Make Adobe Reader and Adobe Acrobat use "Print as Image" setting by default

For certain printers, certain PDF documents, and certain print setups, using the “Print as Image” setting in Adobe Acrobat and Adobe Reader is the only way to reliably get a print job to succeed. To get to this setting, you would go File -> 1. Print -> 2. Advanced (button) -> 3. Print as Image (checkbox) -> 4. Ok -> 5. Ok (PDF prints).

Steps to print PDF as Image

This is a rather buried location for a setting that can bring down a printer or printing system (PDFs and PS driver do not always play nicely together and sometimes poorly-formed PDFs can bring down an HP Laserjet printer with a service engine error: “49.00FF Service Error”). Fortunately, the “Print as Image” setting is a work-around for these problems. But where do you set it as default and how do you set it for multiple users on a machine and multiple machines on a network?

To make things more complicated, the key is set per-computer, per-user, per-application, per-printer: The location for Adobe Acrobat 7, Adobe Acrobat 8, Adobe Reader 8, Adobe Acrobat 9, and Adobe Reader 9 are all different and use slightly different methods to apply this setting. Registry keys under the HKEY Current User allow you to apply this setting. You’ll need a key in the registry for each printer that you want this setting to be the default.

The method I am using to set “Print as Image” as default is to use the REG Add command in the logon script pointed to with our Group Policy. This should work if you are employing a group policy in your environment. Otherwise, you can put a script (text file ending in .bat or .cmd) in the All Users Startup folder on the Start Menu to get this script to run for everybody, every time they log in to that machine. Either way, modify and then add the lines below for your version and application to your script to make this setting default. You can also hand add these keys through the regedit interface, but a script would be more efficient for multiple computers/users. Of course the generic warning of always being careful and only working with a backup is in place for any time you work with the registry and regedit, including this time.

Adobe Acrobat 7 (registry values)

Location: HKey Current User\Software\Adobe\Adobe Acrobat\7.0\General\cPrintAsImage
Value: s# (# = start at zero and count up for each printer, ex: s0, s1…)
Type: Reg_Binary
Data (in value): Hexadecimal value of the name of the printer

Adobe Acrobat 7 (script lines)

@REM Set Adobe Acrobat 7 to Print as Image by default for a printer called PDFCreator
REG ADD “HKCU\Software\Adobe\Adobe Acrobat\7.0\General\cPrintAsImage” /v s0 /t REG_BINARY /d 50 44 46 43 72 65 61 74 6f 72 00 /f

Adobe Acrobat 7 setting in regedit

Special comments regarding Adobe Reader/Acrobat 8: Version 8 of the software stores the value of the printer in a binary key as a long line of hexadecimal values. You can translate the ASCII name of your printer to hex or you can set the setting once, read it from the registry and copy it to your script (recommended). For example, in the code below this: ’4c69627261727920422657202831302063656e74732070657220706167652900′ translates into ‘Library B&W (10 cents per page)’. Fortunately an improvement was made with version 9 and it is now a string value.

Adobe Reader 8 (registry values)

Location: HKey Current User\Software\Adobe\Acrobat Reader\8.0\General\cPrintAsImage
Value: s# (# = start at zero and count up for each printer, ex: s0, s1…)
Type: Reg_Binary
Data (in value): Hexadecimal value of the name of the printer

Adobe Reader 8 (script lines)

@REM Set Adobe Reader 8 to Print as Image by default for LibPrint B&W/Color printers
@REM Library B&W
REG ADD “HKCU\Software\Adobe\Acrobat Reader\8.0\General\cPrintAsImage” /v s0 /t REG_BINARY /d 4c69627261727920422657202831302063656e74732070657220706167652900 /f
@REM Library Color
REG ADD “HKCU\Software\Adobe\Acrobat Reader\8.0\General\cPrintAsImage” /v s1 /t REG_BINARY /d 4c69627261727920434f4c4f522028746f6e65722d62617365642070726963696e672900 /f

Adobe Acrobat 8 (registry values)

Location: HKey Current User\Software\Adobe\Adobe Acrobat\8.0\General\cPrintAsImage
Value: s# (# = start at zero and count up for each printer, ex: s0, s1…)
Type: Reg_Binary
Data (in value): Hexadecimal value of the name of the printer

Adobe Acrobat 8 (script lines)

@REM Set Adobe Acrobat 8 to Print as Image by default for LibPrint B&W/Color printers
@REM Library B&W
REG ADD “HKCU\Software\Adobe\Adobe Acrobat\8.0\General\cPrintAsImage” /v s0 /t REG_BINARY /d 4c69627261727920422657202831302063656e74732070657220706167652900 /f
@REM Library Color
REG ADD “HKCU\Software\Adobe\Adobe Acrobat\8.0\General\cPrintAsImage” /v s1 /t REG_BINARY /d 4c69627261727920434f4c4f522028746f6e65722d62617365642070726963696e672900 /f

Adobe Reader 9 (registry values)

Location: HKey Current User\Software\Adobe\Acrobat Reader\9.0\General\cPrintAsImage
Value: t# (# = start at zero and count up for each printer, ex: t0, t1…)
Type: Reg_SZ (String)
Data (in value): String value of the name of the printer (ex. “Library B&W (10 cents per page)”)

Adobe Reader 9 (script lines)

@REM Set Adobe Reader 9 to Print as Image by default for LibPrint B&W/Color printers
REG ADD “HKCU\Software\Adobe\Acrobat Reader\9.0\General\cPrintAsImage” /v t0 /t REG_SZ /d “Library B&W (10 cents per page)” /f
REG ADD “HKCU\Software\Adobe\Acrobat Reader\9.0\General\cPrintAsImage” /v t1 /t REG_SZ /d “Library COLOR (toner-based pricing)” /f

Adobe Acrobat 9 (registry values)

Location: HKey Current User\Software\Adobe\Adobe Acrobat\9.0\General\cPrintAsImage
Value: t# (# = start at zero and count up for each printer, ex: t0, t1…)
Type: Reg_SZ
Data (in value): String value of the name of the printer (ex. “Library B&W (10 cents per page)”)

Adobe Acrobat 9 (script lines)

@REM Set Adobe Acrobat 9 to Print as Image by default for LibPrint B&W/Color printers
REG ADD “HKCU\Software\Adobe\Adobe Acrobat\9.0\General\cPrintAsImage” /v t0 /t REG_SZ /d “Library B&W (10 cents per page)” /f
REG ADD “HKCU\Software\Adobe\Adobe Acrobat\9.0\General\cPrintAsImage” /v t1 /t REG_SZ /d “Library COLOR (toner-based pricing)” /f

Screenshot of Registry key for Adobe Acrobat 8 to 'Print as Image' by default

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