Problems with graphics when printing to PDF

[CShute]

When creating a PDF of a large document (8000+ pages) from FrameMaker 9.0p250, a graphic error message appears, the PDF stops generating, and the graphic images appear as gray boxes in the partially generated document. The error message states: "Cannot print some imported images. Click OK to continue."

The computer system was recently upgraded to a Dell Optiplex 755 with Intel Core2 vPro running Windows XP. Acrobat Pro v9.2.0 is also installed.

The problem occurs when generating the PDF from FrameMaker, as well as printing to file and using Acrobat Distiller to create the PDF.

A test was run on the previous system and the expected result was achieved. This system is a Dell Precision 380 with Intel Pentium 4 running Windows XP, FrameMaker upgraded to 9.0p250, and Acrobat Pro 8.1.7.

What parameters are sensitive and what should we be looking at in our operating system to correct this problem?

[Art Campbell]

The first things I'd do/check :

* Is this a single Frame file, or a book file with component files?

* What version of XP? SP3 disables graphics imported as OLE objects, which would produce that symptom.

* How much RAM and free disk space is on board? 8000 pages is going to eat up a huge amount of resources and /temp space.

* Are the frame files local, or is there a network server involved?

* Can you print/PDF component files or sets of pages containing the graphics OK?

* How are you creating the PDF?  SaveAs or Printing to the Acrobat printer (recommended?)

[CShute]

Please note: this document has been in production for several years and has printed correctly over several versions of FrameMaker and Acrobat.

• This is a book file containing about 435 component files.
• Both systems are running XP 2002 SP3 (checking with IT about fix).
• New systems have 3.25GB ram and 55+GB free disk space.
• Frame files are located on a network server.
• Component files containing 2000+ pages have printed correctly.
• The PDF is created by printing to Acrobat PDF.

[Arnis Gubins]

Two possible issues.

What format are the graphics and have they been imported by Reference or by Copy or simply copied & pasted into the documents?

The files are located on a network server. FM sometimes has issues with networks depending upon whether you're using a mapped network drive or a URL. Sometimes aggressive anti-virus software also messes with FM by checking on the temp files being created during operations.

[Guest]

Starting with the image itself, what kind is it? Where is it located, locally or on a network? How is it inserted in the FM file, i.e.  by reference or as an OLE object?

Is this a single file or a book with multiple chapters? If it's multiple chapters, does the graphic behave correctly when PDFing the individual chapter? Are there other images of the same type and location that do print correctly?

Can you confirm whether either or both systems have had the MS hotfix 952909 applied:

> here are two links for the hotfix:

>

> http://blogs.adobe.com/techcomm/2008/07/hotfix_for_framemaker_1.html

>

> http://support.microsoft.com/kb/952909/en-us

[CShute]

The images are professionally created .jpg files located on a network server with a mapped drive and inserted into the FrameMaker files by reference.

[Arnis Gubins]

Have you tried doing split runs, i.e. generate page ranges for each half of the book at a time. If these both are succesful, then some sort of resource limit is being hit. If you get a failure, keep halving the splits until you don't get any grey boxes.

Note: if the grey boxes start appearing at the same location always, I'd double-check the specific image files.

[CShute]

Split runs are sometimes successful. Gray boxes appear at ramdom locations.

Because this document has been produced correctly numerous times from the same server files, and can be produced correctly now from the old system, the image files and FrameMaker files are not the issue. The new system has more free disk space than the old system (55GB vs. 44 GB), and the RAM is the same (3.25GB).

The old system is running Acrobat 8, so that version will be installed on the new system and another test of the document performed. Will keep you posted on the outcome.

Thanks to everyone for all the input.

[Arnis Gubins]

The grey boxes are generated at the FM end of things not the PDF end, so installing Acrobat 8 would not be the course I'd recommend first.

If you can install FM8 on the new machine and try it from there (after resaving all files in FM8 format) that should let you know if it's something specific to the machine or FM9.

[Arnis Gubins]

With 8000+ pages, it also quite possible that you're running out of resources. The (temporary) postscript file must be huge if you've used lot's of graphics.