My Illustrator crashes every time I open a pdf?

[Deeshana]

For years I have been opening and editing pdf's in illustrator. For 2 days my app crashes every time I attempt it or freezes. What's going on? I updated, deleted and reinstalled the program in an attempt to rectify the problem

[Doug A Roberts]

Does this occur with a particular PDF or all PDFs?

[Deeshana]

It is occurring with multiple PDF's and one or two actual ai. files

[Deeshana]

And with eps. files now that I have tried

[Deeshana · Accepted solution]

So I found out the problem, My graphics card was out of date.

I had to go into preferences in Illustrator, Click on "performance" and untick "GPU performance"

It is now working again.

[Doug A Roberts]

i haven't heard of that causing crashes so far. could you list your OS version, Illustrator version and graphics card for the reference of others?

[pookie1231345213513]

A little late to the party, but that tricked saved my brand new MacBook with the latest Illustrator from crashing on opening two pdfs from a client. Thanks for your pain!

[James332730236ngr]

Only one of my pdfs are crashing my illustrator and I tried your method but my gpu tick box was already unchecked so sadly it didn't help my situtaion.

[Bobby Henderson]

Is there anything unusual about the PDF, such as large file size and/or very complex artwork? Does the PDF have any of the newer features and effects from Illustrator, such as free-form gradients? Was the PDF saved with Illustrator Editing Capability intact? Or was the PDF created by another application, such as one not made by Adobe? PDF files in general are not meant to be edited further and that's especially true for PDFs not generated by Adobe applications.