When I open a CDR file previously saved under X3 or X4 and then resave under X5, the file size is almost double. I noticed that (or can't find) the checkbox for bitmap compression is missing. However, a few of the files I have tried this on have no embedded bitmaps at all.
What size was the file to start with?
Hi Yani,
The file was originally 265KB in X4. As resaved in X5; 697KB and resaved with profiles unchecked, 319 KB. While this is not a problem at these files sizes, I do have quite a few files over 20 MB in size and they also come very close to doubling in size. My usual method is to convert elements of the design that are complex such as lenses, drop shadows etc. to bitmaps as I go. I have found that a safer and faster approach than leaving it all vector but harder to edit later. This method does increase file sizes considerably if the bitmaps are large and hires. Anyway, that is why I am concerned with file sizes.
Thanks for you help. I have found your involvement very helpful in answering many questions that I shared with other users for several years.
Gerry Swemer
Hi!
I did a test saving from x5 using these 3 files(Bitmap, text, shape). Here are the result. File sizes are not much greater:
I also imported and saved the combined 3 files as a cdr12 into x4 then saved, and again into x5 and saved (and did not embed color profiles in x5) and this was the surprising result.
-John
Hi John,
Thanks for taking the time to test this issue. I just tried saving a typical file of the style I use in my work, originally created in X4, in X5 with the the embed color profiles turned off. The original file was 10,178 KB and the X5 version is 23,571 KB. Since the files are on the big side, I posted them on my FTP site if you or anyone else is interested in verifying this file size ballooning effect.
The two files are here; http:\\ftp.ges-designs.com
Use corel@ges-designs.com as the user name and corel (everything lower case) as the password.
Thanks,
Hi.
I imported your Exterior_1_Nite_Dark file into each and saved. Here is the result:
Here are my save settings.
I checked my settings for bitmap compression etc. to yours. The only difference was in the "Save Textures with the File" which was set to the Rebuild option. I switched it to match yours and once again resaved the file. It still remains at 23 MB on my machine. My machine at work is a laptop which barely meets the minimum hardware requirements; P4, 2.4 Ghz, I Gb ram, Shared video. The X5 program seems to run just fine on it and does not appear sluggish. I will retry this with my home PC which has an AMD dual core chip, more ram, striped disks etc. and report back.
Thanks again for your efforts,
Yea X5 works fine on old hardware and even better on old hardware if you use Win 7.
Have you tried to SaveAs the file?
..yes. I did use save as.
-john
I ran the same test on my more capable home machine. No difference, so I guess that rules out an installation or corrupt workspace or hardware dependence source for the problem. I did notice that the file I posted to the FTP had some issues. When I imported it instead of just opening, some strange things had happened to the coin elements that had extrusions. So I tested the import and resave method with another file. The result was maginally better with only a 7 MB increase in file size. It was 19 MB to begin with. When I merely opened the file and resaved under X5, it had again more than doubled.
At this point I don't think it is worth my time and yours to pursue this further. I can live with the larger file sizes and can always convert to tif, jpg or PDFand downsample to get smaller files for distribution and printing. FYI, outputting to PDF via the export command yielded a doubling of file size compared to using the print to PDF creation style but was much faster (export version). Acrobat 6 is installed on my office laptop. Both were the normal, much smaller file size than a typical CDR file.
I do find it strange that your machine's results are so different from mine. I hope that the Corel people will take notice of this oddity.
Thanks to all for your inputs and assistance.
Gerry