Converting CAD files to PDF

as a few people have mentioned you can do this in autocad.

Go to print and where you select the printer, there will be an option to print "dwg to pdf" along with all the usual printing options like paper size, scale etc.

I use it all the time at work to send my CAD drawings as .pdf files so they can't be easily altered

Thanks for the comment Adam. When I posted my initial question, I was using AutoCAD 2000 and there is no facility for printing to PDF. Installing CutePDF helped a little, but as stated above, the quality is poor. I have since had a failed new laptop and have had to replace it it with a 64-bit Win7 machine that will not run AutoCAD 2000. I have installed AutoCAD 2011 and the quality is as it should be. I still have a working older laptop with AutoCAD 2000 which, with conversion of drawings, is still used for drafting.

Dave

Dave,

Hope you aren't suffering info overload but with cutepdf ( or any of the other pseudo printers) installed you "print to a file .... xxxx.pdf from your autocad or almost any other document making software

This pdf file can be opened in Adobe Acrobat, viewed and checked from there and printed from Acrobat to your local printer or you can copy the pdf file to send to your A1 printshop by whatever your preferred method is, take it on a memory stick, email as an attachment etc.

Apologies, the year went by unnoticed until I read your last post and saw all that had occurred in the meantime.

Bob D.

Edited By Robert Dodds on 23/06/2012 23:16:05

Thanks Bob,

By installing AutoCAD 2011, I now am able to print to PDF with quality is as it should be. As you have said, that will enable taking the files to a local print shop for reasonably priced A1 sheet printing.

Dave

CutePDF installs as if it was any other printer and can be used by any windows program (not sure about Apple). I use it all of the time with Autocad and MS office. After you print it askes you where you want to save the pdf file.

Autocad cannot open a pdf file and therefore it will not show up when using the Autocad file open function. PDF files can however be inserted into an Autocad drawing by pasting from the clipboard. It is displayed as like jpg image and not to scale. The individlual lines cannot be selected.

It is possible to trace over this imported image but the drawing produced is not very accurate.

Regards, Paul.