Evince vs Adobe Reader

[pt_lam]

I used to use Evince to read PDFs. But now on Hardy, Evince seems to have some problems, it slows down my computer every time I open it. I checked the system monitor and found that it ate 130MB of memory for just opening a few MB file.

So I just tried Adobe Reader, first time in Ubuntu. So much better, at least it loads and opens up files more quickly.

So anyone who got troubles with Evince on Hardy may give Adobe Reader a try.

[philliptweedie]

I use XPDF now and I absolutely love it. I found evince locked up quickly when viewing larger pdfs.

[SunnyRabbiera]

I have no issues with envince personally, but I still use adobe reader for its browser plugin for fast access.

[scouser73]

I have always used Adobe PDF Reader, and I consider it the best.

[urukrama]

I generally use epdfview (http://packages.ubuntu.com/search?suite=default&section=all&arch=any&searchon=names&keywords=epdfview). It is fast and looks better than xpdf

[FuturePilot]

Evince is nice, but you can't do much more with it than view stuff. Adobe Reader has a ton of other options, and I like it for the browser plugin.

[maniacmusician]

Evince is the bane of my life. I lost a few pages of a huge final paper because I had 3 instances of evince open on large PDF files containing the primary literature I was using, and each instance of evince decided to take up more memory on its own than the 1 instance of X -- [breath] -- and somehow managed to freeze up my computer, forcing me to a hard reset, and then cry over my paper.

Now I use KPDF/Okular. All the time. Because it doesn't jump or freeze up my computer. Or consume 200+mb of memory.

[SunnyRabbiera]

Yeh Okular is actually pretty good, so far the best thing available fore KDE4 as the rest of it sucks... for the time being.

[Catalyst2Death]

I tend to use acroread when I have the chance, but my laptop doesn't have it installed, so then I use evince... For heavy document editing I use acroread, just because it is generally nicer (and it only opens .pdf so it "knows" which file I want to open). Evince will open multiple filetypes, so if I have a *.ps, *.dvi and a *.pdf file with the same name, I have to type the name.pd to get it give me the one I want...

[sub2007]

Neither! I dislike Adobe Reader and I dislike Evince, I had a bad experience with it on Gutsy that every time I tried to open a PDF with evince it brought my computer to a standstill!

I use kpdf for general PDF viewing, it's full featured and every bit as nice looking as Adobe Reader. Has a problem with landscape printing though (for me anyway) so I keep around xpdf around for that.

[spupy]

Evince. I have to say it is pretty fast on my computer. I even use it as a pdf plugin for Firefox (with mozplugger). The thing that I don't like is that it displays some heavy pdfs a little slow.

Installing epdfview atm.

[Barrucadu]

I'm using ePDFView. It does everything I need it to, and is fairly lightweight.

[maniacmusician]

Yeh Okular is actually pretty good, so far the best thing available fore KDE4 as the rest of it sucks... for the time being.
Well I'm kind of diggin' the new kwrite, and the new krunner, and the amarok, and the krita, and...basically, what I'm trying to say is stop flamebaiting. It's not attractive. It's not polite. We get it. You weren't satisfied with 4.0. Leave the topic be, and let's not create opportunities for unnecessary arguments.

[cardinals_fan]

ePDFview.

[macogw]

Evince. After seeing how craptastic Adobe is on Windows and how their Linux version of Flash is even more craptastic than the Windows version, I can only expect Adobe Reader for Linux to be the epitomy of craptastic browser-crashing power.

[maniacmusician]

Evince. After seeing how craptastic Adobe is on Windows and how their Linux version of Flash is even more craptastic than the Windows version, I can only expect Adobe Reader for Linux to be the epitomy of craptastic browser-crashing power.
I've always found Adobe reader to look out of place and ugly in linux. But stability wise, it was actually surprisingly reliable when I was using it.

[AbtZ]

What, there's an Adobe Reader for Linux? How is it compared to the bloated piece of **** you get on Windows?

Seriously people, my experience with Adobe Reader have been nothing but bad. The first thing I do when I help people reinstall Windows is make sure they get Foxit reader instead of Adobe.

One of the good things with Ubuntu that initially drew me in was that it had a built-in pdf-viewer, and that it didn't suck ***. I never noticed Evince was a resource hog, and it seems to do its job well (for me at least). However, I'm gonna have a go with epdfviewer and see if I like it.

[FuturePilot]

Evince. After seeing how craptastic Adobe is on Windows and how their Linux version of Flash is even more craptastic than the Windows version, I can only expect Adobe Reader for Linux to be the epitomy of craptastic browser-crashing power.

Actually it's not. Surprisingly, Adobe Reader on Linux is pretty good, unlike Flash.

[Stenico]

I have yet to see any alternative pdf viewer to Adobe's that can render and print all pdfs correctly.

Thats why I use Adobe Acrobat. It always renders and prints correctly and is a lot more reliable too. If your work involves viewing/printing lots of complex pdfs, Acrobat is the only choice. I was stunned when Canonical decided not to keep it in the repositories.

People who claim Acrobat is bloated cr*pware clearly haven't used the current versions which are very fast and slick. In fact while there were a couple of bloated releases for Windows, Acrobat has always been impressive on Linux in my experience.

[jsmidt]

basically, what I'm trying to say is stop flamebaiting. It's not attractive. It's not polite. We get it.. let's not create opportunities for unnecessary arguments.

What is more unethical? Bashing software or presupposing someone's intentions and bashing them over the head with it (Which also causes fights)?

My advice to you is: use your "foruming" to be helpful. He didn't say he wanted a flame war. Why slam him? All you are doing is "creat[ing] opportunities for unnecessary arguments".

As am I, so lets all now stop and post helpful things.

[master5o1]

AdobeReader -- only because I needed something *more accurate* on those editable (almost wrote edible) pdfs you get from uni...:)/:( At least it isn't shown on my vrms XD

[kerry_s]

i went retro "gv" for me. :)

[pt123]

Evince - fast and a neat interface.

[garba]

evince is crap, period, i couldn't even browse some old pdf's because of it eating up all my ram and crashing miserably... nothing is better than kpdf imho

[garba]

Evince. After seeing how craptastic Adobe is on Windows and how their Linux version of Flash is even more craptastic than the Windows version, I can only expect Adobe Reader for Linux to be the epitomy of craptastic browser-crashing power.

:lolflag:

[pt_lam]

I have yet to see any alternative pdf viewer to Adobe's that can render and print all pdfs correctly.

Thats why I use Adobe Acrobat. It always renders and prints correctly and is a lot more reliable too. If your work involves viewing/printing lots of complex pdfs, Acrobat is the only choice. I was stunned when Canonical decided not to keep it in the repositories.

People who claim Acrobat is bloated cr*pware clearly haven't used the current versions which are very fast and slick. In fact while there were a couple of bloated releases for Windows, Acrobat has always been impressive on Linux in my experience.

Agree. Adobe Reader used to make me sick when I was on Windows, but its latest version is just nice and flash on my Ubuntu.

[geoken]

Evince. After seeing how craptastic Adobe is on Windows and how their Linux version of Flash is even more craptastic than the Windows version, I can only expect Adobe Reader for Linux to be the epitomy of craptastic browser-crashing power.

It's free and can be installed/un-installed in about 1 minute. Surely that isn't too long to formulate an educated opinion? In the time it took you to post you could have installed the app and realized your assumption was completely incorect.

[geoken]

What, there's an Adobe Reader for Linux? How is it compared to the bloated piece of **** you get on Windows?

Seriously people, my experience with Adobe Reader have been nothing but bad. The first thing I do when I help people reinstall Windows is make sure they get Foxit reader instead of Adobe.



That was true for versions of Adobe reader prior to 8. I too opted for Foxit over Adobe Reader v7, v6, etc. But with version 8 Adobe has made great stides to alleviate whatever issues people were having with the app. I can safely say Adobe 8 is faster than Foxit on all windows boxes I've tried it on. I actually uninstalled foxit and replaced it with Reader 8 on my wifes old XP laptop.

[Foster Grant]

I have yet to see any alternative pdf viewer to Adobe's that can render and print all pdfs correctly.

Thats why I use Adobe Acrobat. It always renders and prints correctly and is a lot more reliable too. If your work involves viewing/printing lots of complex pdfs, Acrobat is the only choice. I was stunned when Canonical decided not to keep it in the repositories.

People who claim Acrobat is bloated cr*pware clearly haven't used the current versions which are very fast and slick. In fact while there were a couple of bloated releases for Windows, Acrobat has always been impressive on Linux in my experience.

I have Reader installed for one simple reason — Evince doesn't print right. Common bug that brings lots of info but no resolution with a Google search. :mad:

[Mr. Picklesworth]

Those who say Adobe Acrobat Reader is slick (on Windows):
Open msconfig and search for Adobe in your startup processes.

...That should do.
As you can see, they add two unnecessary pieces of bloat there: "Speed launcher" (even on Vista, which already does smart preloading) and Adobe Updater. Speed launcher essentially loads Acrobat reader into memory, regardless of whether you are going to use it or not (let alone care about load times). It is useless bloat.

[Depressed Man]

Yeah I disable both of those in Windows. But anyway, one thing that bugs me about Evince is that it can't read the notes or highlights I make in Acrobat in Windows. Especially the highlights, they just are a straight yellow box so I have to highlight them with my mouse in Linux just to see what it says.

[AndyCooll]

Evince does the job for me. My pdf needs are basic so I've never felt the need to use anything else.

:cool:

[geoken]

Those who say Adobe Acrobat Reader is slick (on Windows):
Open msconfig and search for Adobe in your startup processes.

...That should do.


I'm looking at Sysinternals process explorer right now and I'm seeing foxit running as a child process of svchost.exe even though I haven't run that app since I booted my computer this morning. It would appear that all Adobe has done is used the same tactics Foxit used to initially make everyone think Adobe reader is bloated.

[alexandermimix]

I used to hate adobe v7 however after reading this thread I gave v8 a try and after opening up some of my uni PDFs with adobe v8 (I read hundreds of them a semester).

sudo apt-get remove evince

The program loads very quickly and it deals with my often image laden PDF files better then evince, ePDFView or any of the other PDF viewers I have tried in the past.

Before you bag it, try it? Adobe v8 is very good.

[bash]

Adobe Reader 8. Why? Because it has a browser plugin. Yes I tried evince with mozplugger, but half the time it wouldn't load or not load at all.

A 64-bit version of Adobe Reader and its plugins would be really nice though. But that is probably going to come along with a Flash player 64-bit version sometime around PCs have become obsolete.

[CarpKing]

I use Evince these days, though I do wish it had a proper browser plugin. I've used Adobe Reader in the past, but it was always slow and used a lot of CPU. I've had Evince crash on me a few times when I had a lot of PDFs open, but I think that was on Gutsy.

[fogcat]

I've used Acroreader in the past. Used Kpdf while using KDE but Im a Gnome user nowadays. Hardy uses Evince...in a 64bit environment lets just say I am underwhelmed. HUGE memory load, does not print anything for me, messed up OpenOffice while using pdf...destroyed the document!

I have just installed Acroreader, do not know the outcome of this story yet BUT...if it does the job as it always has before...you know the ending!~ :)

Anyway; just a line drop on evince in 64bit...not very good :(

fogcat

[mustang]

Adobe's offering is much more superior. Evince consumes a lot of memory and occasionally lags on rendering certain PDFs.

[Methuselah]

Evince only for me.
I find it to be a lot less bloated than adobe's software on windows. I have never installed adobe on linux/freebsd.

[vijaymbs]

In my case, Evince did not display some pdf files correctly. Hence, I installed acrobat reader from medibuntu using the procedure described in one of these forums.

However, I have a problem with acrobat reader. It does not appear in the 'programs list' given in 'open with'? I have to open acrobat reader from the Applications --> Office; and then open the document needed.

Can any one help?

[mali2297]

In my case, Evince did not display some pdf files correctly. Hence, I installed acrobat reader from medibuntu using the procedure described in one of these forums.

However, I have a problem with acrobat reader. It does not appear in the 'programs list' given in 'open with'? I have to open acrobat reader from the Applications --> Office; and then open the document needed.

Can any one help?

Go to Open with... -> Other Application -> Use a custom command and type in acroread.