Printing to PDF quality Awful
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unclestu last edited by
I just switched from FF to
Version: 36.0.2130.65 - Opera is up to date
Update stream: Stable
System: Windows XP 32-bit(I am a very experienced user. Just saying it to save someone time.)
I am very happy with Opera except for one issue. For me it is a big deal.
Quality of print output to hard copy (HP1200, PCL, black and white, Laser) is fine.
Quality of printing to PDF is awful - ultra bold/heavy text, even blocked up letters. It even happens on "printer friendly" pages.
I use both Adobe 9 Standard and CutePDF, and have twiddled the settings a lot. Nothing makes a difference.
It happens on every web site I print from with Opera. When I use FF and print the same page with the same PDF printers, it is excellent.
Loading the preview takes quite a long time as well, but the quality is the biggest issue for me.
Thank you for your help.
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unclestu last edited by
Just to add:
If a copy of a PDF will help, I'll be glad to send one - even one using that other browser.
Thanks again. -
unclestu last edited by
Just adding more information to my post about Opera's poor PDF print quality.
PDFs are created as images, rather than editable/searchable text as with FF, regardless whether created with the Adobe or CutePDF driver.
Zooming in on the text shows the problem. Very poorly rendered text with bumpy rough edges. Only when Opera does the printing.
OCR would have to be applied to obtain actual text. I doubt whether the result would be acceptable.
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A Former User last edited by
I have the same complaint about preserving text. Haven't experienced bad quality. You can copy text off the page and paste it into a word processor like MS Word which will preserve the format. Haven't tried text and images but I think it would work. I use PDF-Xchange Viewer which tries to install a browser version to Opera and Chrome, but no npapi so no decent pdf. To make a PDF of a page I print it to PDF then load it into PDF-X, which comes with a splendid OCR engine. It has not failed me yet. That's PDF-Xchange Viewer, which is free, not Editor. Tracker software.
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unclestu last edited by
@tcebob,
Thank you for your input. I'm glad you found a solution that works for you.
For me it is too many steps, and requires installing software that would duplicate what I already have - Acrobat Standard and CutePDF Writer (free) - both do an excellent job.
Why would I do that when FF already does it automatically?
In my opinion, Opera is using inferior pdf creation software because of cost or some other factor.
The only reason I moved to Opera was faster loading of the program and of accessing web pages. It is very pleasant, but that's all.
Now I have to use FF to make PDFs of on-line receipts, etc.
Needing two browsers is unacceptable. This print issue could send me back to FF.
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A Former User last edited by
To follow up on that, it appears that Chrome does have some similar bugs in its printing to PDFs. Very odd.
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A Former User last edited by
This still hasn't been addressed. I second that this is a real pain. I have been a loyal Opera user for years, but that's because it's usually done a great job of keeping up with the competition.
I have been printing to PDF a lot, and have been slow to realize that the problem isn't with printing to PDFs in general, but with Opera itself. If I use Opera's print to PDF, it renders the text as text, but does not include formatting like bold and italics, and replaces some letters with gibberish. Totally unacceptable. Especially since it's using Chromium under the hood.
If I use a third party print to PDF driver, it renders the pages as images, which is also totally unacceptable as they are not searchable or editable. OCR is in no way an acceptable solution to this.
Even Internet Explorer does a far better job of rendering PDFs. This is a critical feature for me, so if Opera cannot enter the 21st century with this functionality, I may finally have to switch browsers. Why has this not been fixed?
