In a move that will apparently bolster Abode Systems’ influence over the popular document format, the company Monday unveiled the Acrobat X – the latest version of Abode’s Acrobat suite of software for creating and viewing PDF files.

According to the Abode announcement, the Acrobat X family of productivity software will come with new versions of Reader and Acrobat. Since the suite essentially builds on the features that the company introduced in Acrobat 9 in 2008, it enables users to embed and view video, Web pages and other dynamic content in PDF files.

The new Acrobat X, which includes more tools for collaboration and a growing focus in the enterprise-software arena, will be available in both Standard and Pro versions, together with a free version of its Reader X software. While the Standard version will cost $299, the Pro version will cost $449. The upgrades for these versions will cost $129 and $199 respectively.

A suite which combines some of the flagship Acrobat apps - including Adobe Photoshop CS5, Adobe Acrobat X Pro, Adobe Captivate 5, Adobe Presenter 7, Adobe LiveCycle Designer ES2, and Adobe Media Encoder CS5 - will cost $1,199, or $799 for upgrade.

Abode said that the new Acrobat X and Reader X software will ship in mid-November. PCMag. com's Ed Mendelson, who has reviewed the new Abode Acrobat X, is of the opinion that “even in its beta incarnation, Acrobat X leaps ahead of the pack as the most powerful, flexible, and best-designed PDF software ever written.”