What's a good and cheap way to print to PDFs in Windows XP?

September 21, 2005 12:24 PM

What's a good and cheap way to print to PDFs in Windows XP?

I'm sure Adobe has an expensive option available, but I'm working on a limited budget and would like to do this on the cheap. I've googled up a few different apps, but I don't really know one from another. OS X with it's "Print to PDF" everywhere has severely spoiled me, and I'd like something similar.

posted by Mercaptan to Computers & Internet (16 answers total)

Best answer: PrimoPDF
posted by letterneversent at 12:26 PM on September 21, 2005

Best answer: CutePDF
posted by trey at 12:26 PM on September 21, 2005

CutePDF.
posted by SteveInMaine at 12:27 PM on September 21, 2005

Jinx.
posted by SteveInMaine at 12:28 PM on September 21, 2005

Best answer: PDFCreator. (What's with these people and not using spaces?)
posted by Goblindegook at 12:33 PM on September 21, 2005

(What's with these people and not using spaces?)

Makes it easier to find them on Google.
posted by russilwvong at 12:41 PM on September 21, 2005

PDF995. There is a free version, but it's nagware IIRC, so paying $10 (i think) for a license is probably worth it.
posted by misterbrandt at 1:54 PM on September 21, 2005

Ghostscript and Ghostview. the only one you'll ever need. Postscript to pdf, pdf to postscript, PDF to JPEG, TIFF ,etc. All free.
posted by cosmicbandito at 1:56 PM on September 21, 2005

A second for PDFCreator.
posted by unixrat at 2:12 PM on September 21, 2005

Can't you just "Print to PDF" assuming you've installed a basic version of Reader with the print driver? I've never had a problem with it, although it's not nearly as flexible/powerful as distilling postscript. Great for little documents or instruction sheets though.
posted by prostyle at 2:19 PM on September 21, 2005

prostyle, Reader has no "print to PDF" functionality that I know of.
posted by zsazsa at 2:45 PM on September 21, 2005

PDFCreator.. buggy.. buggy.. buggy..

PDF995.. works great.. but the nagware is a drag..

PS -> Ghostscript/Ghostview.. works great.. the multistep print process is a hassel..

If work most of the time in OpenOffice.. it has a great PDF export function.
posted by cowmix at 2:56 PM on September 21, 2005

I use OpenOffice unless whatever I'm printing has lots and lots of graphics. When that isn't happy, I use PDFCreator. As a last resort, I'll use the Adobe software, which doesn't work most of the time, anyway.

Funny how the free stuff works, and the expensive propriatary stuff doesn't...
posted by QIbHom at 3:06 PM on September 21, 2005

Leo Laporte actually answered this question on his radio program a few weeks ago, and listed a good number of them in the show notes.
posted by scottfi at 3:56 PM on September 21, 2005

Another vote for CutePDF.
posted by krisjohn at 7:06 PM on September 21, 2005

For those suggesting Ghostview, you should know that CutePDF just repackages Ghostview in a super-convenient print driver.
posted by exhilaration at 12:44 PM on September 22, 2005