Displaying pdf in WinForms webbrowser control under x64

Question

I have an application that uses the webBrowser control provided by Microsoft to display a pdf to the user. It has been found that when the application is running under x64 the pdf will download and open in Adobe Reader and not display in the user control. (Reference: http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/winforms/thread/06ad960b-7c5e-459c-9261-ca9d0e4ac88f/) Has anyone found a workaround for this issue other than compiling the application in x86?

Answer 1

That's to be expected; the 32bit PDF Reader Document Object is only loaded by the 32bit browser. When it's not there, you go down the normal file download codepath.

See also: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ieinternals/archive/2010/01/13/web-browser-control-does-not-show-flash-or-silverlight-in-a-64bit-dot-net-application.aspx