Although I have either tried or checked out the specs of quite a few supposed Acrobat replacements, the only one I have found that is pretty much equivalent is Nuance's PDF Converter Pro.
I also have Acrobat Standard 9, which I mainly use. I find the interface on that a bit easier to work with (I hate having to memorize a bunch of icons--years ago folks invented alphabets to make things easier ....) However, I have found that the OCR in PCP 8 is more accurate. Awhile back I OCR'd a scan of a letter in Times New Roman typeface, about 10 point with Acrobat and it came out as complete garbage. I ran PCP 7 OCR on the same letter and accuracy was well above 90%. PCP also can handle white text on dark background, which Acrobat 9 completely skips.
ALL Nuance PDF products with OCR (and also Acrobat) install a service that indexes PDF's containing text so they are searchable by Windows Search. When the product is first installed, that service indexes ALL PDF's currently on the computer. That slows down most computers quite a bit until the indexing is done, which can take several hours. People routinely assume their computer has a virus or the hard disk is going bad or the new software is incompatible. It's best to install the program immediately before you DON'T need it (such as just before leaving for work or going to bed), then leave the computer on. Unless you have an absurd number of PDF's on your computer it will be done in maybe 5-10 hours. There is no way to set the PDF indexer to run at a low priority. (The service just ties in the TEXT parts of PDF's to Microsoft's indexing service. It doesn't automatically OCR all current PDF documents.)
Another thing that is definite in 7 and probably the same in 8: PDF Converter Pro creates PDF's MUCH larger than Acrobat. To reduce the file size: Document => Inspect Document ... => [Inspect Document dialog] => Check [X] Embedded non-display data => Remove
This does not remove the OCR text layer. Example difference in file size: PNG's and JPEG's combined with Acrobat 9 to create a PDF: 58Mb. Same PDF's combined with PCP 7: 117Mb. Run Inspect Document, PCP size now 58Mb.
Two other thing MOST folks who use this or Acrobat are not aware of:
1) If a PDF is secured against editing but allows printing, you can print TO a PDF VIRTUAL PRINTER--either a free one such as DoPDF or the one installed by PCP. The new PDF does NOT have the security. You can then OCR the new PDF to recover the text.
2) For large documents you can MASSIVELY speed up searches by adding an EMBEDDED INDEX. Document > Advanced Processing > Embedded Index. Searching a 1000 page document will produce Google-speed results. (Although Ctrl-F works, try Shift + Ctrl-F, which shows ALL search results at once.)
UPDATE: I did eventually buy a copy when it went on sale. It works under Windows 10.
PDF Converter Professional 8.0
3.5 | 328 ratings
Price:
Last update: 09-01-2024
About this item
Effortlessly create 100 percent industry standard PDF files
Reduce file size before sharing or storing PDF files either one at a time or as a batch
Make changes to PDF files with the fluidity, flexibility and interactivity of word processing
Get accurate document conversion complete with columns, images and tables saved as editable microsoft word, excel and powerpoint documents
Scan paper to PDF with superior one click scanning
Reduce file size before sharing or storing PDF files either one at a time or as a batch
Make changes to PDF files with the fluidity, flexibility and interactivity of word processing
Get accurate document conversion complete with columns, images and tables saved as editable microsoft word, excel and powerpoint documents
Scan paper to PDF with superior one click scanning
Top reviews from the United States
Joseph T. Reinckens II
Good alternative to Acrobat. Works under Windows 10
Reviewed in the United States on June 23, 2012C. Jorbin
Good PDF software
Reviewed in the United States on October 4, 2013x
encryption and pdf splitting by pages
Reviewed in the United States on April 26, 2014