Specifications

NOVEMBER 6, 2007 PC MAGAZINE 31
BullZip PDF Printer
Free
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PROS Simple PDF creation.
Advanced settings for security
and display via dialog box or from
command line.
CONS Can’t set initial zoom level
for PDF fi les or translate Word
comments to PDF annotations.
For more:
go.pcmag.com/bullzippdf
deskPDF Professional
$29.95 direct
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PROS Straightforward. Easily ac-
cessed display, security settings.
Converts Offi ce comments to
PDF annotations. Output defaults
are easy to set. Raw PostScript
output.
CONS Unintuitive interface for
merging two fi les.
For more:
go.pcmag.com/deskpdfpro
PDF Converter Professional 4
$99.95 direct
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PROS Converts PDF fi les to Micro-
soft Offi ce and WordPerfect docs.
Exceptionally accurate OCR on
image-only PDFs. Advanced PDF
editing and form fi lling. Removes
sensitive data totally.
CONS Some unintuitive menus,
operations. Can create indexes
only in separate fi les, not embed-
ded in PDFs. No warning if you
have an old copy without a data-
removal feature.
For more:
go.pcmag.com/pdfconvertpro4
DeskPDF Professional
For a tenth the price of Adobe Acrobat 8 Standard,
deskPDF Professional provides what most personal
and small-business users require and even throws in
clever conveniences. You can create PDFs by print-
ing from the standard Windows print dialog, by
dragging documents onto a desktop icon, or from
within Microsoft Offi ce apps.
My favorite feature puts all your PDF-making
options in a single dialog box that gives the usual
choices for specifying a fi lename and folder. It also
lets you set output quality, send the PDF as an e-mail
attachment if you want, and determine how the
fi le will display by setting options for zoom levels
and more—features other programs (including
Acrobat) bury. Another welcome convenience lets
you save multiple settings as reusable profi les.
Despite the low price, you get some high-level
features. You can convert Offi ce document annota-
tions into PDF comments, for example, and merge
multiple PDF fi les, although the latter isn’t exactly
intuitive. For more than creating or merging PDF
docs, you’ll need a higher-end product, but deskPDF
Professional gives most users all they need.
PDF Converter Professional 4
Depending on your needs, you may be able to get
more for less with PDF Converter Professional. The
program isn’t as polished as Acrobat Standard—for
example, a PDF page disappeared when I added
a comment and then opened the utility’s navigation
panel. But closing the fi le without saving it and then
opening the uncommented version brought the page
back, and I was pleasantly surprised by the package’s
fl exibility, usability, and superior OCR capability.
An automatically installed plug-in provides
redaction that completely removes sensitive mate-
rial so hackers can’t uncover it—a crucial feature
for some users, and one not in Acrobat Standard.
An even bigger plus is the OCR capability, which
excels at the really hard jobs that cause Acrobat to
stumble, such as transforming a PDF of a scanned
19th- century book into a text-searchable PDF.
Unfortunately, this software lags behind Adobe’s
latest versions of Acrobat Standard and Professional
in PDF indexing. It can create a separate index fi le
for one or more PDFs but can’t embed the index into
a PDF. For that convenience, you’ll have to stay with
Acrobat. Otherwise, PDF Converter Professional is
a worthy low-cost alternative.—Edward Mendelson