pdf margin different than printer margin

The margins and a number of other issues associated with layout (including line breaks) are controlled strictly by Excel in conjunction with the print driver. By the time the conversion of PostScript to PDF occurs (when you print to Adobe PDF, Excel creates GDI which is passed to the printer driver which creates PostScript and Acrobat's driver plug-in passes that PostScript to Acrobat Distiller which converts PostScript to PDF which then saves the PDF and opens the PDF file in Acrobat), all layout decisions have been made. The factors involved include page size, unprintable page margins (Adobe PDF has no unprintable areas, real printers do - typically up to 0.25" on each edge of the page), and device resolution (Adobe PDF defaults to 1200dpi although you can change this in the Printer Setup).

By the way, similar “issues” occur when you create PDF from Excel using Acrobat's PDFMaker (Save as Adobe PDF - the preferred method of creating PDF from Excel) or even Microsoft's own “Save as PDF” (number of nasty bugs and can't handle OpenType CFF fonts).

          - Dov