Need help with Windows 8 settings - .pdf reader quit working

[awp_101]

Sometime last week the Microsoft Reader quit opening .pdfs, I get a pop up stating it's timed out. This happens with items that have been on this computer for a long time as well as new downloads. I haven't updated anything nor have I knowingly changed any settings. I simply turn it on, navigate the internet doing internet things and turn it off, nothing else.

Is there some setting I can get to that might have gotten borked? Running stock Windows 8 and the latest Firefox browser (which shouldn't matter. right?). Nothing has popped up in multiple AV scans.

Possibly related, sometime last year images in emails randomly quit displaying. For example the images in the daily email ads from Midway and a wood turning supplier won't display on my desktop or work laptop (that one is Windows 10 I think) but will on my iphone and ipad, all running the latest FF browser.

Thanks!

[HeavyDuty]

Could this be related to Flash being discontinued?

[olstyn]

Is downloading the latest Adobe Reader an option? How about upgrading to Windows 10? If not, this might be a tough one. Is Windows 8 even still supported by Microsoft at this point? Speaking purely about the Enterprise editions because that's what I'm familiar with supporting at work, even a lot of versions of Windows *10* are end of lifed for support by Microsoft at this point.

[revchuck38]

The laptop I'm on now came with Windows 8. I was a Windows 10 early adopter because I figured 10 couldn't be worse than 8.

Adobe's Acrobat Reader is a free download. I'd go with that rather than worry about the Windows 8 accessory. You might be having issues with Microsoft no longer supporting what you have.

ETA: My experience is with the non-Enterprise version of Windows 10.

[SeriousStudent]

Is downloading the latest Adobe Reader an option? How about upgrading to Windows 10? If not, this might be a tough one. Is Windows 8 even still supported by Microsoft at this point? Speaking purely about the Enterprise editions because that's what I'm familiar with supporting at work, even a lot of versions of Windows *10* are end of lifed for support by Microsoft at this point.

End of Extended Support occurs in 2023 for Windows 8.1, per Microsoft. That's when patching stops.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/lifecycle/faq/windows

I think you would find the upgrade to Windows 10 worthwhile. Just my very humble opinion.

[Half Moon]

First guess is you've lost the file association. This explains how to change associations though isn't Win 8 specific:

https://www.filerepairtools.com/tips...ge-windows-10/

[olstyn]

End of Extended Support occurs in 2023 for Windows 8.1, per Microsoft. That's when patching stops.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/lifecycle/faq/windows

I think you would find the upgrade to Windows 10 worthwhile. Just my very humble opinion.

IIRC extended support is just security patching, though, not feature updates of any kind. I agree that the OP is likely to find W10 to be a worthwhile upgrade over W8.

[HeavyDuty]

For what it’s worth, I truly despise the M$ “tiles” format of Win10, but Classic Shell makes it tolerable. I’d upgrade, too.

[Andy T]

I am partial to XODO as a pdf reader. Also consider installing MS Edge. I am using it as a standard browser and it has pretty good PDF capability as well.

[olstyn]

I am partial to XODO as a pdf reader. Also consider installing MS Edge. I am using it as a standard browser and it has pretty good PDF capability as well.

Edge does fine for most things, but we've run into a few .pdf documents recently at work which Edge (and Google Chrome, which of course uses the same render engine - MS basically gave up on truly providing their own browser) could not successfully open, but Acrobat Reader could. The documents in question are undoubtedly corner cases, and we haven't yet been able to determine what makes them not play nice with Edge, but on some level .pdf is Adobe's format, might as well use their software with it.