Any suggestions for good PDF Reader? | Advice Corner | Forums

I've been using Foxit Reader for about two years now, it mostly worked fine.  Today I loaded Secunia's PSI program and it told me my version of Foxit Reader had a security bug that needed to be patched.  It downloaded the most current installer (just released this week) and in the process I failed to uncheck the "install Foxit extension for Firefox".  You can read my e-mail below for the consequences, take it as a warning to avoid Foxit Software if you like.  If they do a great job of responding I'll try to give them credit here….

So, given that Adobe's reader program is FAR too bloated and slow (hey, I just want to read my electic bill, have no need to share markups in real time with collaborators in India!), what's a good program for viewing .PDF files?

Here's the e-mail I sent to Foxit (sorry, I left it out of my initial post a few minutes ago).

Thanks, Locutus, for the lead on PDD+Xchange, I'll check it out next.  And what service, only two minutes after my original post !

My appologies, twice I forget to paste in my letter to Foxit Software.  And I got a letter back from Foxit telling me how to uninstall "the toolbar" containing instructions that would not have worked.  I had no "Foxit Toolbar" entry in my add/remove programs list, and the uninstaller for Ask toolbar does NOT uninstall it.  Thanks to Revo uninstaller both are gone (Foxit's Firefox plugin was taken out when Revo removed Foxit).

I do appreciate all the suggestions.  I downloaded PDF Xchange Viewer last night and will give it a try today, looks great on their website.  STDU also looks promising since it also handles XPS files.  Sumatra was rated low on rendering quality but high on speed, so it may be helpful as well.

As for the Smiling Member picture, well, I'm just a smiling member!  Look at all the great help I've found here at dotTech!  I used Serif's Photo Plus to add some basic shapes to the default photo, nothing too fancy, it was late…

Anyway, here's my letter – feels kind of anti-climactic at this point….

——-

To: support@foxitsoftware.com, sales@foxitsoftware.com,
marketing@foxitsoftware.com

This letter was originally a question for your support group (and yes, I
need an answer), but I figure someone in marketing had a hand in trying to
sneak Ask.com's toolbar onto my PC and someone in sales is likely going to
hear similar complaints from many customers…..

Ok, I made a serious mistake and trusted your installer program.  It had a
box checked that said something like "Foxit extension for Firefox".  Ok,
this must be so I can read .pdf files from within Firefox, right?  I left it
checked.  I'm such an idiot.

You changed my home page to Ask.com.  After some research to figure out what
it was before, I got that one fixed.  If I wanted Ask.com, it would have
been my home page before I ran your installer.  You obviously don't care.

You added a toolbar for Ask.com.  If I wanted that taking up space in
Firefox, it would have already been there.  In fact, whenever I needed
Ask.com, and felt too lazy to type those 7 characters, it was an option in
another toolbar (Groowe Toolbar), a super-toolbar that has Google and many
others.  Ok, so I had look at my list of plugins, and said to disable the
Foxit Reader Plugin for Mozilla.  No way to remove it, just enable or
disable.  I exited Firefox and the plugin is still there, and SO IS THE
TOOLBAR.

Ok, I ran Revo Uninstaller, found a program called Ask Toolbar.  Told Revo
to uninstall it.  Up pops the uninstaller for Ask Toolbar, as expected.
Except there's no uninstall option.  I tried setting both the install
settings to X, nothing installed on the PC, and clicked OK.  The installer
then informed me I already had the toolbar installed and exited.  Revo
continued onward and found about 30 registry entries and about the same
number of files on my hard drive, all related to the Ask Toolbar.  I told
Revo to delete all of them.  I STILL HAVE the "Foxit Reader Plugin for
Mozilla", and don't know if the Ask Toolbar is truly gone.  Just in case, I
removed Ask.Com from the list in Groowe Toolbar and I'm looking for a way to
add Ask.Com to a list of sites that are not allowed on my PC, I think I can
do that with my Firewall.

You've wasted almost an hour of my time so far, and got me pissed off at
Foxit and Ask, and I'll need to spend a few more hours now looking for
alternatives to Foxit Reader.  Yes I know it was all my fault for not
understanding all the damage that would happen by leaving that checkbox
checked in the installer, but I feel Foxit went too far in changing things
and installing things I did not want or knowingly ask for. Rest assured, I
will no longer recommend Foxit Reader to all my neighbors, relatives and all
the people at work.  I thought I was happy with Foxit Reader until I tried
to install the new version to fix the SECURITY issue you guys placed on my
PC with the previous installation (thanks, Secunia PSI for finding that
threat).  Time to move on.  I'll let the good folks at several tech web
sites know about this as well, hopefully they'll know of another PDF reader
I can use.

This letter was originally a question for your support group (and yes, I

need an answer), but I figure someone in marketing had a hand in trying to

sneak Ask.com's toolbar onto my PC and someone in sales is likely going to

hear similar complaints from many customers…..

Ok, I made a serious mistake and trusted your installer program.  It had a

box checked that said something like "Foxit extension for Firefox".  Ok,

this must be so I can read .pdf files from within Firefox, right?  I left it

checked.  I'm such an idiot.

You changed my home page to Ask.com.  After some research to figure out what

it was before, I got that one fixed.  If I wanted Ask.com, it would have

been my home page before I ran your installer.  You obviously don't care.

You added a toolbar for Ask.com.  If I wanted that taking up space in

Firefox, it would have already been there.  In fact, whenever I needed

Ask.com, and felt too lazy to type those 7 characters, it was an option in

another toolbar (Groowe Toolbar), a super-toolbar that has Google and many

others.  Ok, so I had look at my list of plugins, and said to disable the

Foxit Reader Plugin for Mozilla.  No way to remove it, just enable or

disable.  I exited Firefox and the plugin is still there, and SO IS THE

TOOLBAR.

Ok, I ran Revo Uninstaller, found a program called Ask Toolbar.  Told Revo

to uninstall it.  Up pops the uninstaller for Ask Toolbar, as expected.

Except there's no uninstall option.  I tried setting both the install

settings to X, nothing installed on the PC, and clicked OK.  The installer

then informed me I already had the toolbar installed and exited.  Revo

continued onward and found about 30 registry entries and about the same

number of files on my hard drive, all related to the Ask Toolbar.  I told

Revo to delete all of them.  I STILL HAVE the "Foxit Reader Plugin for

Mozilla", and don't know if the Ask Toolbar is truly gone.  Just in case, I

removed Ask.Com from the list in Groowe Toolbar and I'm looking for a way to

add Ask.Com to a list of sites that are not allowed on my PC, I think I can

do that with my Firewall.

You've wasted almost an hour of my time so far, and got me pissed off at

Foxit and Ask, and I'll need to spend a few more hours now looking for

alternatives to Foxit Reader.  Yes I know it was all my fault for not

understanding all the damage that would happen by leaving that checkbox

checked in the installer, but I feel Foxit went too far in changing things

and installing things I did not want or knowingly ask for. Rest assured, I

will no longer recommend Foxit Reader to all my neighbors, relatives and all

the people at work.  I thought I was happy with Foxit Reader until I tried

to install the new version to fix the SECURITY issue you guys placed on my

PC with the previous installation (thanks, Secunia PSI for finding that

threat).  Time to move on.  I'll let the good folks at several tech web

sites know about this as well, hopefully they'll know of another PDF reader

I can use.