Alright, found the issue so I thought I'd post it here in case anyone runs into this in the future.
It was a registry permission issue. The user wasn't permissioned to modify the registry entry located at HKLM\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Adobe\Acrobat Distiller\9.0\AdobePDFOutputFolder.
TO FIX: Go to Start-->type "regedit" in search to get to the registry editor and right click on the HKLM\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\ folder, select "permissions", find/add your username to the list of allowed users, ensure you're permissioned for "Full Control" by checking the box under "allow", click OK and you should be all set.