PDF-XChange Pro 7.0

Actually three tools in one, PDF-XChange Pro includes a fully-customizable PDF virtual printing (PDF-XChange Standard), a state-of-the-art PDF editor (PDF-XChange Editor Plus), and a versatile set of PDF-related utilities called PDF-Tools.

Given the wide scope covered by PDF-XChange Pro, you’ll find it hard to spot an action that you cannot perform on your PDF files using this tool.

Though it may give you the impression that this is a one-interface set of tools, this bundle will actually install the three completely independent software programs listed above, complete with their unique desktop icons and individual entries on your system’s program list. One direct consequence of this marketing strategy is the overlap of a number of features and utilities that appear in more than one program. Not that it detracts from the high level of quality of each of these software tools separately – it simply makes the whole thing a bit more confusing.

PDF-XChange Standard is a virtual printer. It’s the tool that you’ll need to create PDF files out of any document that can be sent to a standard printer. This includes all Office filetypes and AutoCAD, to name but a few. This PDF creation tool allows for a wide variety of options and settings, not only in terms of page size or resolution, but also about the level of compression, the quality of the graphics, the fonts, the watermarks, the bookmarks, the headers and footers, and the level of security of the resulting PDF file, among other possibilities.

PDF-XChange Editor Plus is a full-fledged editor that will let you modify any existing PDF (or any new PDF created using its sibling program) as easily as if you were editing a Word file in Office. You can modify the existing text; move, delete, or add images; add annotations and sticky notes; protect PDF files, and OCR scanned documents, among many other features. Besides, it can also create new documents from images, Office files, scanned pages, etc.

Finally, PDF-Tools is a convenient toolbox that will help you to perform specific tasks straight away by selecting the corresponding feature from the menu. These tasks refer mainly to PDF document creation (from images, text, scanned pages, OCR...), PDF file conversion (to Office formats, images, plain text, etc.), page edition (crop, OCR, Bates numbering, headers and footers...), PDF document enhancing (overall optimization, comments, weblinks, conversion to PDF/X...), PDF document security, and a couple of extra features.

The possibilities are endless, and the amount of functions and features to create, edit, and enhance your PDFs are overwhelming at times. Its dispersion among three different programs doesn’t help much either, and the bundle’s high level of overlapping helps even less. Had it been designed as a unique high-end PDF utility instead of a package with three different and yet very similar tools, PDF-XChange Pro would surely become a serious alternative to Adobe Acrobat Pro.