I've searched the forums and found topics that are only loosely related to my problem, so I'm starting a new thread. Hopefully someone can help, because I'm at a complete loss.

I have logo artwork that was released to me on a CD from a client. The logo consists a ring split into four parts, each one of which is filled with a gradient. The original artwork is saved as Adobe Illustrator 6 EPS files and I need the ability to use them freely when I create new documents in Adobe Illustrator 10.

The problem I am having is that when I copy and paste the logo artwork to a new document, the gradients shift completely out of alignment. Sometimes, the same also happens when I scale the artwork. When I am finally able to get the artwork to paste (and print) properly, the gradients shift again when I save the document as a PDF and view it in Adobe Acrobat 5. The problem also seems to be highly unpredictable, such that a solution that works one day, is not guranteed to work the next.

I have tried "flattening the transparencies" (as I saw suggested in a related thread), but that usually darkens all my colors or splits up my artwork into lots of extra paths and embedded images. I have tried saving the original file as v.10 first, and then copying the artwork to a new document (which seemed to work last week), but that solution doesn't work anymore. I have tried creating brand new documents and copying everything over, but the problem still remains. I have tried restarting, deleting prerferences files, deleting .plist files, etc. but none of that has worked either.

Now I've found that when I get the artwork behaving the way it should and save it, the next time I open the file (only a few minutes later) the gradients have shifted again. I don't know where this problem is coming from and every time I think I've solved it, it still seems to show up and frustrate me.

For the record, I'm running Adobe Illustrator 10.0.3 on Mac OS 10.2.8 on a PowerPC G4 (1 GHz) with 768MB of RAM with no peripheral devices. As far as I'm aware, I have all the latest updates for both Illustrator and Jaguar (I don't have Panther on this machine).

Anyone who might have any clues or suggestions, I'd love to hear about them. I am going to test this on my home computer (with Panther), but I doubt that is the cause of the problem. Does anyone know if the gradient feature in Illustrator has any lingering bugs in it, or could this be a problem with the original artwork itself?

Thanks in advance,

Mike.