Acrobat Reader X Won't Open/Launch

Report · May 17, 2012

Hello All,

I have a user running Windows XP Pro (fully patched) and has had Reader X installed for some time - yesterday the user attempted to open a PDF, but Reader would not open. I've been digging into this issue since then. The box is clean, no virus/malware infection. I have uninstalled (and completely removed all Adobe directories) Reader X and reinstalled (rebooting as well) several times with no success - Reader simply wll not open ... this has been tested with all antivirus software completely disabled as well. I've also attempted to launch Reader X within a new profile on the box, no change.

Any advice on what the issue could be / how to rectify it?

Many Thanks,

Kenneth

Report · May 17, 2012

Hi Kenneth, I am having this same issue but I am in a domain controlled environment. What I discovered is that I had to go to the actual exe file in C:\Program Files\Adobe\Reader 10.0\Reader\AcroRd32.exe then right click on the exe, run as local administrator. Then I got a pop-up talking about this protected mode that I have seen in other places. I chose to ALWAYS open with protected mode disabled. Then my reader opened and worked perfectly. UNTIL I closed it and tried to open it again as my user. My problem is that I can't even get to the settings as my user to be able to disable protected mode. It seems the setting change is user to user not system wide. I hope this helps. Hopefully though I can get some help on being able to disable protected mode for the whole system. I currently can't find a registry key...there must be one!!

Report · May 17, 2012

Hi nblaz,

Your mention of protected mode raises some interesting questions - thing is, I created a new user profile on this box and gave the new test user full admin and *still* wasn't able to launch the reader. Makes me wonder if the setting is somehow universal, extends beyond the single user profile. I haven't yet searched for registry keys but that's a good idea ... I definitely will dig for that as well. I'll share anything new that I find.

Thanks!

Kenneth

Report · May 17, 2012

Try searching the Enterprize Admin Guide, can be downloaded from this link:

http://helpx.adobe.com/acrobat/kb/enterprise-administration-acrobat-products.html

Report · May 18, 2012

Ok, the thing that is strange about this issue in my environment is that I have the majority of our users with the same version of Adobe all functioning properly. Now I have another user pop up with the same issue this morning. So its 2 out of about 40 that are using reader. All have same domain permissions. So I can't figure out what is different about these 2. Like I said before the process will start then stop within 2 seconds. I never get the pop-up to choose to load with or without protected mode unless Im the local administrator.

I will check out that file you sent Bugs619...maybe there is an mms file like Flash that can be tweeked...

Report · May 18, 2012

Bugs your the best! Thank you for that resource!

This worked for me...

Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Adobe\<product name>\<version>\

FeatureLockDown.

2. Right click and choose New > DWORD Value.

3. Create bProtectedMode.

4. Right click on the key and choose Modify.

5. Set the value to 0.

Now though I have to figure out why it is only happening at certain stations. If protected mode is automatically enabled, some stations can run in protected mode and some can't...not sure why. But I suppose that is for a different forum. ADevotedDad...I hope this works for you.