As the lingua franca of electronic documents, PDF forms the basis of numerous software applications capable of creating documents that can be accessed on a various systems. Of course Adobe, as the developer of the Portable Document Format, has its own tool for this purpose; namely Acrobat. In its current version (X1 Pro), Acrobat can set you back a budget-stretching £400, though. Solutions provided by other companies are more economically viable, though, with one such offering being PDF Transformer + from ABBYY priced at £60.
PDF Transformer + has a Windows 8-style interface, with tiles representing the program's main options - which are split between opening up existing PDF documents and selecting from a choice of new document options. When creating a new PDF document, you can work with a single existing file, combine together a group of files or receive content from an attached scanner (with support for either TWAIN or WIA technology). Working in the opposite direction, you can convert an existing PDF document into various formats that include Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel Workbook, Microsoft PowerPoint Presentations, HTML or Electronic Publication.
PDF Transformer + offers support for a variety of file formats that can be used as the source for creating a PDF document. These formats include JPEG, GIF, TIFF, RTF, Text files and HTML. The more observant will have noticed one surprising format missing from this list. There is no direct support on offer for the popular Microsoft Word format when creating a PDF document. I was really surprised by this omission especially as the software supports this format when converting files from PDF.
When working with PDF documents, the ABBYY software offers a range of features. These are available from a task bar positioned at the top of the screen. Selected items in the document can be erased or embellished with an image or appropriate comments and you can add a digital signature or stamp to a document. Content can be scanned and converted into other formats when necessary.
If working in a group is important then this ABBYY product allows for collaboration with others in the creation and editing of document. Sensitive documents can be protected with 128- or 256-bit encryption and a password. Documents can be sent to other interested parties via email or directed towards an attached printer for hard copy.
As PDF documents can be created by various third-party applications, it is important that your chosen tool can handle any slight differences that can occur when dealing with documents from various sources, including the de facto standard of Adobe Acrobat. PDF Transformer + was able to handle a variety of documents from various sources. It was generally quick in this task even when the documents consisted of hundreds of pages.
During the loading and resaving of PDF files created by a variety of applications, it was noticeable that often the file size would be reduced. This was more noticeable when the document being converted consisted mainly of text. For example a 990KB PDF document consisting entirely of text was reduced to 680KB. A 3000KB document, with several embedded images, was reduced slightly to 2890KB. While hardly a prime reason for purchasing this product, it could prove a useful attribute in space is at a premium.
There were, however, a couple of occasions when an image was totally or partially ignored when converted a PDF document into another format. This was a minor fault that I could live with especially with the accompanying cost saving. Michael Fereday
If money is tight, then this product could be the PDF tool for you.