digg

Join DiggAbout

Discover and share the best of the web!
Learn more about Digg by taking the tour.

See the original image at blog.micropledge.com

Thank you, Adobe Reader 9!

blog.micropledge.com — Recently I wrote a blog entry about bloated software, and how much better Foxit PDF reader was than Adobe Reader. But I was using Adobe Reader 8. Little did I know how much superior version 9 would be.

Bury
show profanity settings
expand all
  • Kylde, on 07/04/2008, -11/+460lol, precisely why I use foxit reader
    • 15charmaxwtf, on 07/05/2008, -3/+9With version 8, at least, of Reader you can just move the plugins to the Optional folder and it loads up as fast as foxit. You may want to keep the search plugins in plugins folder though.
      • kalkin, on 07/05/2008, -1/+4move what in the what now? why bother with that and then having to disable auto-updates to remove that Update5 folder from your MyDocs? install foxit and be up and running in seconds - simple.

        with regards the article - excellent stuff! made me laugh out loud. especially the comment about the acrobat.com link in the start menu. whoever said sarcasm was the lowest form of wit? :)
      • palehorse864, on 07/06/2008, -0/+3Oscar Wilde
      • Giga, on 07/06/2008, -0/+0@kalkin
        The Update5 folder no longer exists in the newer point releases of version 8.
    • DaySeven, on 07/05/2008, -0/+10abobe reader lite is good, too
      http://www.softpedia.com/get/Office-tools/PDF/Adob ...
      thank shark007, he has also repacked itunes to make a 'lite' version, but he's probably most famous for his vista codec package.
      • PedleZelnip, on 07/05/2008, -0/+5Ditto, only problem I have with Foxit though is it doesn't seem particularly smart about printing. If you do a multipage print job it sends each page as a separate job as opposed to one. When I'm at work this makes printing REALLY SLOW, so I still keep an old version of Adobe Reader (v5 I think) for printing.
    • ufia, on 07/05/2008, -2/+75You people don't get it, do you? Adobe Reader 9 is all about the Crysis easter egg hidden in it. Opening a PDF document may seem slow to you, but only because the hidden game is preloaded in case you feel like playing first person shooter during that boring meeting. Get a clue!
    • devophl, on 07/05/2008, -3/+9Adobe has been bloatware longer than there have been PCs. Back in the days of $4K Macs, spending $3-4K on Adobe software was considered the norm. But like most PC software, diminishing marginal returns on Adobe software hit about 10 years ago. In other words, now you get about 1000 features in a software package where you only need about 30-40. And you're paying about $500/upgrade to get all that bloat you don't need. Don't get me wrong, Adobe pretty much invented the modern image processing and desktop publishing market. But I could never justify spending $800 for Photoshop when there were $100 packages that did what I wanted to do.

      But like with all high end software companies, Microsoft included, trying to find ways to get more software into your computer and finding cute ways to get you to buy more of their STUFF, has become the modern day norm.

      So you better get used to PCs taking 20 minutes to boot and software taking 3 minutes to load. Bloatware is here and is not going away anytime soon!!
      • wildchild77, on 07/05/2008, -6/+3We're still talking about FREE PDF reader software. Acrobat 9 is one of the most versatile and advanced PDF writing programs yet.
      • TheMidnight, on 07/05/2008, -22/+6Microsoft, Microsoft, bloatware all the way
        I've sat here installing Word since breakfast yesterday
        Oh Microsoft, Microsoft, moderation please!
        Guess you didn't notice four gig drives don't grow on trees!
      • TheMidnight, on 07/05/2008, -19/+2For you morons digging me down, it's the chorus to a parody song from back in 1998. You young whippersnappers need to get off my lawn.

        http://www.davidpogue.com/pogue_unplugged/songspoo ...
      • fpaudon, on 07/05/2008, -0/+16@TheMidnight

        I'm not digging you down because I didn't recognise the chorus, I'm digging you down because your comment was lame and your second comment reveals that your ego is decided by how many diggs you receive
    • Canadian0207, on 07/05/2008, -18/+3foxit reader straight up sucks. like really. adobe 8 was faster, cleaner, and less buggy.
    • FoxMcCloud1, on 07/05/2008, -12/+1if you are just using the reader for very basic stuff use whatever low cal one you want, but personally I think it is ultimatly ignorant on your part because you are going to need the latest acrobat to utilize some feature someone integrated somewhere. So why bother with some crappy light reader when in fact since you need both it actually takes up more space.

      Acrobat Reader is great, has a lot of tools, just use it.
    • mikeleeuk, on 07/05/2008, -18/+6Precisely why I use a Mac.
      • ophello, on 07/05/2008, -5/+13*cough* not really relevant *cough cough*
      • darkfish, on 07/06/2008, -2/+3Mikeleeuk comes off sounding too smug, but he does have a point: You don't need to download Adobe's bloatware if you are a Mac user, since Preview already does a great job of displaying PDFs. You can also do simple manipulation of whole PDF pages, such as re-ordering, cutting, concatenation of PDF files.

        It does a lot of what I need without Adobe's bloatware.
    • netneutrality, on 07/05/2008, -0/+5Precisely why I downgraded from Acrobat 6 to Acrobat 5 and kept reinstalling 5 on new computers ever since..... This Foxit thing sounds quite promising though.
    • Ebulating, on 07/06/2008, -1/+2FoxIt reader is OK and uses less ram, actually about half as much as Adobe Reader, but it has this really annoying glitch were it sometimes repeatedly redraws the same diagram over and over very rapidly for a few seconds and it stops responding to input while it does this. It was so annoying I switched back to Adobe Reader 9.
      • loveandrockets, on 07/06/2008, -0/+2Yeah I noticed that too. It seems to happen with large diagrams/pictures only. It is really annoying.

        But not enough for me to move back to Adobe Reader. That thing wouldn't close. I had to go to Process Explorer repeatedly to kill it. Even after I uninstalled it. Funny how that is.
      • theRIAA, on 07/08/2008, -0/+1yep, i couldn't load a trail/road map of my city, and it couldn't print graph paper right.
    • denomolos, on 07/06/2008, -5/+2Except you have to sign up for crappy trail software. No thank you.
    • Elranzer, on 07/07/2008, -0/+1I am disappointed with Adobe. It seemed like they realized how bloated Reader 7 was. For an Adobe program, Reader 8 was light-weight, fast-loading and yet more user-friendly and feature-filled than any version of Reader.

      Sounds like they dropped the ball with Reader 9, unfortunately.
  • SuckMyDigg, on 07/04/2008, -4/+70Search for Sumatra PDF as someone mentioned in the comments for an awesome lightweight open source pdf reader.
    • crazydiode, on 07/05/2008, -3/+9I dont know about the current version but with earlier versions you were not able to print docs with Sumatra. The only reason I am using Foxit, not that Foxit is bad, but Sumatra is even slimmer.
      • markdde, on 07/06/2008, -0/+2You can print docs now. Sumatra is faster for me and it's open source, so if it ever gets too bloated someone can fork it.
    • CPUYODA, on 07/05/2008, -1/+4Sumatra wont open JPEG enabled PDFs I have,...but foxit downloads an update that enables it to.

      Foxit FTW!
  • geoken, on 07/04/2008, -64/+18Adobe Reader serves it's purpose. If the PDF's you're reading are basic documents, and your hardware specs lend to an appreciable difference in start up speeds then I'm sure Foxit or Sumatra are great options. If you're doing professional print work, those other apps (evince and kpdf included) create a lot of artifacts on complicated vectors (ie. stuff published from Illustrator or inkscape).

    I don't see why you would knock an app for running slow, when that app has obvious features others don't. If I send a pdf with embeded 3d models to a foxit user are they going to be able view it? It would be like saying Notepad++ is bloated because it's starts slower than notepad.exe while ignoring the fact that notepad++ has code folding, syntax highlighting, a functions list and about 10k other things notepad doesn't.
    • UncleCrapper, on 07/05/2008, -2/+83If you are doing professional print work you definitely would not be using Adobe READER. The fact remains that with each new version Adobe Reader continues to rocket toward the threshold where its utility is outstripped by its obnoxiousness. There is no reason for a PDF viewing utility to require 210 MB of hard disk space once installed, especially when Foxit is only around 3 or 4 MB.
      • geoken, on 07/05/2008, -4/+3It's not a PDF viewing utility. It can view embeded 3d models, it can have videos embedded in it, etc. It's a program for distributing various formats.

        That's the point I was trying to make above. Different apps for different functions. If you're reading simple PDF's, and color accuracy and advanced vector effects (blurs for example frequently display as a solid, opaque lines in foxit) are of little/no importance than foxit is a decent choice.

        Are you not aware of the features present in Reader that don't exist in foxit? (and I don't mean small features, I mean the ability to render entire formats)
    • shadowmoose, on 07/05/2008, -2/+25I believe the point of the article is that all I want that program to do is open simple pdf files. Nothing more, nothing less. I rarely use or see that format so I don't want to waste space on the program I may use once a month.
      • geoken, on 07/05/2008, -1/+3I know that was his point. My point was, why call an app bloated because it does way more stuff than you need? If there was no quantifiable difference between the abilities of the 2 apps, and one was much larger than the other, then that would be bloat. If one app has 10x the features of the other app then that isn't bloat

        Going back to the notepad++ example, if all I need to do is edit plain text files does it make sense for me to download notepad++ (a full featured code editor) then complain about it's bloat when compared to an app that can't do, and was never meant to do, a fraction of what notepad++ can do? I can wright a line of text and print it with the 84kb notepad.exe, is notepad++ bloated because it's executable is over 10x larger?
      • SpeckledLemon, on 07/06/2008, -0/+1You rarely use or even see PDF files? Wow.
    • PAStheLoD, on 07/05/2008, -3/+5Oh, the linux kernel is powerful too, but still fast and small. It's not about the features, it's about that ***** bloat/crap in most of the Adobe products.

      They have a special installer, but even a simple NSIS installer is perfectly fit for the job.
      Just to download the installer, you have to mess around for minutes. Makes no sense.
      Restart your computer. Hello, we're in 2008.

      When I just want to open a simple PDF, no "professional" stuff (not that FoxIt can't open most of the "pro" stuff) just simple text, why can't it load itself without the "extra" modules? After all, no one's forcing them to load every single ***** unnecessary DLL at startup.

      It's about good design principles, or the lack of them.

      When you could make your software modular and extendable by plugins/extensions and, you should. Especially if you're adobe, with enough manpower and/or money. And on-demand dynamic loading those modules isn't exactly quantum physics.

      Of course, ***** up your potential customers is somewhat easier...
    • geoken, on 07/05/2008, -6/+3"When I just want to open a simple PDF, no "professional" stuff (not that FoxIt can't open most of the "pro" stuff) just simple text, why can't it load itself without the "extra" modules?"

      Because that isn't what it's for. If I'm just trying to read a simple PDF I use evince, If I need view it with high accuracy, or if it contains advanced features (ie. embeded 3d object) I'll use reader, just like how I use phatch or gThumb for simple resizing rather than firing up GIMP.

      You characterization of poor design principles could be used against almost every app in existence. Is GIMP poorly designed because I need to load the whole app to do a simple resize? Is rhythmbox bloated because I need to load the full app to transfer a single song to my mp3 player? Is Blender bloated because it loads all it's tools when all I wan't to do is make some 3d text?

      I can't really comment on the installer because I use the .deb they provide and it (like pretty much any .deb) installs without any prompts.
      • PAStheLoD, on 07/06/2008, -1/+1Well, you're right, it's not for "viewing". But have you seen anything lightweight on Adobe's site lately? So if their Reader isn't for viewing.. what do they offer for the simple folks, who just type in "PDF viewer" into Google/Live/Yahoo and unluckily wander to adobe.com?

        And yes, I think most of the programs we use today are flawed at least a little. With open source, your distribution will probably provide you with an image viewer, and the GIMP is an image editor. Sure, resizing is editing, but most people will find out about their viewer's resizing capability.

        But with Windows being commercial, and MS being in monopol position, they'd face a hard time, if they had put a PDF reader in Windows. So the average users are more or less stuck with what they can find / get first. Even if they find a professional half-editor first, that's labelled as a reader.
  • siong1987, on 07/04/2008, -33/+4That's why I use Skim on Leopard.
    • dragon76, on 07/05/2008, -0/+38Or you could just use Preview.app.
    • solistus, on 07/05/2008, -0/+5Why would you need a 3rd party app to use PDFs on OSX? It's the native document format... If any 3rd party app is doing much besides calling the same API functions as Preview, it's very inefficient.
  • serenityflexed, on 07/05/2008, -6/+66Using Evince on linux.
    • kleverness, on 07/05/2008, -0/+9Okular rocks, it's very fast and good looking :)
    • felipe82, on 07/05/2008, -0/+18I still remember the first time I installed linux (I think it was ubuntu 5.04) and double clicked on a 100 page PDF and less than 2 secs later the file was open.
      It was nothing short of some sort of witchcraft to me, since I was using Adobe Reader 7 back then (waaaaaaaaaay more bloated than 8).
    • mossblaser, on 07/05/2008, -0/+3I found that Evince does crash on certain PDFs so I've taken to using kPDF most of the time, I believe okular is an improvement over both though
    • neckaros, on 07/05/2008, -2/+10Use built-in Preview.app in OSX.
    • silfiriel, on 07/05/2008, -0/+4Just tested Evince, and it opens Lord of the Rings 13MB, Stardust 42MB and The Atlas of Middle Earth 80MB, in about 5 seconds anyone of them, with no redrawing whatsoever.
    • tomd123, on 07/05/2008, -2/+0xpdf is where it's at. light and easy to use. the only thing different about it are the controls, but it's awesome.
    • addicted68098, on 07/06/2008, -0/+1Evince has a lot of trouble with graphical things though
  • Andres84, on 07/05/2008, -29/+3Oh the irony...
  • illustrick, on 07/05/2008, -4/+25.....would you expect anything less, this happens with any standardized platform, once it becomes mainstream it becomes bloated and almost unusable.
  • PrometheusZero, on 07/05/2008, -11/+363I think he's being sarcastic... not sure though.
    • ozziegt, on 07/05/2008, -33/+10The sarcasm is laid on so thick it's annoying. I got sick of reading it after a couple paragraphs. Thank goodness he bolded the important parts! It was like cliff notes!

      I would hate to know that guy in real life.
      • baylat, on 07/05/2008, -4/+7I would have hated you if we met in real life.
    • flarn2006, on 07/05/2008, -10/+4Sarcasm sphere self-test complete
    • NecroSexy, on 07/05/2008, -8/+1Not sure? He wrote that v9 is ~11 MB more (noted in bold) than the previous!
    • zulfy26, on 07/06/2008, -2/+18I think you're being sarcastic... not sure though.
    • Archer007, on 07/06/2008, -4/+1I love rebooting and starting all my apps again!!!!!111!!
    • chaos7, on 07/06/2008, -7/+1you THINK he's being sarcastic? he is.
  • yeskia, on 07/05/2008, -59/+11***** ADOBE
    ***** ROGERS
    ***** THE RIAA
    ***** CREATIVE
    ***** JACK THOMPSON
    ***** VIRGIN MEDIA

    Oh God you know what, just ***** everybody.
    • saxreturns, on 07/05/2008, -3/+24Oh you crazy anarchist rebel, you're so cool! I wish I was as non-conformist and trend-setting as you.
      • sofunnyithurts, on 07/06/2008, -0/+0lol
      • Gudeldar, on 07/06/2008, -0/+2I too wish I could be non-conformist by listening to the same music, dressing the same way, and acting the same way as other non-conformists. That would be the best way to conform to the ideal of non-conformity.
    • bigredgpk, on 07/05/2008, -2/+30Including your mom?
    • tama00, on 07/05/2008, -1/+2yay digg users are getting laid!
    • Tonorific, on 07/05/2008, -2/+3***** CANADIANS.
      • Fozefy, on 07/06/2008, -0/+2:( That hurts.
      • Tonorific, on 07/06/2008, -0/+1Sorry, when he said ***** ROGERS he was painting his reply into a corner. He should have said ***** COMCAST! in order for his message to make sense to a broader audience. Most Canadians are much smarter than that.
  • xtraa, on 07/05/2008, -24/+10Well, this is really an advantage of the build in pdf functionality in Leopard/osx.
  • skellener, on 07/05/2008, -14/+5They are becoming irrelevant on what used to be their bread and butter - the Mac. Their software is too slow, too overpriced and too bloated. Adobe will be gone in less than a decade.
    • arjie, on 07/05/2008, -1/+11Are you sure about that? Somehow while everyone touts the fact that graphic designers use Macs, I have actually seen well paid designers who use Windows, and I have met designers who use Blender on Linux. Not to say that I haven't met my fair share of Mac-enthusiast designers, people who would work with nothing but a Mac pro, and sure Macs were over-represented with respect to the general population, but are Mac-users such a large percentage of Adobe's base really? Some numbers would be nice.

      I'm pretty sure that Adobe will be around even if Macs get some program that's superior to their creative suite. There's a lot of inertia anyway, lots will stick to Adobe because 'everyone uses Photoshop'.
      • solid12345, on 07/05/2008, -3/+4As a graphic designer, I use a Mac at work but a PC at home. I got a grin on my face when I read CS4 will be 64-bit only on Windows because i've had battles in the Mac Labs many-a-time about why I prefer a PC.
    • dragon76, on 07/05/2008, -4/+8I am just waiting for Apple to release a Photoshop killer which is really possible with Core Graphics. I'm tired of Adobe ***** with Photoshop's interface just because they can and I am tired of having to install 2 completely unrelated applications just to install Photoshop. Adobe is the new Microsoft.
      • arjie, on 07/05/2008, -3/+13Ironic that you should call on Apple because Adobe makes you install completely unrelated applications to use the one that you want. You do remember the Safari-iTunes thing, don't you?
      • BossKey, on 07/05/2008, -0/+3If you are a Photoshop power user and not just doing simple stuff, it should be clear that the things Core Image does have very little to do with what makes Photoshop as useful as it is in a production environment.

        I mean, Core Image has been out how long now, yet the apps based on it are still simple apps hooking up a UI to Core Image, which doesn't manage to advance past Photoshop in any practical way for graphics pros. Core Image was intended to elevate the graphics capabilities of an average apps, but is not capable of advancing past Photoshop without some innovative coding added on top of Core Image.

        Core Image demos well, though...
    • solid12345, on 07/05/2008, -1/+10"Adobe will be gone in less than a decade"

      Yeah when there becomes a halfway-decent alternative to Photoshop, Illustrator, Indesign, Flash, and After-Effects comes along, call me.

      There is more to Adobe than just "ol' photoshop" its going to take more than the Gimp to replace a graphic designer's tool set.
    • Sabin, on 07/05/2008, -2/+5Not bloody likely. Working in digital pre-press I have seen a steady shift away from the mac and towards windows even from designers (there is no technical advantage to staying with the mac now and comparable PC software is almost half the price) but if anything Adobe has definitely increased its market share. I haven't seen a Corel file in over a year now (not even sure how Corel stays in business anymore) and InDesign is moving in on Quarks territory very quickly. Adobe may be becoming irrelevant on the Mac but overall design itself is becoming less relevant on the Mac. Yes, a lot of designers still work on the Mac but the shift is (slowly) happening.

      BTW, printers hate you pretentious Mac using, designer pricks and please stop trying to do your own imposition, you are a designer, not a printer. We're actually charging you more to fix your broken impositions than we would be if you sent us an un-imposed file.
      • GreenAlien, on 07/05/2008, -3/+3If there's been a temporary trend of designers shifting towards the PC it was probably to do with the delay with Adobe supporting native Intel Macs.

        The only pretentious users are the ones blurting out insults like "printers hate you pretentious Mac using, designer pricks"
  • modusop, on 07/05/2008, -6/+107Why would any Mac user want this? Preview is fast and light, and has great editing features. One time I was in a bind and cut some stuff out of a picture using Preview (when Photoshop wasn't available.)
    • blackjack75, on 07/05/2008, -0/+25Preview is actually pretty powerful when it comes to PDFs (considering it's only supposed to be a general purpose viewer). You can crop PDFs, add or remove pages (just drag them from another PDF), rotate pages etc.
    • BossKey, on 07/05/2008, -2/+9Preview is great, I use it about 50% of the time. But Apple tends to use an older version of the PDF library, so some types of PDFs contain data that Preview can't handle, like forms and some annotation types. The Leopard version may be better at this, but in my experience, sometimes you do have to drag out the Reader if you need to use a PDF that's more than just a static page.
    • RedS0x, on 07/05/2008, -1/+8Quick Look is even more useful IMO.
    • etx313, on 07/05/2008, -3/+6Preview is sweet, but try adding notes to a PDF file or viewing 3D content. These two functions are used in my workplace on a daily basis and make pdf files irreplaceable.
      • atgmac, on 07/05/2008, -0/+3Meh, I'd rather have the extra speed for the 99% of occasions I don't need those features.
      • BurgerPunch, on 07/06/2008, -0/+0Don't think I've ever seen a PDF with 3D data
      • Karmavs, on 07/07/2008, -0/+1The first is easy in Preview; the second makes me wonder — why?
    • haterofps3, on 07/05/2008, -7/+1Cause everyone uses a Mac?
    • srujanlive, on 07/05/2008, -1/+1Skim is another good one for OS X
    • smpx, on 07/05/2008, -0/+1Tofu recently started beta testing pdf functions, it's still a hit and miss, but it's by far the single most comfortable text viewer around. I'm actually starting to prefer reading on tofu than on paper.
    • diggimator, on 07/05/2008, -3/+2I first tried Leopard's Preview for this year's PDF tax forms, but it wouldn't save edited forms, and it was crashy, so I used Adobe Reader 8 instead.

      ...Just installed Reader 9. The 41MB installer was in wizard format. I simply had to press next about 3 times and that was it. Strangely, it didn't uninstall Reader 8 so now I have two versions and no uninstaller for 8. I guess I'll have to simply drop it in the trash when I feel like it.
    • Sunsneezer, on 07/06/2008, -3/+2Preview often unnacurately renders PDF files.
    • steuben, on 07/06/2008, -0/+1Tho this thread is about the reader, the full version has truly fantastic OCR that deskews each page, cleans up artifacts, and impressively pulls words from the images into a pdf+text file. On the Mac, 9 is much faster to load and use than 8. I wish I had timing data to back this claim, but I've already removed 8 from the machines I use. However, anecdotally, 9's a big improvement over 8: it may be the same size on disk, but the speed alone is worth it.

      On a different note, Preview can add notes and markup to documents yet some programs, like DEVONthink, don't allow you to export them and then remove or edit the markup. With Acrobat, that problem appears to be gone.
  • Sacrifice, on 07/05/2008, -4/+301I don't drink coffee, so Reader 9 may not be so exciting for me.
    • borninda818, on 07/05/2008, -1/+36May I suggest tea.
      • tomd123, on 07/05/2008, -4/+1Which tea has the most caffeine? black?
      • MillionsLivio, on 07/05/2008, -1/+2Indeed, black has the most; I suggest getting tea from Adagio.com, amazing site.
      • Yookji, on 07/06/2008, -1/+1Isn't it called freedom bag water?
      • Archer007, on 07/06/2008, -0/+2Earl Grey, Hot.
      • trousercustard, on 07/06/2008, -0/+0Make it so.
    • Kakemonstere, on 07/05/2008, -7/+1You don't drink coffee?!?!
    • Tonorific, on 07/05/2008, -0/+1You've gleaned from the story, exactly what it was about. Adobe Reader 9 is for the Coffee crowd
  • tedhead2k, on 07/05/2008, -17/+8Funny and sarcastic, but honesty, I'm actually really impressed with Reader 9. It launches and opens a PDF much faster than 8 did on both my Mac and PC.
    • DjArcadian, on 07/05/2008, -2/+3I upgraded to version 6. Surprisingly nimble and quick.
      • Boktai1000, on 07/05/2008, -0/+8I upgraded to Foxit. Surprisingly even more nimble and quick.
    • Snakedal337, on 07/05/2008, -2/+9Now try a real application! You'll ***** bricks!
    • BossKey, on 07/05/2008, -1/+3I believe you. To be fair, Adobe has made progress. Up to version 7, Reader got slower and slower. Starting with 8, they clearly did some optimization because Reader 8 was as fast as Apple Preview. I am holding off on installing Reader 9 as long as possible, but it's nice to know that they may have continued the optimization efforts they apparently started in 8.

      My main method of viewing PDFs now is pressing the spacebar in Leopard (QuickLook).
    • tunafizzle, on 07/05/2008, -3/+1I think you just searched for a pdf on each computer and actually timed them with a stop watch for the sole purpose of that thar comment. -5 diggs right now, you fail.
  • kd420, on 07/05/2008, -2/+141After reformatting I almost installed Adobe Reader instead of Foxit and had to cancel the installation in a cold sweat. I try not to think about what might have happened that day...
  • Albo23, on 07/05/2008, -10/+5I was about to say wtf..
    • overt, on 07/05/2008, -0/+6Thank god you didn't.
    • advancedOption, on 07/06/2008, -1/+3I think we've had enough sarcasm for the day overt.
  • toastgodsupreme, on 07/05/2008, -15/+1I guess it's too hard for some people to go in and delete the 25Mb of unneeded plugins.

    Trims on size (mine sits at 65Mb) and startup is instant.

    Meh, to each their own.
    • blackjack75, on 07/05/2008, -0/+16Right, 65mb is so small for a viewer.

      I remember a time when graphical operating systems fit on my 20 mb harddrive.
    • BuGi2, on 07/05/2008, -0/+5Why are the plugins included in the install in the first place? At least i think of plugins as something that users install by themselves later if they need them. Not deleting them from the installation when not needed. And even then I can't understand why they need 65Mb for a viewer.
    • BinaryFragger, on 07/05/2008, -0/+5Only 65MB?
      FoxIt is 6.5MB, and SumatraPDF is even lighter at 1.1MB.

      Although what annoys me the worst about Adobe Reader is the mandatory reboot after installation.
      • benstudley, on 07/05/2008, -1/+0I just installed it and didn't have to reboot.... it also loads in about 2 seconds.
  • p13t3rm, on 07/05/2008, -7/+69What exactly are the benefits of updating to Reader 9?
    • SonnyW, on 07/05/2008, -2/+52The coffee, duh.
    • p13t3rm, on 07/05/2008, -4/+55Negative diggs, for an honest question. Really?
      • saxreturns, on 07/05/2008, -4/+32Less hard drive space, an extra start menu item, and more time for coffee. You don't really need to ask the question when the article answers it for you...
      • p13t3rm, on 07/05/2008, -3/+24The article didn't answer anything really, he just kept bitching about the install process and went on and on about his coffee. I should rephrase my question, are there any IMPROVEMENTS in Reader 9?
      • saxreturns, on 07/05/2008, -1/+9Well, you can always go to Adobe's site and take their word for it, but since the first 'reason to upgrade' is 'improved launch speeds', I wouldn't trust them too much!

        http://www.adobe.com/products/reader/reasons_to_up ...
      • schoate09, on 07/05/2008, -1/+4Actually, I installed Adobe Reader 9, and it's the fastest launching time of any Adobe Reader yet...
    • Gutterpunk, on 07/05/2008, -3/+39For you? None.

      For Adobe? A chance that you'll install their eBay bar and make them some ad money

      EVERYBODY WINS!
    • lordkenthegreat, on 07/05/2008, -1/+14None.
    • Arramol, on 07/05/2008, -1/+9To make your OS feel slim? Seriously, this much bloat in a mere document reader makes Vista seem downright anorexic.
    • Sushubh, on 07/05/2008, -1/+2i think the support for new features added in adobe acrobat 9 like flash support inbuilt.
    • smpx, on 07/05/2008, -0/+2all those nifty features like a free adobe.com link in your start menu!
  • PurgueFlantar, on 07/05/2008, -3/+269For those of you that aren't aware: Foxit PDF reader is a complete replacement for Adobe Reader. It is small and opens in a flash. It does NOT put icons all over your PC desktop and start menu, will NOT put icons back on your PC after you delete them and does NOT install an auto updater that is nearly impossible to disable, will NOT check for updates before opening the PDF causing a 30 second hang of your PC, etc

    Foxit is available for free dowload from the below link. There are other suitable replacements for a PDF reader, any of which I'm sure are similarly superior to Adobe's.

    http://www.foxitsoftware.com/pdf/rd_intro.php

    Sorry to get a little heated but I run an IT dept for about 100 users and between Adobe's reader, pro, flash, and framemaker, I spend a large percentage of my time battling wills with Adobe's autoinstallers and updaters that end users don't have the rights to run (not my choice) so they watch progress bars go up... then down.... then up....... then down again.... repeat.
    • PurgueFlantar, on 07/05/2008, -2/+10From the comments section in the article:
      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBkKBeVX9js

    • Modab, on 07/05/2008, -3/+12I manage a few hundred computers for public labs and classrooms, and we switched to Foxit Reader last year. It was quick to launch, but it had big problems when it came to printing, so many that we had to switch back to Adobe. Just a warning if your users will be printing alot. I'm guessing about a 3% fail rate.
      • PurgueFlantar, on 07/05/2008, -0/+2Modab, I hear you. I don't use Foxit for the enterprise.
      • PAStheLoD, on 07/05/2008, -16/+23% against Adobe's 100% pure FAIL .. hm, it's really a hard dilemma.
      • BurgerPunch, on 07/06/2008, -1/+0HAH enterprise
    • matthiasgoodman, on 07/05/2008, -4/+3You do know that you can create a GPO with a a custom ADM to disable the autoupdate, etc, through group policy, right?
      • PurgueFlantar, on 07/06/2008, -0/+2If I were granted the rights in AD, no problem. It's a crazy world.
    • johnkelly84, on 07/05/2008, -0/+2I think Adobe also offers an MST utility to customize their MSI installers, so you can disable any of those icons all over the place, disable auto updates, suppress the EULA, and all kinds of other tweaks. Deploying using GPO would also probably save a ton of time.
    • darthsand, on 07/05/2008, -0/+5foxit is amazing
    • e2superman, on 07/05/2008, -2/+5Foxi has troubke with protected editable forms. Just saying.. not a complete replacement.
    • geoken, on 07/05/2008, -1/+1Also, foxit doesn't have the CAD and various other 3d format support that reader has.

      Probably useless for most, but just pointing it out because for anyone who does use that stuff foxit couldn't be considered a replacement.
    • spyres, on 07/05/2008, -1/+3Foxit's rendering and printing are *****.

      Especially for heavily layered graphic images and so on.
      • anonymous457, on 07/05/2008, -0/+1move the update.api plugin from the plug_ins folder to the optional folder...problem solved
      • anonymous457, on 07/06/2008, -0/+1i fail at reply
    • Nysul, on 07/05/2008, -0/+1Foxit reader doesn't quite work with tablet PCs, as it seems to randomly position menu bars everywhere whenever I switch from landscape to portrait view.

      I wouldn't care so much about adobe, java, and apple if they each didn't install their own update process to run in the background. MS should integrate an update center for 3rd parties (they would probably get sued, but they can take the hit) where it checks like once a month for installed application updates.
    • passedoutghost, on 07/05/2008, -1/+0I thought the main failing of foxit is that it couldn't search words within the whole document, just the page you're currently on. That's the main reason why I haven't downloaded because I often need to browse through 100+ pdf documents and I don't want to do through each page looking for an author or phrase.
    • lowbot, on 07/06/2008, -5/+4Wow you "run" an IT department but cant figure out how to shut off the updater?. Resign and give your job to someone worthy of it. All your complaints are very simple fixes for anyone who isnt a paper MCSA.

      Adobe isnt the problem, its your incompetence. IT is full of incompetent people. The faster we get rid of them the better.
      • PurgueFlantar, on 07/06/2008, -1/+2lowbot: perhaps you don't understand what is meant to "run" an IT department. The huge scope of responsibilities and projects that I oversee leaves little time to fart around with Adobe's numerous auto update default failures. I don't see how you can defend Adobe's actions, they are SPAMmy. Bottom line: I don't have to wrestle and fight with anyone else's products, be it PDF readers or whatever. Only Adobe pulls this cr@p on a regular basis, and we Diggers are here to bitch about it.

        Go back to your console. :P
    • 142TeeTH, on 07/06/2008, -0/+2"go up... then down.... then up....... then down again.... repeat."
      That's what SHE said; sorry, I just had to.
      But in relations to the topic, I don't even remember the last time I used Adobe Reader.
  • finn, on 07/05/2008, -4/+13ack...almost fell for that (be very careful with sarcasm in text) but thankfully common sense kicked in and after the 1st sentence I was pleasantly assured that yes indeed the article was tainted heavily by sarcasm and acrofat 9 was exactly as i expected it would be.
  • Ablue, on 07/05/2008, -13/+30Oh, look at me! I'm making people happy! I'm the Magical Man from Happy-Land, in a gumdrop house on Lollipop Lane! Oh, by the way, I was being sarcastic.
    • utahnkid, on 07/05/2008, -18/+3If you dugg this down because A. You don't know what it's from. or B. You know where it's from but don't think it's funny. YOU FAIL

      /Homer
      • utahnkid, on 07/06/2008, -3/+1Who the hell would digg that down. Dumbasses
  • santixar, on 07/05/2008, -4/+28Foxit FTW!
  • ivan423, on 07/05/2008, -14/+5When I downloaded and installed Adobe Reader I did not experience anything he is talking about.

    I just downloaded the application, no plug-in, installation took less than 2 minutes, no computer restart, and no Acrobat.com link on my Start Menu. And when I run the application it only takes a couple of seconds to load.

    Maybe the software is not the problem. It could be the old Celeron with 512 MB of RAM, and to avoid crap installations perform a custom installation instead of a typical installation.
    • BinaryFragger, on 07/05/2008, -1/+10Celeron with 512MB of RAM? A lot of such computers are still in use, and perfectly usable for grandma to check her email and surf the Web.
      You shouldn't need a quad core to view PDFs.
    • PAStheLoD, on 07/05/2008, -1/+3Maybe that "when" happened a few years ago... thus making your statement true. (Reader 4 or 5 wasn't that bad.)
    • FFXIfrohike, on 07/05/2008, -2/+1Tool.
  • digitallysick, on 07/05/2008, -4/+25Preview ftw, if you are in windows try Foxit reader
    • jmreid, on 07/05/2008, -0/+3Ya, Preview is all I need. I vowed not to install any Acrobat ***** because they put that stupid toolbar in MS Office that you can't remove and their plugin wants to take over Safari's default. No thanks Adobe.
    • DevilInPgh, on 07/06/2008, -1/+1Sorry, but Skim >>>>>>>> Preview.
  • Premier, on 07/05/2008, -2/+74I've never understood the need for such a bloated piece of software, there's no reason a program that allows you to see a page should be as big as an os install disk.
    • fuzzynyanko, on 07/05/2008, -2/+7I have a lot less problem with Microsoft software, and didn't realize it until I played with some of Adobe's CS3
      • haterofps3, on 07/05/2008, -0/+4Oh I agree most of my problems with Microsoft relate to adobe the second I got ride of Adobe my enjoyment of Microsoft shot up.

        Adobe please go to hell!
    • geoken, on 07/05/2008, -0/+1It does a lot more than read PDF's (like integrated viewing of 3d models).
      • Premier, on 07/06/2008, -0/+1And how many ppl use it for it's integrated viewing of 3d models? It's main job is to display a simple page. It should do that quickly and easily. If additional features are needed it should load them on demand, not by default.
  • chaos7, on 07/05/2008, -9/+2LOL funny!!!!!!
  • bugsysservant, on 07/05/2008, -7/+3Reader was actually a major reason I switched the OS on my EEE PC. Not only did they choose to install a bloated, slow piece of software that does a piss poor job of maximizing real estate on a computer with a resolution of 640*480 (IIRC), but they did that on top of making it part of the read/write "core" of the computer, so that you can't remove it, or any other piece of software, without serious modification. Sure, I could have gotten rid of the unionfs, but it just seemed easier to put on Xubuntu.
  • Ev3nt372, on 07/05/2008, -7/+19Whenever I go to fix somebody's software problems along the way I usually end up uninstalling Adobe PDF Reader then going to filehippo.com and getting Foxit Reader. I use Foxit Reader and doPDF to "print" docs in PDF format http://www.dopdf.com/. I also have a matching set of programs for the XPS document format found here http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/xps/viewxps.mspx.
    PS: Somebody seriously needs to make a FREE on Bitorrent! sticker to slap on those $700 Adobe Photoshop boxes I just cant help but snicker whenever I walk past them.
    • bipolarruledout, on 07/07/2008, -0/+0If you work in graphic design then thats what you use. Period. There are great solutions for ocasional use but you need the right tool for the right job.
  • damndj, on 07/05/2008, -2/+21I've turned a lot of people on to FoxIT. After being long time Adobe Reader people, they are pleasantly surprised at how good FoxIT is. I agree.

  • M0stBlunt3d, on 07/05/2008, -7/+1haha...

    Adobe is horse ****!
  • ConfusedCartman, on 07/05/2008, -2/+7The sad part is, I thought he was serious until I got to the "restart computer" portion of the article.

    By the way, I do use FoxIt. For those of you who don't: http://www.foxitsoftware.com/downloads/
  • Ne007, on 07/05/2008, -1/+9why does it take for ***** ever to open up a PDF? Freezes the computer up for like a minute.
    • cadmiumpaint, on 07/05/2008, -1/+3it has to draw all the vector stuff. if you have a complex file with lots of layers and information it will take a while. Files originated in illustrator with tons of vector points take the longest.
    • lordkenthegreat, on 07/05/2008, -0/+3In a web browser, it has to load Adobe's PDF reading code, which is bloated. Therefore, we have lag.
    • fred0204, on 07/05/2008, -8/+2probably because your computer's broken. Takes less than a second to open up a 100+mb pdf for me.
  • zakatov, on 07/05/2008, -2/+17PDFs are great, Preview (and OS X in general) handles them wonderfully, it kills me that Adobe is making everyone hate them by releasing this garbage.
    • bubba9999, on 07/06/2008, -0/+1The PDF format is great. I think that most people (rightly) affix their distaste on Adobe itself. Acrobat Reader makes me want to slap babies.
  • HAKdragon, on 07/05/2008, -2/+47"I could only thank Adobe’s engineers, presuming they were filling up my hard drive with yummy icons, tasty DLLs, and amazing 3D JavaScript add-ons. No matter — the 210 MB it required was there to be used."

    I remember when people balked at the fact that Windows 98 need around 200MB of hard drive space.
  • cadmiumpaint, on 07/05/2008, -3/+23Preview is the best. It will open a 1gb psd file or multi page PDF as easily as a small jpg. Comes with Mac OS. Pretty awesome.
    • akhomerun, on 07/06/2008, -0/+2i think it may be so good because mac os x uses the PDF rendering engine/something similar to render all 2D stuff, but i could be very wrong.
      • bipolarruledout, on 07/07/2008, -1/+0No your correct but apple could in fact be wrong... but then if you can't figure out how to render 2D in 2008 then you have no business creating an OS.
  • diggerphelps, on 07/05/2008, -0/+6This is what happens when the "bean counters" take over completely from the tech visionaries.
    You can thank the OLD Adobe of Warnock and Geschke for the PDF format (which is still excellent, at least for its original intended purposes), Postscript, Photoshop, Illustrator, etc, but all this bloatware crap they've been putting out for the last ten years or so is Bruce Chizen's legacy.
  • takatoo, on 07/05/2008, -7/+4You're welcome.
  • vspazv, on 07/05/2008, -2/+54to me Foxit is like my motorcycle. It's fun and fast for getting around but is abolutely useless for most of my work requirements.

    I work with full page newspaper advertisements that make foxit curl up and die when it attempts to load them. After waiting 10 minutes for it to redraw the screen 15 times (multiply by 5 if I actually try and scroll down the page) it then lets me print one copy of the form (no high volume prints for you!) and then sends the document to my printer in a format that makes my HP 9000 sit there for 4 minutes between pages.

    With adobe it takes 40 seconds to load the page (redraws twice) then lets me print out 120 copies in 3 minutes.
    • jakefloyd, on 07/05/2008, -0/+16Finally someone who looks at it logically. In the end, though it's a larger program, Reader does the job better than Foxit. Whenever I am trying to export in PDF format from CAD, opening the file in Foxit will take quite a while while it draws it up. Then, everytime I scroll it redraws it. So unbelievably slow for high quality or high res files.
    • quomen, on 07/06/2008, -2/+7It's like people who say Open Office > Microsoft Office.
      I just don't get it.
    • spyres, on 07/06/2008, -1/+4Agreed. Everytime Adobe Reader is mentioned, a slew of folks yell "Use Foxit!", not realizing that Foxit's Rendering and printing is basically ***** for anything complex.

    • jojoyohan, on 07/06/2008, -1/+4You realize that you are in the minority who might actually benefit from waiting 10 seconds to open up a PDF. For everyone else, there is foxit.

      Also, on an older version of foxit, i did notice some rendering lag but a recent update eliminated that for me. It might be worth a try if you want to test it out.
    • bipolarruledout, on 07/07/2008, -0/+0Well for your sake I'm glad that Adobe knows their target market but It kind of sucks that the other 99% of us need to suffer just becuase we're not intending on ever printing much nor do we care about what font or pantone colors it needs to look PERFECT in.... we just want to READ the damn thing.
  • medj, on 07/05/2008, -3/+9For any people here using Photoshop, you might want to consider the portable version. Here is a link in case you are interested.
    http://www.leechers.info/adobe-photoshop-cs3-porta ...
    Only 56mb.
    • GreenAlien, on 07/05/2008, -3/+8Portable Photoshop CS3? Sounds handy! I tried the Portable Gimp and what a useless POS that was.
    • bipolarruledout, on 07/07/2008, -0/+0Tell me about this "portable" movement in the warez community. I have been seeing this a lot and I don't quite get it.
  • dullnation, on 07/05/2008, -10/+12I just downloaded Reader 9. WTF is the issue?! Yes Adobe Reader has been horribly slow and bloated in the past. I just opened a rather large PDF document in firefox and the Reader plugin loaded instantly. Theres really nothing wrong with it any longer!
    • horseradish2, on 07/05/2008, -1/+0except for the fact you're devoting massive resources to constantly running reader services in the background, hard drive, and browsers that the rest of us use to run everything faster and more efficiently, hence "bloatware"
  • seventhc, on 07/05/2008, -1/+12I used to hate PDF's until I stopped using adobe. I use 'Evince' on a linux box and PDF's open instantly. Back when I was using windows with adobe, I cursed whenever I had to open a PDF.
  • BamB00, on 07/05/2008, -6/+6There is acrobat reader 9 lite, only ~50MB after installation and it has no auto updater, installation take about 10 seconds, launch only take 1 second.
  • MrViklund, on 07/05/2008, -15/+2With today's computer there are no such thing as bloated software.
    • MrViklund, on 07/05/2008, -1/+1Digg me down but you are still wrong.
      With today's computer power, there is no such thing as bloated software. The computers today are so powerful we don't really have any software except games that can take advantage of all the power. "Bloated Software" may have been a problem in the mid 90's. Once upon a time, machine code was preferred in front of script code like Java Script because Script languages are generally very slow to execute compared to machine code. Today it's less of a problem. Even slow and bad code execute well on today's machines.
    • djepik, on 07/07/2008, -0/+1You are everything that is wrong with the computer industry.

      Hey I know, next version of Acrobat Reader will auto-calculate PI to 10^gogolplex digits everytime you load a page- Just because programs *can't* be bloated any more.

      NO this would be a USELESS feature. Just like everything in Acrobat Reader.

      I hope to hell you're not a programmer.
  • gaberowe, on 07/05/2008, -1/+12Adobe thinks that if you were OK with waiting 30 seconds to load a PDF in 1999 on your Pentium Pro, then you should still be OK with that. Therefore, if the base functionality loads a PDF in 5 seconds, then you have 25 seconds to load all sorts of random crap along with it!! Also, while you are at it, you should ask them if they want to update their version of Acrobloat to version 8.1.2.5.3.1, which adds exciting new features such as font mangling when you least expect it--particularly on page 50 of a 200 page document.

    I used FoxIt and CutePDF writer... my life is about a billion times better because I open PDFs all the time being a grad student doing lots of literature searches... I got so used to going into task manager and finding acrobat or acrord32 and killing the process I could probably do it with my eyes closed. What's hilarious is that FoxIt doesn't need a constant memory resident program, and Acrobat does, but still FoxIt loads PDFs faster... ha! I just don't know what the heck is wrong with Acrobat--they really blew it!
  • dxgg, on 07/05/2008, -10/+4Oooo! A sarcasm meter...that will really work. *KABOOM*
    • dxgg, on 07/06/2008, -2/+1Those who dugg me down must not have seen the Simpsons episode.
  • alphaterminus, on 07/05/2008, -1/+6Where adobe really jumped the shark is with the installation Adobe CS3 video applications like Premiere Pro. I paid $799 for the upgrade (the video suite) only for it to refuse to install. I got a new notebook which had Vista pre-installed and I needed to upgrade from Premiere Pro 1.5 and the related suite. Apparently, it refuses to install if there is ANY other Adobe product installed... even Reader. They walk you through this draconian registry scrubbing process which I spent four hours on, only to end up ***** up my OS on "level 4 scrub." I'm not making this up. Google it. It is a complete, *****, disaster. What I really feel bad about is how I loved Macromedia as a company and all their products, which are now Adobe monstrosities. BTW I never got the CS3 suite to install. I just took the hard drive out of my old laptop and swapped it with the new one, so I could have the benefits of the new hardware yet have software that works.
    • GreenAlien, on 07/05/2008, -1/+2I've also heard of Adobe putting their copy protection on the first sector of the harddisk where they shouldnt even be messing with. This can break legitimate apps such a full drive encryption, rendering a harddisk useless unless you have a restore/fix disk. The latest version of TrueCrypt bumped into this.

      Ironically it's legitmate customers who get screwed, as is always the case with copy protection. People who pirate it don't go through this inconvenience. For some reason these companies think they do whatever they freaken like on computers they don't even own.
      • freedomhater, on 07/05/2008, -0/+1I went out and bought the full CS3 suite and Ive had no issues at all. Infact it was one of the most pleasant experiences Ive had installing such a large gamut of applications. I like the fact that it allows you to install it a second time on a laptop or any other secondary computer. It even rewards you with a sweet download of your choosing for registering it. (I went for the free font download).

        We bought the design suite upgrade for the office too... no problems. Put the disk in and that's it. Maybe its the OS difference since we are using OS X on a mac?
      • GreenAlien, on 07/05/2008, -0/+2"Maybe its the OS difference since we are using OS X on a mac? "

        Possibly. The issues I described were with the Windows version. No idea how the Mac version handles this.
      • alphaterminus, on 07/05/2008, -0/+2It probably is an OS specific issue, but damn, Vista is a large base, don't you think. I'd think about getting OSX but one of the programs I use heavily is Ultra. Adobe basically bought Ultra out last year, ported it to CS3 without making any changes, other than supposedly making it Vista compatible, which I really couldn't tell you if that was successful or not! It was a wonderful little vector keying program when it was a standalone. Adobe didn't bother to port it to OSX and only makes it available as part of their "Premium Studio." It blows After Effects out of the water as far as keying goes, as After effects doesn't use the vector keying method, which is far superior.
    • tama00, on 07/05/2008, -0/+1If you pirate it, it becomes SOOO much easier!
    • Memnochxx, on 07/06/2008, -0/+1I had that problem, ran the adobecleaner, fixed the problems and installed just fine.
    • PabloMac, on 07/06/2008, -0/+1"I got a new notebook which had Vista pre-installed..."
    • BurgerPunch, on 07/06/2008, -1/+0Its Macromedia who are the ***** programmers not adobe

      compare Flash to Photoshop, one is a terrible hack job the other quite excellent
    • bipolarruledout, on 07/07/2008, -0/+0It's not that hard to make an MSI installer.
  • specialK16, on 07/05/2008, -1/+2Yeah, it sucks, it is awfully slow, automatic updates that just pop out of ***** nowhere with 8.0 sucks as well... but to be honest, Acrobat Professional is the most robust app around, even more than Foxit.
  • MFF37, on 07/05/2008, -3/+39dugg for "You broke my sarcasmeter." ..lol
  • AshishBaldha, on 07/05/2008, -12/+6I like Adobe reader 9
  • amenic, on 07/05/2008, -0/+3What's the leanest version you can get for XP that lets you print to PDF files?
    • peaceninja, on 07/05/2008, -0/+3print to pdf files? why not just use foxit to view pdf's and use cutepdf writer to print to pdf?
  • Fetching more discussions...
    Show 51 - 100 of 103 discussions
  •  

    Login or register to add a comment

    Create a new account or login to join in the conversation on Digg. You'll also be able to Digg stories to help promote things you like.


© Digg Inc. 2008 — Content posted by Digg users is dedicated to the public domain.
DIGG, DIGG IT, DUGG, DIGG THIS, Digg graphics, logos, designs, page headers, button icons, scripts, and other service names are the trademarks of Digg Inc.