Two types of viewing software are available for DWF's. Autodesk Express Viewer allows users to view drawings, zoom and pan around them, and print to scale. It is available from Autodesk's web site free of charge.  Click on the Express Viewer logo on the right to download it.  Express viewer is automatically installed at the time of AutoCAD 2004 installation.  When DWF's are published to the internet, Express Viewer works as a plug-in to Internet Explorer, allowing you to work with DWF's directly through your web browser.  

Volo View is another type of viewing software that includes additional functionality. It's features include the ability to open both DWF's and DWG's, 3d viewing and orbiting, redlining and text callouts, and commands for measuring distance. Click here for more information, or contact us for pricing information.

The Adobe PDF format is another popular method of transferring drawings to clients not using AutoCAD. With Adobe Reader installed you can view PDF's, zoom and pan around them, or print them to scale. However, creating PDF's from AutoCAD, requires the purchase of additional software. Several companies offer software that creates a PDF plotter, allowing you to print directly to a PDF file. Such software includes Adobe Acrobat, PDF X-Change, and JAWS PDF Creator.

The primary considerations distinguishing DWF's from PDF's include quality, file size, ease-of-use, and accessibility. Since DWF's are essentially a compressed DWG format, they maintain good quality while minimizing the file size. Although plotting to PDF's usually provides good quality prints, some loss of quality will be evident in the conversion process due to the fact that a PDF is basically a snapshot image of the original drawing.

When transferring files over the internet, file size is another important concern. Results will vary depending upon the type of drawing and the resolution of the DWF or PDF, but DWF's are generally smaller than PDF's. Using a 325Kb drawing as an example, plotting to a PDF file with a resolution of 1200 dpi resulted in a 1,370Kb file. The same drawing resulted in an 82Kb DWF file at 1200 dpi. DWF's also have a wider range of available resolution, anywhere from 150 dpi to 60 Million dpi. Even at 60 Million dpi, a DWF of the same drawing was only 680Kb. With Adobe Acrobat 6.0, the available resolution range is 72-4000 dpi.

The other advantage of DWF's in conjunction with AutoCAD 2004 over PDF's is the ability to publish multiple layouts at one time. If you have a drawing containing multiple layouts, the Publish command allows you to embed all those layouts, as well as a model space view, into one DWF file. When opening the DWF in Autodesk Express Viewer, it provides a list of the available layouts to choose from for viewing and printing. With PDF's, you have to create a separate PDF for each layout.

The one clear advantage that PDF's have over DWF's is the fact that 99% of computers already have the software necessary to view PDF's in Adobe Reader. In order to access DWF's, it is necessary to download and install the Express Viewer.