Do not be misled by the program’s name – PDF24 Creator does much more than “creating PDF files”. Actually, the Windows version has been renamed PDF24 Toolbox, which says more accurately what it really is. This Swiss-army knife kind of tool offers 34 PDF-related utilities to all users at no cost. The program can be enjoyed either online or as a Windows standalone program, and it will let you perform tasks that are usually available only on costly PDF editors.
This excellent and versatile PDF macro tool offers a wide variety of utilities in one single software application. While most PDF editors ask for a usually fairly expensive fee, PDF24 Creator is available for free and in two versions – online and Windows-based. Both variants offer you the same functionality, which has been split into 34 buttons that will take you to 34 highly useful utilities. Surely, the program lacks some of the functionality that – for certain users and companies – makes professional PDF editors worth the fee, but for the average user, PDF24 Creator can easily become that perfect inexpensive solution they will ever need.
Each of the 34 buttons that appear on the main interface lead to a clear interface. They’re all different and alike at the same time, so that regardless of which tool we pick up we’ll always know how to go about its functionality without any help. Clearly, the standalone version mirrors its online counterpart when it comes to interface design, which has its pros and cons. Some of the dialog boxes look too big for a Windows program, and sometimes we’re forced to scroll down a bit to find a certain button. Also, if you happen to close the tool, you’re using instead of using the “Home” button at the top of the window, you’ll be closing the entire application inadvertently. Still, you just have to try two or three of its tools for a couple of times, and you’ll find out how easy it is to get used to it.
Without being exhaustive, I will mention but a few of the 34 utilities included in the program to show its amazing capabilities. PDF24 Creator or Toolbox comes with OCR capabilities, which means that you can scan a document as a PDF file or take an already existing scanned PDF and “extract” the text that appears there just as part of an image. You can also convert PDFs into various formats, including EPUB (right from this version) and different image file formats, and extract as independent files whatever images are in the PDF. Going quickly though some of its minor (yet always useful) utilities, you can merge, compress, edit (with restrictions), protect, unlock, split, rotate, sort, and compare PDF files, among others.
I invite you to discover and try the entire list of tools and utilities by yourself. You’ll surely be pleasantly surprised.
v5.0 [Nov 16, 2012]
Version 5.0.0
(16.11.2012)
BugFix: Fixed an Word 2010 related conversion issue
Feature: Language file for Portugal added
Improvement: Language file updates
BugFix: Fixed scanner (TWAIN) issues
Feature: Load last profile in Save As dialog automatically
Improvement: Overriding files improved
Improvement: Improved image quality in Image To PDF feature
Improvement: Improved image quality in saving to PDF process
Improvement: Optimized quality of internal preview
Feature: Integrated new option when saving to PDF
Improvement: Buttons rearranged in PDF24 Assistant
Improvement: Optimized the background in the GUI of the PDF24 Assistant
Removed the default quality part from the settings. Is no longer necessary.
Improvement: Save As dialog optimized to ease the usage.
Improvement: Save as PDF process optimized to control the quality with the parameters a little better.
Improvement: Mail As PDF
Improvement: Element Customize... added to the profile selection in PDF24 Assistant
Improvement: Load multiple files with the PDF24 Editor on command line
BugFix: PDF file filter issue fixed
Improvement: Hidden and system files are never displayed in the file list of the PDF24 Editor.
BugFix: Missing file extension when saving a file in PDF24 Assistant
Update mode is not automatic by default
Improvement: Added new Ghostscript version to the setup
Improvement: Optimized internal processing parameters
Improvement: Improved message boxes in PDF24 Assistant
Improvement: Image to PDF tool determines image DPI which is then used in the PDF file
Improvement: PDF/X and PDF/A settings pages in Save As dialog combined with the PDF page
Feature: PDF/A-1 and PDF/A-2 Standard added
Improvement: A lot of minor improvements in the Save As dialog formular
BugFix: Fixed an issue when using some special characters in PDF informations
BugFix: Fixed a potential time computation problem in update process
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