Error combining files to PDF, only MS Office files on a network drive.

Report · Feb 21, 2023

I'm going insane. When I try to combine files to a PDF (DO NOT WANT Portfolio!) I get a very unhelpful error that simply says "There was an error encountered while combining files. Do you want to open the combined file or return to the file list and try again?"

This is happening on several Windows 10 computers. Occassionally, one of my computers will show a dialog box titled Create Adobe PDF with the message "The Security level is set to high. Please run the application which created this document, in the "Security Warning" dialog select the check box "Always trust macros from this source" and enable macro's created by Adobe Systems Inc."

Simply running MS Word does not bring up this dialog, and neither does opening the file I'm trying to add to teh PDF. I have tried many files, and none of the ones that actually give me the option combine, will work. Interestingly, a fair number of files simply don't give me the option to combine in the right click menu.

I am using Microsoft Office 365, and Adobe Acrobat DC through Creative Cloud.

I have completely removed all of MS Office AND all of Adobe including the Creative Cloud app itself.
I have also attempted the various repair options of all products.
I have rebooted many times.
I have run all Windows updates and system updates.

This problem seems to crop up for people once in a while and Google search results go back to 2017 at least. None of the fixes suggested have worked so far. Once again, I DO NOT WANT to create a portfolio so I have checked that option many times and it is NOT CHECKED.

Oh yeah, if I copy the files to my desktop, the process works fine.

I don't know what else to do and it's infuriating. Any help would be great! Thank you.

Report · Feb 22, 2023

The current solution I've found is to disable Protected Mode at Startup.

In Acrobat, Go to Edit-> Preferences and choose Security (Enhanced) in that left column. At the top left of the page Uncheck "Enable Protected Mode at Start Up (Preview) and say Yes to the dialog that comes up. Close Acrobat and try combining files again. It should work now.

I don't know what potential risks this poses, but it fixes the problem for now. If anyone knows why I *SHOULDN'T* do this, please let me know. I'm going to keep investigating.

Report · Feb 11, 2024

Dave, you are a genius. This has been driving me crazy for months, but thanks to you it's fixed now. I previously had to turn macros of in Word every time I wanted to combine Word documents into a PDF. Adobe, itself don't seem to have worked this out this fix, as their employees are still pushing the old 'Uninstall and reinstall' line on this forum. Given the problem has been affecting so many people it's amazing that they haven't sorted this in an update. Anyhow, you have me thanks.