The slowness of Flash has long been a complaint on the fairer platform and it finally looks like somebody at Adobe was paying attention. Adobe Labs has released a beta for Flash Player 10 and among the changes is a major speed boost. Indeed commenting on his personal site, one Adobe Flash engineer has gone so far as to say that "this version of the player runs... [the GUIMark] benchmark substantially better on OSX than any previous Flash Player version. It should be up to 3 times faster" (more details here).Adobe Flash Player 10 beta 2 is a free download from Adobe Labs. However, they warn that previous version should be uninstalled before updating.
[via MacNN]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
7-07-2008 @ 6:01PM
mingistech said...
Wow... the speed increase is amazing.
Sites like the Nike+ running site (it's ALL flash) for the iPod kit show HUGE improvements.
The site used to be slow as heII. This is well worth the download.
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7-07-2008 @ 6:49PM
twoeightnine said...
I guess I'll upgrade then, the Nike+ site has never once loaded for me in FF.
7-07-2008 @ 7:00PM
twoeightnine said...
And it's still not loading for me.
7-07-2008 @ 6:08PM
Neil said...
Well it certainly stops the fans from spinning up quite so much when I'm using YouTube and BBC iPlayer on my MacBook.
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7-07-2008 @ 6:18PM
reallycrazyguy said...
Sure it's three times faster than the current released version of the Flash plugin. However it's still much slower and takes much more of the CPU than under Windows on the exact same system.
Hey Adobe, instead of trying to hack Flash onto the iPhone, where Apple doesn't want you, maybe you can convince Apple it's worthwhile if you produce a first-rate implementation on MacOS X, instead of the second-class plugin you're currently foisting on us.
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7-07-2008 @ 7:22PM
oZ said...
Only took six comments for someone to post some snark. Hey, reallycrazyguy, did it ever occur to you that this is a pretty good sign that they're working on it? No, of course not, because you'd rather bitch and leave your mark. Go home.
7-07-2008 @ 8:49PM
reallycrazyguy said...
oZ, I would say you are quite optimistic if you believe Adobe is finally working on making the Flash plugin work as well as it does on Windows. That they've finally made that commitment to begin this work after only 10 years of leaving it in the crapper.
7-07-2008 @ 7:10PM
Jason said...
Ugh, I hate Flash, but I went through the laborious process of uninstalling 9 and installing 10. I'm completely sick of having jerky flash video playback on a Core 2 Duo w/ 3GB of RAM. That's pathetic.
By the way, nice job Adobe on the hideous uninstaller program that looks like it came from OS9, appears to freeze for about a minute with no CPU or disk usage, then just quits with no indication of whether it was successful. Bravo Adobe, bravo.
I'd really love to go Adobe-free on my system, maybe moreso than Microsoft-free. Sometimes I just need a Windows app. I'm trying hard to wean myself off of Photoshop. When I do -- see ya later Adobe!
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7-07-2008 @ 8:23PM
Chris Papadopoulos said...
Adobe's software is generally ok — maybe a little bloated and un-Maclike at times — but definitely functional.
But their software's installers are consistently the worst of any major company I've seen.
Constantly having to download and use some crappy uninstaller that looks like it was made in 1998 just to install software is ridiculous.
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7-07-2008 @ 8:23PM
OwlBoy said...
I am having the same issues with beta 10 that are listed here:
http://www.360east.com/?p=1010
Distorted video content, green blocking, etc. I am on a G5 with GeForce FX 5200.
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7-08-2008 @ 1:08AM
David Lawrence said...
yep, same problem with flash video here. Completely unviewable. Too bad because it really is *much* faster on my powerbook G4. Uninstalling for now. :(
7-09-2008 @ 4:13AM
Mark S said...
I have that problem too. I had to uninstall and go back to the current version. Really unfortunate. I've generally had really good experiences with the beta plugins.
7-07-2008 @ 9:07PM
Chris G. said...
I had the Flash 10 Beta 2 installed, but some sites claim that Flash isn't installed (CNN's video for example). I decided to reinstall Flash 9 until I know Flash 10 has more support.
That said, it is amazingly faster. I can't wait for the final release.
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7-07-2008 @ 10:44PM
morgenstern said...
this may seem odd or whatever but i was having some big problems with flash not loading on some websites and sometimes crashing the browser. what I found works is installing or reinstalling the shockwave player. I can't explain why.
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7-08-2008 @ 9:45AM
funkonaut said...
Didn't work for me at all. Flash apps would load, but I Flash never registered any mouse clicks. Uninstalled and went back to version 9. Thanks for playing, Adobe. :(
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7-08-2008 @ 10:38AM
eric f. said...
@reallycrazyguy, if they are working on a new version, that kinda implies that they are trying to make it better.
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7-08-2008 @ 11:35AM
tom.b said...
It works great on my 2.2GHz MacBook, but on my 867MHz PowerBook, YouTube is unwatchable due to the previously mentioned blocky green artifacts.
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7-08-2008 @ 10:18PM
gtoast said...
Tried it on 10.4.11 on a Dual 1.24ghz PowerPC G4. Not quite ready for prime time...
In most flash apps green lines appear all over the display.
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7-09-2008 @ 4:04PM
Brent Hobbs said...
I have the same problem mentioned above with the uninstaller. It just hangs and quits with no indication of whether it was successful or not. Have the green blocking problem too. Maybe the two problems are linked?
On a PB G4.
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