Visio 2K SR1: Acrobat distiller printer selection ignored

[Paul Urbanus]

I have had Acrobat Distiller 5.0 and Visio 2000 installed and working
togther for years.

About a month ago, tried to create a pdf file from one of my Visio
drawings by printing to the 'Acrobat Distiller' printer. I go to the
printer dialog box, select the Acrobat printer, then hit the 'Print'
button in the dialog box. Printed output goes to my default (real)
printer instead of to Acrobat Distiller.

I have uninstalled/reinstalled my Acrobat 5.0, but to know avail.

Unfortunately, I don't know what I might have installed that mucked
things up, as the problem didn't show up until I needed a PDF of one of
my Visio drawings.

Suggestions?

TIA
urbite

[Paul Urbanus]

More info on this problem.

It appears that Visio always wants to print to my default Windows
printer, even if I select a different printer from the File-Print dialog
box. I set up my Acrobat Distiller to be the default, and it works fine.
With Acrobat as the default printer, when I try to print to a physical
printer from Visio File-Print, print output gets redirected to the
Acrobat Distiller.

I have looked in the registry and at some ini files to see if there is
any setting that ignores the printer from the print dialog box. I would
think this is an OS function to select the printer, not a Visio choice.

Go figure.

Oh, and HELP!

urbite

Post by Paul Urbanus
I have had Acrobat Distiller 5.0 and Visio 2000 installed and working
togther for years.
About a month ago, tried to create a pdf file from one of my Visio
drawings by printing to the 'Acrobat Distiller' printer. I go to the
printer dialog box, select the Acrobat printer, then hit the 'Print'
button in the dialog box. Printed output goes to my default (real)
printer instead of to Acrobat Distiller.
I have uninstalled/reinstalled my Acrobat 5.0, but to know avail.
Unfortunately, I don't know what I might have installed that mucked
things up, as the problem didn't show up until I needed a PDF of one of
my Visio drawings.
Suggestions?
TIA
urbite

[Paul Urbanus]

I found the problem, which is apparently related to my Visio SP2
installation, as detailed below

http://www.mcse.ms/archive191-2004-10-1150539.html

Unfortunately, SP2 is not uninstallable. So, if I want to print to a
printer other than the default - which the PDF writer won't be the
default - I have do the following.

1. Go to printer control panel and make the Acrobat Distiller the default.
2. Print from Visio 2000 SP2
3. Go back to printer control panel and restore my real physical printer
as the default.

A pain in the a**, but at least workable.

Post by Paul Urbanus
More info on this problem.
It appears that Visio always wants to print to my default Windows
printer, even if I select a different printer from the File-Print dialog
box. I set up my Acrobat Distiller to be the default, and it works fine.
With Acrobat as the default printer, when I try to print to a physical
printer from Visio File-Print, print output gets redirected to the
Acrobat Distiller.
I have looked in the registry and at some ini files to see if there is
any setting that ignores the printer from the print dialog box. I would
think this is an OS function to select the printer, not a Visio choice.
Go figure.
Oh, and HELP!
urbite

Post by Paul Urbanus
I have had Acrobat Distiller 5.0 and Visio 2000 installed and working
togther for years.
About a month ago, tried to create a pdf file from one of my Visio
drawings by printing to the 'Acrobat Distiller' printer. I go to the
printer dialog box, select the Acrobat printer, then hit the 'Print'
button in the dialog box. Printed output goes to my default (real)
printer instead of to Acrobat Distiller.
I have uninstalled/reinstalled my Acrobat 5.0, but to know avail.
Unfortunately, I don't know what I might have installed that mucked
things up, as the problem didn't show up until I needed a PDF of one
of my Visio drawings.
Suggestions?
TIA
urbite

[Barb Way]

The method that you found is documented in KB article 902323
(http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=KB;EN-US;902323) as well.

You are correct that there is no removal process for just the SP2 update.
In order to revert to a previous version of Visio 2000, you would have to
remove the product and re-install to the SR1 level. There are some
valuable fixes in SP2, so I would not suggest doing so, but that would be
your option if the setting of the default printer is not a reasonable work
around for your work flow.