Compose PDF is extremely slow...

[Ty Rideout]

New to VDP here, and just started using FusionPro for the past couple weeks...

 

I've noticed that composing PDF's take several minutes for such small amount of data (34 pg PDF with only 4MB's of data take roughly 3-4 minutes to process)

 

We're printing to a Xerox 700 DP with an Integrated Fiery CW 5.5 - and we run a PC w/ 32G of ram, Intel i7 4770K 3.5GHz

 

Is there any solution towards increasing speed? We know we'll hit a roadblock in the future once we start producing 5000 pg PDF's with FusionPro

 

Any suggestions will help, Thanks!

[Dan Korn]

There are a lot of factors that go into how long it takes FusionPro to compose. Just to name a few: The sizes of graphics in the job, the number of complex rules, the number of frames, the specs of the hardware. Knowing some basic info such as the version of FusionPro would be helpful. But there's no way to analyze the job without seeing it.

[Ty Rideout]

Here's a sample of what we are producing: http://www.sendspace.com/file/4ff9ha

 

We're currently running FusionPro VDP Creator 9.1.0

 

Admittedly, there's a lot of entry fields on both sides. We are forced to compose the print 6-up given the format our variable data is received.

 

But overall we're still surprised at the lack of speed. Once we start producing 2500-5000 page orders, we're currently looking at 2.5 to 3 hours of composing per job - maybe longer. It's not uncommon for us to process 3 to 4 of those jobs a day.

 

We simply wonder if composing PDF's and/or Postscript files direct-to-printer might not be the best solution. If there's anything faster, we'd like to explore it.

[David Miller]

It would be helpful to have a sample of the data file. Have you tried to flatten transparency in your PDF?

[jwhittaker]

I think the first thing to speed it up is to create a 1up instead of 6up document and create an imposition using FPImposer. There would be 6 times less fields to process per page. I try and not impose anything unless I have to in the pdf template. The FPImposer is still limited but I think it processes faster.

[Dan Korn]

Yes, absolutely, Jon is correct; you want to use Imposition here. That will give you fewer text frames overall, and even though you would still be composing the same number of records overall, it will be faster. Or if you absolutely can't do that, I would at least use a Repeatable Component (Template page). Also, if you can combine some of those frames by using tab stops or tables, that will help as well. Finally, depending on the printer/RIP you're using, you will probably see better composition speeds, and likely faster RIP speed, with a VDP-optimized output format such as PPML, VDX, or PDF/VT.