giggles, I'll mention that a PDF file is nothing more than a bunch of PostScript information, just like what is sent to most printers... To create them non-programmatically, you typically install a driver, script, etc. that will appear to you as a printer, but when you print to it, it will capture the PostScript stream and redirect it into a file with a few minor modifications. The "leader" is Adobe Acrobat (reader is free, creator is expen$ive), but there are many free (as in cost) and/or Free (as in speech) ways of creating them - for Windows, CutePDF works good. On Mac, it is a "native" thing since you have a nice Unix subsytem going for you, and for everyone else (various Unices and Linux, etc.) there are lots of utilities, and there are even ways of creating a network printing system that emails the PDF back to you...
Other than understanding what a pdf behaves like, all the above is geek to me.0 -
yes, many times when i try to open a PDF file it basically freezes for about 10 seconds and then opens. i have no idea why 0 -
As <i>iwannausername</i> said, there are other readers. I have not personally used the one below, but people I know and respect recommend it for lower-power systems, as it doesn't need as much memory etc. as the official Adobe reader.
http://blog.kowalczyk.info/software/sumatrapdf/
Note that this is for Windows only.
Greg0
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