Opening PDF in Illustrator. Some font characters outlined, some not.

Here's what I'm experiencing...
Let's say I create a poster with a couple of blocks of text in Illustrator, using a single font. Then, I generate a PDF of the poster.
Now, on the same computer, I open the PDF in Illustrator, and Illustrator pops-up an alert saying some text has been outlined to preserve appearance. And, indeed, here and there throughout the text, some words, combination of words, or whole lines of text have been outlined, but most of the text is still live.
Why does this happen? There's no difference, font-wise, between the text that is untouched, and the text that got outlined. Same face, same weight. In fact, the same word, set the same way, will be untouched in one line, and be outlined elsewhere in the text. It's really baffling.

No, there are no transparency effects or objects in the final file.
As a matter of fact, the file is purposely made without transparency effects because the printer my client sends the pdf to still uses an ancient RIP that cannot accurately process anything newer than PDF 1.3.
I'm not at my studio right now, so I can't get a screenshot for you.

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Hello waitingone,
please try this (all terms are translated from my German programs to my best knowledge):
1. Did the creator of the pdf file enable the import options?
2. See import options: choose an other visibility option for your layer.
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Workaround for 2 Spot Colors in Gradients (Converts Spot Colors located in Gradient toCMYK – all other Spots stay intact)
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Color Type: Spot Color
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Tags (edit): none (add)
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Opening PDF in Illustrator. Some font characters outlined, some not.

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