Standardise page sizes in merged PDF?

[Scrubnib]

Hi everyone,

I'm trying to merge together a PowerPoint '07 and an Excel '07 file, both set to A4 lanscape page layouts, in Acrobat 9 Standard.  However, in the final merged PDF, the old Excel pages are huge compared to the PowerPoint slides - about 6 times larger.

Any ideas how I can force Adobe output a merged PDF all in the same page size and orientation?

Thanks in advance,

Simon

[Bill12]

If you check the lower left corner of Acrobat for each PDF, do they indicate the proper dimensions or something else? If the dimension is wrong, you might try the resize option in the crop tool.

[CtDave]

Acrobat's combine feature to merge files into one PDF does not provide a page size "editor".
Likely a cleaner work flow if the input files had page size adjusted by their native application.
Once done, use combine to merge into the single PDF.
You may find this is (over all) easier than using the Crop Tool resize features.

To view any PDF's page size when open in Adobe Reader/Acrobat go into Preferences.
Select the Page Display catagory then tick the "Always show document page size" choice.

Be well

[Scrubnib]

Thanks for your suggestions guys.

All three docuemnts I'm trying to merge are set to A4 (roughly 11.69 x  8.27 inches) in their native applications.  I've checked out the merged page sizes - the PowerPoint remains the same, one Excel goes to 23.39 x 16.54" and the other Excel goes to a whopping 36.54 x 25.84"!

I also can't find a 'resize' option in the crop tool, perhaps that's only available for Acrobat professional...?

Anything else you can suggest would be gratefully recieved!

Cheers,

Simon

[Bernd Alheit]

First create the PDF files then combine the PDF files in Acrobat.

[Scrubnib]

Bernd,

Just tried this.  Unfortunately the Excel files still turn out large even when converted individually, so combining them after that just ends up with the same result.

Thanks anyway,

Simon

[Bill12]

I think I would concentrate on why the PDFs for the PPT and Excel are not A4. Resolve that issue and you should be set. I do not think it is a merge issue, unless the merge process is doing the conversion at the same time. In that case, check the properties of PDF Maker in each application with the corresponding file.

[williwild3 · Accepted solution]

I had this same problem. I sent someone an 8 page document to which they signed 2 and scanned and returned them. When I tried to replace those 2 pages into my original (giving me a complete and signed document) the pages I inserted were smaller than those of the original.

DO THIS: Mouse over the bottom left side of the page in Adobe Acrobat. You will see which pages are WRONG. In my case, it was the originals that were too large. I then printed them via Adobe PDF Printer. Select "fit to printable area" (checking those dimensions to be at 8.5x11) When the document was printed this way, it was easy to fit those other pages in as they were all now the same size. No messing with the zoom which is a nightmare.

[Scrubnib]

Thanks - I'll try this later today.  Does it fix the page sizes in the soft copy of the document or just for the print outs?

Cheers,

Simon

[williwild3]

Both. It will literally save the new image as whatever "fit to printable area" you choose. Make sure the page

size is indicated on the preview. Done. The saved page is on a page of that size. Zoom it, insert it, extract it, replace it, print it. It is that size.

[OppfinnarKnullare]

OK, so was there a way to set all pages of a pdf to the same size?

There needs to be,because the insert page is flawed...

I have two documents, both of which have pages of the size 8.27x11.69 inch, open in Acrobat 9.0 Pro.

Now, if I copy one page from the first of these documents and insert from clipboard into the other, the inserted page becomes 22.55x31.89 inch!

How do I fix this?

And BTW, I *hate* the SDI interface!!

[Scrubnib]

Have you tried the 'Adobe PDF' print option outlined above?  That worked perfectly for me, all page sizes turn out equal.

[OppfinnarKnullare]

Thanks, but no I didn't try it. I was looking for a quick and easy way. Since "insert from clipboard" is obviously flawed, I thought that maybe there was a quick and easy way to counter the bug, but alas no, it seems...

I solved it in a way similar to the print approach.

1. Select the page you want to copy

2. Save it to a file

3. In the other document, insert the file

This works, but I still feel it is too cumbersome.

Note that my problem is not that the page has one size and I want to copy it to a document with pages of another size. Everything is the same size. My problem is that the "insert from clipboard" command doesn't work correctly.

[ServantSaint]

I have the solution and it works consistantly...

work around but somehow it works

select 'organize pages' from the edit pdf drop down

hold 'shift' and select all pages

on the organize pages ribbon to the far right, You will see a 'more' dropdown menu

click on the 'set page boxes' 

at the bottom of the pop up window there should be a 'change page size' radio buttons

select custom and type in the right width and height, in My case 8.5 and 11 was chosen

click ok 

now select edt pdf from the options, Your pages will still be wrong but this is ok...

now scroll to the 'too large pages' and acrobat will auto draw bounding boxes around objects

click on any of them and adobe should instantly resize the entire page,

then it is just a matter of clicking on any bounding box on any large page and they should reduce to the same size.

I did this on some legal work with scanned type and it came through from a pdf the scanner saved, so for some reason the scanned pdf was several times bigger than the others. when I printed, it came out just fine, but if You are emailing or filing a document, then the pdf will stay very different sizes prior to the step I have outlined above .

[Jo25007848e1tr]

This is amazing - you have saved me a huge amount of work and worked perfectly thank you for this!