(ref: Previous thread "PDF moveing sooooo slow")
I have increasingly found the need to work with PDFs of as-built drawings in Chief Architect, especially for additions. However, It is almost impossible and painfully slow to do so.
What is so appealing about working with as-built PDFs is that you don't have to create a complete floor plan, elevations or sections for additions.
You simply model the addition only, generate a cad detail with a solid white fill of the plan, elevation or section and place it over a properly scaled as-built PDF.
It could be such a time saver.
I believe the solution is to make an imported PDF in Chief Architect into an "underlayment". That is how AutoCAD handles them. It is similar to their x-references.
Is it possible to make an "underlayment" in Chief Architect? Is there any effort being made to do this?
So many as-built drawings are available in a PDF format either generated directly from the drawing software or by scanning line drawings. It would be a shame not to try to use this resource.
Christmas is coming.
06-14-2013, 04:34 AM #2
Humble Chief User/Abuser
Join Date Sep 2003 Location Vista, CA Posts 3,264Not aware of any efforts to make PDF's an underlayment but something should be done with the slow slow slow performance of any page with a PDF on it.
The purpose of Government is to control the common resources, not the common man.
Larry Hawes
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I never import a pdf. Well, I did once and I learned my lesson. Jpg or png with reduced file size before import. Photoshop is open about half the time I am working on CA projects.
alan lehman - Lehman Design Studio - Carmel, CA
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Administrator
Join Date Jan 2000 Posts 4,161My guess as to why PDF's are slow is that the one you have imported is scanned at high resolution rather than being generated from the original software. Depending on the scanned resolution this can put a very heavy load on the software to render. You may be better off saving the scanned image as a png and possibly at lower resolution. Because of the heavy memory load that a high resolution scan can have it is also possible that you are running out of real ram and using virtual memory which will also seriously slow down you computer.Doug Park
Humble Chief User/Abuser
Join Date Sep 2003 Location Vista, CA Posts 3,264I receive my PDF's from various sources and seem to have no control over their resolution and every one I've ever used, even a single file, causes Chief to slow to a crawl on any page that contains them.
I'm learning to avoid them at all costs, rendering such a great feature virtually useless - for me at least.
The purpose of Government is to control the common resources, not the common man.
Larry Hawes
Hawes Home Design
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Godzilla fan
Join Date Jun 2005 Location Southern California Posts 4,874Around here we have to draw the whole house and To get the roof correct. How do you show the roof plan? Partial I guess. Too many things to get away with that here. I use to draw partials about 25 years ago. Open your "PDF" and resave it with a smaller resolution and it should work better for you. Whenever I scan something I always have to resave it smaller.
Perry
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Humble Chief User/Abuser
Join Date Sep 2003 Location Vista, CA Posts 3,264Is it safe to assume you have the full Acrobat program that allows changing the resolution of a PDF? Is there another way I'm missing? I've just stopped using them as much because of the slow performance.
The purpose of Government is to control the common resources, not the common man.
Larry Hawes
Hawes Home Design
Vista, CA
Hawes Home Design
X5 and X6 Public Beta 3
Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit
Motherboard EVGA Classified SR-2
Processors (2) 6 core Xeon L5640
Memory 24GB PNY DDR3 1600
Video EVGA GTX 780
Monitor 26" LG 1920 x 1200
21" Viewsonic
Humble Chief User/Abuser
Join Date Sep 2003 Location Vista, CA Posts 3,264I just imported a very simple PDF invoice from a vendor and it worked fine but my Title 24 reports start to choke Chief at around 3 pages so the res must be higher on that PDF but I'm not sure how to change that. Ask the vendor to scan at a lower res?
The purpose of Government is to control the common resources, not the common man.
Larry Hawes
Hawes Home Design
Vista, CA
Hawes Home Design
X5 and X6 Public Beta 3
Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit
Motherboard EVGA Classified SR-2
Processors (2) 6 core Xeon L5640
Memory 24GB PNY DDR3 1600
Video EVGA GTX 780
Monitor 26" LG 1920 x 1200
21" Viewsonic
Godzilla fan
Join Date Jun 2005 Location Southern California Posts 4,874Yes ,I have acrobat X, I'm not sure if you can change the resolution in Reader, but you should be able to change the scanning resolution in the scanning software for sure.
Perry
P.H. DESIGNS L.L.C.
Eastvale Calif.
Alienware, liquid cooled
Ver 10-"X6 x64 SSA
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Humble Chief User/Abuser
Join Date Sep 2003 Location Vista, CA Posts 3,264Thanks Perry, appreciate the input. At this stage it's just so much easier to go back to importing jpg's or tiffs than messing with PDF's, resolutions, scanning, rescanning etc. It's a shame but if indeed the files are simply too large then the work arounds are not worth the effort.
The purpose of Government is to control the common resources, not the common man.
Larry Hawes
Hawes Home Design
Vista, CA
Hawes Home Design
X5 and X6 Public Beta 3
Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit
Motherboard EVGA Classified SR-2
Processors (2) 6 core Xeon L5640
Memory 24GB PNY DDR3 1600
Video EVGA GTX 780
Monitor 26" LG 1920 x 1200
21" Viewsonic
Godzilla fan
Join Date Jun 2005 Location Southern California Posts 4,874BTW, I assume you are not putting the PDF's in your plan. I always put them in the layout and really don't have any problems with them
Perry
P.H. DESIGNS L.L.C.
Eastvale Calif.
Alienware, liquid cooled
Ver 10-"X6 x64 SSA
WIN 8.1 PRO 64 bit
Nvidia GTX780 3GB.
i7 920 2.67-- 12 GB Ram
40" led monitor
Torch Lake
Join Date Feb 2001 Location Rapid City, MI Posts 3,252I have scads of pdfs brought into layout & I don't notice any slowdown at all. What the heck?
Attached Thumbnails
06-14-2013, 07:59 AM #13
Humble Chief User/Abuser
Join Date Sep 2003 Location Vista, CA Posts 3,264
Originally Posted by steveg 
(ref: Previous thread "PDF moveing sooooo slow")
I have increasingly found the need to work with PDFs of as-built drawings in Chief Architect, especially for additions. However, It is almost impossible and painfully slow to do so.
What is so appealing about working with as-built PDFs is that you don't have to create a complete floor plan, elevations or sections for additions.
You simply model the addition only, generate a cad detail with a solid white fill of the plan, elevation or section and place it over a properly scaled as-built PDF.
It could be such a time saver.
I believe the solution is to make an imported PDF in Chief Architect into an "underlayment". That is how AutoCAD handles them. It is similar to their x-references.
Is it possible to make an "underlayment" in Chief Architect? Is there any effort being made to do this?
So many as-built drawings are available in a PDF format either generated directly from the drawing software or by scanning line drawings. It would be a shame not to try to use this resource.
Christmas is coming.
I use PDF-XChange Viewer http://www.tracker-software.com/prod. xchange-viewer and it will convert PDF to images nicely. Those images can be set up on a 'locked' layer and might serve the same purpose as the 'underlayment' you're referring to.
The purpose of Government is to control the common resources, not the common man.
Larry Hawes
Hawes Home Design
Vista, CA
Hawes Home Design
X5 and X6 Public Beta 3
Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit
Motherboard EVGA Classified SR-2
Processors (2) 6 core Xeon L5640
Memory 24GB PNY DDR3 1600
Video EVGA GTX 780
Monitor 26" LG 1920 x 1200
21" Viewsonic
Humble Chief User/Abuser
Join Date Sep 2003 Location Vista, CA Posts 3,264Originally Posted by ebdesign
Must be scanned a lower res? Dunno. If I have the same page full of T24 docs from my T24 guy Chief slows to a crawl. Hmmm.
I just loaded some of those same details Jim and I can get 1 and 2 copies to work fine. 3 copies begins to slow down 4 and more pretty much unusable. Video card?
The purpose of Government is to control the common resources, not the common man.
Larry Hawes
Hawes Home Design
Vista, CA
Hawes Home Design
X5 and X6 Public Beta 3
Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit
Motherboard EVGA Classified SR-2
Processors (2) 6 core Xeon L5640
Memory 24GB PNY DDR3 1600
Video EVGA GTX 780
Monitor 26" LG 1920 x 1200
21" Viewsonic
