OCR not working

[Cedric48]

I am running Windows 10 Home 64-bit v1903 and PDF-XChange Editor v8.o build 334.0.
I am trying to convert a number of PDF files to text searcheable (ie OCR). These are documents produced bydifferent solicitors, with variable amounts of searcheable text in them. I have successfully OCR-ed 2 documents, one virtually 100% no searcheable text, 130 A4 pages nearly 7MB in size. The result was a little larger. The second one was ~3/4 searcheable, ~8MB, and the result corrected skewed text etc.

A 3rd document is 229 A4 pages ~28MB, with some text searcheable content, quite a lot not searcheable. When I open it with PDF-XCange Editor and choose File > Convert, the OCR option (& most of the other options in that menu) are greyed out. Hence I cannot start the OCR process. Can anyone please suggest how to produce an OCRed version of this file?

I have seen a 2009 post on this forum discussing different OCR problems, but that discussion may well now be obsolete, in addition to not mentioning my problem.

[Dimitar - Tracker Supp]

Hello Cedric,

Could you please send us a screenshot of what you see when you click on the OCR button?

Also, is it possible to send us the document that you can not pass trough the OCR tool?

Pleas send it to: support@pdf-xchange.com

Regards.

[Cedric48]

Hello,
Did you receive my reply and screen-shot? I sent it on the 14th.
I could not attach the problem file to the email, because it is too large. It is a 28MB PDF. By the time packet headers etc are added it is 39MB, and my email service (Outlook 365) has a size limit to 36MB). In my email of the 14th I suggested an alternate means of getting it to you.
Regards
Cedric

[Radi - Tracker Supp]

Hi Cedric,

I am afraid that I couldn't find your e-mail in our database, could you please re-send it?

About the file, you can upload it to a dropbox and include a link to it in your e-mail.

Alternatively, you can upload it to our file server. You can find instructions on how to do this here:
https://www.pdf-xchange.com/knowledgebase/321

Regards,
Radi

[Dimitar - Tracker Supp]

Hello Cedric,

As I suspected, your file has protection applied which is forbidding OCR and any kind of editing:

If you want to make an editable copy, you need to remove the protection, if you have the password, or print and after that scan the document in order to do that.

Regards.