Content streams and Excel charts are too big

[elaine.la]

Hi,

I have imported 32 Excel color charts that are each 44k, into my Word
document, which is total 3.3 mg. When I make this document into an
Acrobat pdf, it becomes 7.2 mg! Why is my Word doc becoming so large
when made to a pdf? Acrobat says that 53% of the space is from images
(the excel charts) and 43% are from "Content Streams." What is a
content stream and how do I reduce the size of it?

Also, my excel charts are ballooning up. How do I keep this file size
down? I would copy the chart in Excel and then paste into Word. Is
there another way?

Many thanks,
Elaine

 

[John McGhie [MVP - Word and Word Macintosh]]

Content streams are "text" to you and me (text and formatting, including
fonts and various other things, but essentially, "text").

A three-meg document can be expected to make a fairly chunky little PDF.
Word compresses its file internally, Acrobat may or may not, depending the
settings you use.

First, start by reducing your colour depth if you can. Then reduce the
resolution of your pictures. High-res pictures with high-bit-depth colour
are very large.

Also: Make sure that you are not embedding a copy of the Word document into
the PDF if you do not need it. Acrobat allows you to include a copy of the
original so others can edit the result, but if you do, you need twice the
file size.

Acrobat has multiple settings you can play around with to reduce the file
size, at the expense of quality. If your end result is destined only for
on-screen use, drop the pictures down to 96 dpi: the size reduction is
dramatic. Note that printing such a document will not give good results.
Using the Press Quality settings in Acrobat will print beautifully, but your
file will swell to an awesome size.

Cheers

Hi,

I have imported 32 Excel color charts that are each 44k, into my Word
document, which is total 3.3 mg. When I make this document into an
Acrobat pdf, it becomes 7.2 mg! Why is my Word doc becoming so large
when made to a pdf? Acrobat says that 53% of the space is from images
(the excel charts) and 43% are from "Content Streams." What is a
content stream and how do I reduce the size of it?

Also, my excel charts are ballooning up. How do I keep this file size
down? I would copy the chart in Excel and then paste into Word. Is
there another way?

Many thanks,
Elaine

--

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <[email protected]>
Microsoft MVP, Word and Word for Macintosh. Consultant Technical Writer
Sydney, Australia +61 4 1209 1410