Save as PDF generates SPLWOW64.EXE error

[TdeV1]

Just moved to new Windows 7 box

Using Frame v 8.0p236

Have book, used Save as PDF option, click "Set".

Get a popup box with big red "X" says: c:\windows\SPLWOW64.EXE

Ideas?

TIA,

Theresa

[Bob_Niland]

Just moved to new Windows 7 box

What Windows 7?

Hopefully Professional, Enterprise or Ultimate.

Running in 32- or 64-bit mode?

If 64, do you have XP[32] Mode handy?

Using Frame v 8.0p236

FM8 isn't supported on Windows 7.

You may be able to get it to work.

See: My FrameMaker 8 Keeps Crashing in Windows 7

http://forums.adobe.com/message/3940299#3940299

[Michael_Müller-Hillebrand]

Theresa,

searching Google for SPLWOW64.EXE "Windows 7" you’ll find several posts on Microsoft forums and elsewhere. It makes me believe there is an issue with your printer driver. FrameMaker is a 32 bit application and under certain circumstances Windows 64 bit can not handle certain things, it seems.

On a different note (and most probably unrelated to this problem): Your FrameMaker 8 installation is not patched to version 8.0p277, please do that.

http://www.adobe.com/support/downloads/product.jsp?product=22&platform=Windows

- Michael

[TdeV1]

Michael,

Do you mean Framemaker 8 with Windows XP SP3?

[Bob_Niland]

It also appears that splwow64.exe is target for malware.

Infection or replacement by a trojan splwow64.exe needs to be ruled out before taking other steps.

If the problem can't be resolved in native Win7-64, an alternative is to re-install Frame in a virtual Windows XP (32-bit) running under Win7 ("XP mode"), which is freely available from MS if (big if) you paid enough for your Win7.

[TdeV1]

My system is Win 7 Professional 64 bit. I think I have 32 mode, but I don't know anything about it. Can I set up 32 bit for one application only? Can you tell me where I go and find out about it?

[Bob_Niland]

My system is Win 7 Professional 64 bit.

You qualify

I think I have 32 mode, but I don't know anything about it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XP_Mode#Windows_XP_Mode

Can I set up 32 bit for one application only?

Yes

Can you tell me where I go and find out about it?

http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?displaylang=en&id=8002

Before doing that, another work-around to try would be print to PostScript and separately Distill (if you have the full Acrobat product).

[TdeV1]

How does this work?

I now have Win XP mode (maybe w/ Virtual PC)

Do I have to reinstall Frame to this "pc"?

Do I uninstall it from the regular Windows 7 box?

Do I have to open xp mode in order to be able to run Frame?

[Mike Wickham]

Have you tried printing to the Adobe PDF printer instead of using Save

as PDF? Save as PDF is known to be problematic for many. Printing to PDF

is much more dependable.

[TdeV1]

I've used Save as PDF flawlessly for a year or two. Printing to the Adobe PDF doesn't work at all; I thought it had something to do with some choice of Adobe's. But you say not; I wonder how to troubleshoot its working better. I can use the PDF Printer in other applications.

Ideas?

[Arnis_Gubins]

BestScenes wrote:

I've used Save as PDF flawlessly for a year or two. Printing to the Adobe PDF doesn't work at all;

However, that's exactly what SaveAsPDF does (albeit behind the scenes)! It sounds like there's a configuration issue with your PDF port or perhaps the permissions for the location that has been specified for output. Win 7 is a real PITA when it comes to providing simple access to locations. Also being on FM8, as others have mentioned, is probably exacerbating the situation.

When you print to the AdobePDF from other applications, do you get asked where to place the PDF file or does it just always go the same location regardless of the application? Have you gone through your AdobePDF printer properties and configured it since it was installed?

[TdeV1]

Arnis,

Printing to PDF works from other applications (inclu MS Word!). After unselecting "Do not send Fonts to 'Adobe PDF' ", I can now Print to PDF *and* Save as PDF.

However, when I Print to PDF or Save as PDF, I end up with a file in the Adobe PDF Printer Documents print queue folder. This is also true if I print to PDF from MS Word. Closing the PDF file does not remove the file from the queue/folder. Cancelling the documents removes all but one.

So I think something else is wrong.

Thanks for your help,

Theresa

[Arnis_Gubins]

Theresa,

You have to configure things so that default settings aren't being used. In the AdobePDF printer Printing Defaults, set the Adobe PDF Output Folder to prompt you for the destination:

Note: you also have to make the same settings for the printing preferences.

[Mike Wickham]

Stuck files in the queue sounds like a problem I had with Acrobat X. The

10.0.1 patch broke the Adobe PDF printer, so that it tried to use the

COM1: port, instead of the Documents or Desktop port. (You can check for

this by right-clicking the Adobe PDF printer, choosing "Printer

Properties," then selecting the "Ports" tab.) In fact, it deleted those

ports! (Here's a link to that problem:

http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/893/cpsid_89330.html). The result was PDFs that

would not print, and would be left stuck in the printer queue. The fix

was to delete the Adobe PDF printer, then run the Acrobat repair option

to regenerate it. You might want to do this. Following are the

directions for Windows 7. Windows XP instruction are included at the

link above.

*Windows Vista (UAC on, nonadmin user), Windows 7 (UAC on,

admin user)*

1. Close all PDF files.

2. Go to Printers and Faxes (Windows XP), Printers (Vista) or Devices

and Printers (Windows 7).

3. Right-click the Adobe PDF printer and click Delete (Windows XP,

Vista) or Remove Device (Windows 7).

4. Enter the admin credentials. This step deletes the Adobe PDF printer.

5. Go to Programs and Features (Vista and Windows 7).

6. Select Adobe Acrobat X Pro or Standard and click Change.

7. Select Repair and follow instructions to complete repair.**

By the way, I don't think this was mentioned earlier, but another cause

of problems with PDF generation is having more than one installation

and/or version of Acrobat, Adobe Reader, or the PDF creation add-on that

comes with FrameMaker installed simultaneously. If you have Acrobat, you

should NOT have Adobe Reader or the PDF creation add-on installed on the

same computer, and you should have only one version of Acrobat installed.

[TdeV1]

Mike's answer sounded promising, so I tried it today (Saturday) but it had no affect. I deleted the Adobe PDF printer, repaired Acrobat X Reader from Control Panel. Then was without an Adobe PDF printer, so went to Acrobat 8, Help Menu, Repair Acrobat 8 installation.

I have reinstalled the Adobe PDF printer and changed preferences to uncheck "Do not send Fonts to 'Adobe PDF'". (This is Acrobat 8 Professional remember).

Curiously, for some time yesterday Save as PDF was working. Later I went back to getting the SPLWOW64.EXE error.

Arnis, the Adobe PDF Folder options are only blank or "LPT1:" - not as you state above. Could this be the problem?

Thanks,

Theresa

[Arnis_Gubins]

Theresa,

It sounds like the port info is getting clobbered on your installation. The Adobe PDF printer instance should be set to the "Adobe PDF" port, e.g.

You should have a Port labelled "Adobe PDF". If you don't then you'll have to click on the "Add Port..." button and then manual create a port called "Adobe PDF Port Monitor". You then specify a destination folder folder for this port, which is where Distiller where drop off files by default. You can overeride this by specifying the "Prompt for PDF filename" as shown in the Printing Deefaults panel of the previous message.

[TdeV1]

Arnis Gubins wrote:

You should have a Port labelled "Adobe PDF". If you don't then you'll have to click on the "Add Port..." button and then manual create a port called "Adobe PDF Port Monitor".

In order to add the printer, I need a Port Type. Where do I find the INF file to create the Port Type?

Thanks.

[TdeV1]

Arnis, let me amend that request.

I need to recreate the Adobe PDF printer in Win 7/64.

My available printer port types are: local port and Standard TCP/IP port

If I try to add a port type, I am asked "Please provide a printer INF that containes the port monitor installation information" and then there is a browse box for me to provide a location for the INF file. The Frame and CS3 CDs don't have this file. Searching for *.INF produces 3,111 files. Searching *.inf inside c:\Windows produces 2,967 files.

So, some help would be useful!

Thanks.

[Arnis_Gubins]

Theresa,

Sorry, I missed the part about Acrobat 8 earlier.

Acrobat 8 doesn't have that info for Win7 (that's why it's unsupported for Win7). With supported versions of Acrobat, you need to specify the AdobePDF.inf file, typically found in the Acrobat\Xtras\AdobePDF folder. You will probably need to print to file and then manually use Distiller to create PDFs in your configuration.

[TdeV1]

Thanks for the direction. However, I now get an error "An error occurred installing port monitor 'Adobe PDF Port'. Please contact the manufacturer for assistance.

Ideas?

[Mike Wickham]

Have you tried uninstalling Acrobat, uninstalling Reader, then

reinstalling Acrobat ONLY, and then following the repair steps listed

above (if necessary)?

[Arnis_Gubins]

As Mike says, you can't have two different versions of Acrobat and Reader installed. You have to uninstall both and then re-install Acrobat 8. However, for a Win7 64-bit environment, I would only recommend Acrobat X Pro for things to behave properly.

[TdeV1]

Well, this is curious. On my old box, I had Acrobat 8 Professional and Reader 9 running for quite a long time. Admittedly, I mostly used 8. Recently I upgraded that Box to 10. With no problems.

My associate has 8 Professional and 10 Reader running successfully also, but he uses 10 to read most frequently and does not use 8 quite as much as I. He is on Win 7/64.

So we have empirical evidence that they are able to work together.

However, I do know that my current setup is not working! I'll have to go through Adobe to uninstall/reinstall Acrobat 8, so it may take me a few days to get back to this problem. Thank you very much for all your suggestions so far.

[Mike Wickham]

Sometimes it works, but Adobe reps have warned us not to do it. Acrobat

and Reader installations, especially different versions, step all over

each other when they install, and cause problems that you may not see

until you eventually try to use a feature or program setting that you

normally don't use, or until you run an updater. Add in operating

systems changes and you further increase the chance of failure. And I've

noticed that recent Acrobat updates actually reset some of my

preferences back to defaults without asking.

The installers are actually supposed to uninstall old versions before

installing the new, but don't always do so. I especially imagine that

they don't do it when, for example, you reinstall Acrobat 8 on a machine

that has Reader X, since version X didn't exist when the installer was

created.

Anyway, there are many that say they have multiple versions functioning

fine for them on the same machine. There are also many that we have

helped here, simply by having them follow Adobe's recommendation to have

Acrobat only or Reader only.

[Mike Wickham]

I forgot to mention that I agree with Arnis that the upgrade to Acrobat

X would be wise for Windows 7/64.