The PDF2Office v.2.1 Professional software program by Recosoft (link above) is a PDF document conversion and data extraction tool. PDF2Office converts PDF documents into editable Microsoft Word, RTF, AppleWorks, Unicode, Keynote, Pages, TextEdit and HTML or graphics files. For the most part, it maintains the original layout. The original PDF file retains its original format and layout while the converted file can be used in applications to edit the file. I think it will be useful for those who often need to convert PDF files into editable word processing documents and may well be used by those who need such conversion on occasion. Minimum system requirements are listed above, but I didn�t see any minimums for RAM and for disk sizes, but as in all cases, the more the better.

PDF2Office 2.1 allows users to automatically recreate the original construction and layout of a document, including forming paragraphs, applying styles, regrouping independent graphic elements, image extraction, table creation, headers/footers, endnotes/footnotes and columns/sections. It converts image types such as JPEG, Photoshop, PNG and TIFF and allows you to extract images from specific pages within a PDF document.

PDF2Office provides options for converting a range of pages in a PDF document because memory usage results in it being faster to convert smaller sections and combine them rather than converting a long and complex document in one pass. PDF2Office also has a batch conversion facility for converting many files at once by simply targeting the folders.

Use of PDF2Office is elegant. Drag your PDF documents into the upper Conversion Pane of the PDF2Office window, click on the conversion icon (assuming you don�t want to change the setting you wanted in your Preference file), and PDF2Office will automatically extract the information you require into a usable format.

Strengths: You can quickly learn to use PDF2Office. The accompanying tutorial and the online tutorial are excellent. PDF2Office is a very easy product to use. It handles almost all of the conversion of simple PDFs without a problem and is good on highly complex PDFs, retaining most of the layout of the original. In addition, PDF documents can be opened directly within Microsoft Word X/2004, and other applications which support Apple�s Services function, such as Keynote, Pages and TextEdit. Installation is a little slow, but is simple

Weaknesses: I had some problems converting some scanned documents, but I think additional time learning more of the advanced features would cure most of the problems. I understand that there is a work around that requires that you use OCR software.

For a longer and more comprehensive review of PDF2Office, download a PDF, at www.maccompanion.com/archives/february2005/Software/PDF2Office2Feb2005.pdf.

Conclusion - For those who need to convert PDF files to editable text or graphics formats, PDF2Office is a real time saver. If you often need to do so, it is probably a must buy. For the occasional need, the $129 price tag is a little high, but you may find that you end up converting more documents since the process is so easy. All in all I give PDF2Office 4 Apples out of 5.

Reviewer: Mark Bazrod Mark Bazrod has been involved in leasing computers since 1968 and has been active in the leasing industry as a board member, speaker, and committee chairman. His company was one of the first to lease computer software back in 1992. He bought his first Apple computer around 1978 and currently uses a PowerBook as his main computer, taking it everywhere. He was appointed to the Board of MLMUG in June 2004.

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© 2005 by Mark Bazrod & MLMUG
Posted 04/21/05
Updated xx/xx/05