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Most computer users these days have received (or at some time, will receive) a file with a PDF extension. However, to read and/or print this file, you MUST have a reader program which can do this. The program required is Adobe Acrobar Reader - but where do you get the program?
Acrobat Reader is distributed free by the distributors, Adobe Systems Inc., and as such is readily available from all sorts of places, on magazine and application CDs (you may even have Acrobat Reader on CDs supplied with your PC), perhaps on CDs accompanying books you may have purchased on PC software or hardware and of course on the internet. However, I firmly believe that the best way to get the latest version (version 6) is to purchase a copy of PC Pro or Computer Shopper. Both are monthly UK computing magazines issued during the first 10 days of every month and both of which include a magazine CD. It is many years now since I stopped subscribing to these magazines but they always used to have the latest version of Acrobat Reader. Providing this is still true, by getting a copy of either magazine you will not only Acrobat Reader but you'll also have the magazine and a CD full of possibly useful programs (several of which are usually demos). The latest version is also ALWAYS available on the internet from the Adobe Systems site. However, it can be a rather longwinded process and the latest downloads are generally very large, taking a long time to download although this depends on the speed of your connection. If you are on broadband then there is no need to worry about size since it is an “always on” connection to the Internet.
Of course, you may already have Acrobat Reader on your PC. If you have a .PDF file
on your system, then any PDF files you have will be represented by a symbol (termed
an icon) as shown here (or similar). This 
means that you should be able to double-click
the file using the mouse and Acrobat Reader will automatically open and load the
file into it. You could also look for a directory or folder which has the name Reader
or Acrobat Reader or possibly just Acrobat. Yet another way is to search for PDF
files using the Windows Search feature. This facility has changed over the years
and may appear in various guises (it is not within the scoe of this page to describe
doing a search in the various iterations of Windows and I know nothing of using a
Mac computer). Once you have a dialogue into which you can type a search term, type
"*.PDF" (don't include the inverted commas), select the hard drive/s you want to
search and press RETURN. Windows will then search for any PDF files you may have
on the selected drive/s and tell you where they are, if found. If any PDF files are
found and they are not represented by the icon above or similar, then you are unlikely
to have Acrobat Reader on your system. In the same way you can search for the Acrobat
Reader program file to find out if you have the program on your system. In this case
search for “ACRORD32.EXE”.
You may well have questions to ask about what has been said on this page. If so, then please feel free to contact us and we will try to answer any questions you may have.