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Participant
July 15, 2020
Answered

Adobe Acrobat Pro DC garbled text [2020]

  • July 15, 2020
  • 4 replies
  • 36817 views

I am using Adobe Acrobat Pro DC. I was sent a timesheet from another employee. When I opened the document, it showed the text in the image below. I have been able to open it using Adobe Reader. However, when I try to open it with Adobe Acrobat Pro DC, the text is garbled. No other PDF file is garbled, and when I open it using Microsoft Edge it seems to work just fine.

I have tried running updates on the software, but it says, "no updates are available." I have also tried performing a installation repair, but I continue to get the same results. Does anyone have any suggestions on how to change the garbled text back to normal? Also, can someone explain to me why it happens?

 

 

Correct answer GenXer

Amal,

I went to try this fix and when I opened the same PDF, I was able to read the file in cleartext. I'm a little confused because I don't know the why. Why did the text garble in the first place? Why was it able to correct itself? I'd like to know for furture reference. Thank you for your help, by the way.

4 replies

Participant
January 19, 2024

 

This is how you fix the issue, uncheck this box in Adobe PDF printer properties 

 

To whom this may concern 

Participant
August 14, 2024

heya Jordan, probably too late to the party here but, can i ask how you got to this window?

Participant
August 15, 2024

Distro, not Jordan, but searched around myself this morning to see if this solution works.  To get to the window I went through settings-bluetooth&devices-printers&scanners into my adobe PDF, then printing preferences. Hope that helps.

Participant
January 10, 2023

I had this error also and nothing I found worked.  On a separate Windows user account it works fine.  Deleted preferences in user folder/registry, uninstalled/reinstalled, reinstalled associated fonts, checked/unchecked use local fonts, same problem.

Fixed it by going to:
Go to Edit > Prefernces > Page display >  then uncheck Use page cache

Something appartently got borked, and resetting everything didn't clear where the page was caching.  So maybe/probably a combination of resetting things and clearing the old cache fixed it.

Participant
February 3, 2021

We are getting the same issue, and I followed the advice by trying to "Use Local Font" ... and that did not solve the problem. It was working fine, but on Monday... it went to garbled text. Everything since Monday has been garbled. So far, our work around is... pull it up in Edge, print it to PDF, and then everything is fine. This is not a "fix", though. They're having to go through extra steps to correct the garbled text.

Participant
March 1, 2021

I am getting the same just recently with some docs.  interesting that it happened to you one month ago wonder if there was an update in the last month or two that created this.

Participant
March 5, 2021

I too, have been experiencing the same problem for the past few days.  However, in my case, in addition to garbled text, some text has disappeared.  We use Box so even when we go back in time to previous versions, the garbled and missing text persists.

Amal.
Community Manager
Community Manager
July 15, 2020

Hi GenXer

 

We are sorry for the trouble. As described the PDF text is garbled when you open it in Adobe Acrobat DC and works fine when opening it in Microsoft edge.

 

Web browsers use their own PDF technology to render and display the PDF content. The issue occurs when the font in the PDF file is not embeded properly or not installed on your computer.

 

Please try the following preference settings and see if that works for you:

Go to Edit > Prefernces > Page display > Under rendering select 'Use local fonts' > Click Ok and check.

 

You may also try to use single fixup to embed the fonts. Go to Tools > Optimize PDF > Prefilght > Select Single Fixups and selsct embed fonts and click Fix and proceed with the steps prompted and see if that works for you.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Keep us posted with the results

 

Regards

Amal

GenXerAuthorCorrect answer
Participant
July 20, 2020

Amal,

I went to try this fix and when I opened the same PDF, I was able to read the file in cleartext. I'm a little confused because I don't know the why. Why did the text garble in the first place? Why was it able to correct itself? I'd like to know for furture reference. Thank you for your help, by the way.

Participant
August 17, 2021

This did not work for me as that box was already checked when I looked.   The text only becomes garbled when I try to edit it.  If I hit "Undo" It goes back to normal.