by Paul Betlem
Created
Today we’re making available a preview of Adobe® Flash® Player that we’re calling “Square.” This preview includes support for two new areas, namely enhanced support for Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 9 Beta and native 64-bit support for all major desktop operating systems including Linux, Mac, and Windows.
As part of our collaboration with Microsoft’s Internet Explorer team over the past few months, Flash Player “Square” has been enhanced to directly support the hardware-accelerated graphics capabilities in the newest version of IE. Flash Player “Square” leverages the new GPU support available with Internet Explorer 9 Beta to deliver a faster and more responsive user experience. In our internal testing, we’ve seen significant improvements in Flash Player graphics performance – exceeding 35% in Internet Explorer 9 Beta compared to Flash Player running in previous versions of IE. While the performance improvements will vary based on the type of content and how it’s created, bitmap-heavy content for Flash Player will experience the greatest benefit. Content created for Flash Player that’s embedded as transparent (wmode=”transparent”) will also run more efficiently given the benefits of offloading the HTML and Flash content compositing to the GPU. Try it out by downloading the Internet Explorer 9 Beta and the Flash Player “Square” preview. We’d appreciate your feedback and observations on performance.
The community has been very vocal around the need for native 64-bit support and we’ve heard you loud and clear. Today we’re also sharing a refresh of the Linux 64-bit version of Flash Player together with the first preview of both the 64-bit Windows and Mac versions. If you’re using a 64-bit browser, I encourage you to install a 64-bit version of Flash Player and give it try. Those using the previous 64-bit version of Flash Player for Linux should find this new version even faster and more reliable. These new versions are fully functional, so all content should be compatible. We’ve found “Square” to be stable and ready for broad testing, but keep in mind this a sneak peak and not everything will be fully baked. If you encounter any issues, I’d encourage you to file a bug in our public database so we can investigate.
I hope you enjoy this early preview into some of the areas of focus for the Flash Player team. I encourage you to take the opportunity to try them out and share your feedback with us.
great news!!
Awesome. Thank you. Keep up the good work guys.
I wonder if Hulu Plus will stream properly through Hulu Desktop now…
Is there going to be a debug version of this 64 bit Flash Player preview? As a flash dev I can’t do without it. Unfortunately I have been having a lot of problems with the current FP 10 debug player on my 64bit windows 7 box running FireFox.
Sounds very exciting, can’t wait to start using it
You guys are awesome. Keep up the good work!
“The community has been very vocal around the need for native 64-bit support and we’ve heard you loud and clear. ”
Does this mean the Mac version of the Flash player will actually be worth the download?
This are great news. Thank you adobe for listening to us.
are you planning to add gpu acceleration to the linux plugin? it’s nice that you released a 64bit plugin thanks
Please add Pulseaudio support!
So pleased that 64bit Flash is FINALLY here! I just want to totally ditch 32bit software altogether and move wholeheartedly to 64bit computing.
F I N A L L Y!!!
Great News! I’m installing Flash Player “Square” now
)
Any word on a version of Square for Solaris?
Does “Square” render “Gala” obsolete then? In other words, does Square contain everything Gala does/did for Mac?
Also, I second Jeff Fall, there needs to be a debug version of this before we, flash developers, can start using it.
Pulseaudio, yes please!
What about FreeBSD ?
how about older codecs in flv like sorenson spark ,on2 vp6 ,adpcm & mp3.
i suspect that these codec have made transition to 64bit codec.
p.s. sorry for my english grammar because it’s not my native language.
Taking almost all CPU times while watching video on my mac — is it good?
Hey Adobe!
How about you implement a check-for-updates feature into Flashplayer?
How about you extend Adobe Updater so that it also checks for Flashplayer and Shockwave Player plugins?
And how come you didn’t to so already? [clip]
Adobe began to be more open lately. I like this.
Where/how can I submit bug reports?
Native 64-bit Linux support? This was much needed. Thank you.
Too little too late. Flashs flakyness on 64 bit systems has already diminished it’s reputation as robust multimedia plattform. I doubt this will regain much market- or developer mindshare.
Nice to finally see a 64-bit browser addin. Now I just hope Adobe actually starts to develop with security in mind. Bloody annoying to have to package and deploy new versions every other week due to security holes.
Plain end-user here; just wanted to thank you for your work on the linux version of the plug-in. It’s nice to see a major software company supporting my choice of OS. Also, I’m with Bob from a couple of posts up: if you sneak some of that GPU-supported acceleration goodness into the linux version I swear I won’t tell your bosses. Promise!
Will it work with Vista Home Premium 64-bit…and with IE8…and with Firefox? Will we have to have separate 32-bit and 64-bit versions (like Java)?
Just don’t include freaking optional installers in the installer. My users are too dumb to uncheck the box. They then have 40 toolbars on their browser.
flash sux anyways. html5 ftw!
Yes, yes and yes! I’m using the 64-bit minefield nightly and this finally works. I plan to spend my next 24 hours on z0r.de.
Great to see graphics improvements outside the mobile space, but IE9-only? Hmm…
Very Nice!! But unfortunately there isn’t a really notable performance improvement….
HHUUUGGE BUG here: http://www.aviary.com/online/filter-editor?fguid=a902b9ee-c547-102b-b565-0030488e168c
Compare that to flash player 10.1
Oooah, GPU acceleration for Internet Explorer. That’s great, except that Internet Explorer sucks and is a pain to use. I would consider GPU acceleration in other browsers like Firefox and Chrome to be a higher priority, since they are cross platform and better and more useable in every possible way.
I’ve really been looking forward to 64bit linux support for a long time! Thanks guys
Is it bad that the chief reason I want to download this is just because I don’t have to spend 20 minutes trying to figure out how to download it without the insufferable Download Manager?
No thanks HTML5 is already my choice. Thanks for trying but too little too late. FREEDOM FOREVER!
Aren’t freedom and internet about choice? And not limiting choice about technology or anything else…
You will be charged for saying freedom, I believe either Microsoft or Apple has patented that, oh and HTML5!
Well, if you mean that they’re patentholders of the HTML5′s H.264 video, than yes!
It’s about time! Do you have a final release date yet?
VDPAU/GPU accel on Linux? Otherwise Flash video plays like crap at 720p+
So I can get Flash in Safari now?
Any chance it will finally support multipule monitors? I hate not being able to watch full-screen on a secondary monitor without an out of date hack.
Interesting to see the direction Adobe hopes the rest will also decide upon. I hope Adobe beats Apples narrow minded view on things…
Still tearing on linux… sigh…
Although it has improved in terms of sysload, so thats something…
I’d be more impressed if the link to the Mac OS X uninstaller resolved.
When i first heard the news i thought “yay great, finally”….but everytime i want to visit a flash site in the new Internet Explorer 9 Beta it (the site) crashes. I tested it on several computers, everywhere the same thing =/ . When i disable the new flash player add-on everything works just great.
Im very disappointed.
I still feel like you are lagging behind Unity. Their code is 60 times faster and has hardware support. A 0.35 performance boost in ONE browser is really nothing.
What happened? You were pushing the limits of the internet, now you’re lagging behind.
I cant start this square activeX on my 64 bit Windows 7. I install it correctly. In IE 9 Beta in add-on section i see correct information about plugin. But when I open for example http://www.adobe.com/software/flash/about/ to see is it really works it crashes my browser. What could be a reason?
I have also a problem adding .dll shiped with this ActiveX to my Visual Studio project. Is it possible to use .dll API in this release?
yeah I dont use IE, period…. and WHEN will we get flash for SYMBIAN?????
also, I thought it was available on android??? its not for my mates new galaxy S.. or will froyo include it? I would think the flash download page would at least detect android and mention it…
my cpu playing video at 0 % usage and if it heavy it raise to range 10 on the 32 bit was 1172 % on 32 bit wow
it DO NOT work for ie 9 beta 64bit on my win server 08 r2 system.why?
Flash should be axed. Security flaw after security flaw. But mostly because it CONSTANTLY causes my computer to crash when playing video. I really hate it.
This is my constructive criticism.
Include anything useful Adobe has to offer in the open web standards.
This new flash is way to buggy. I cant play any flash games on FB it uses 100% cpu and the games go super slow to a crawl to freeze. reverting back to 10.1 till that is fixed. i have win 7 and ie9 32bit browser, does the same on the 64bit browser as well.
Only reason Adobe released 64 bit flash as HTML 5 will kill Flash… Flash is a joke..
Thanks, Flash team! I’ve been waiting for real hardware accelerated playback for a long time.
To those posting complaints about it not working, it’s a preview release for goodness sake. If you find a problem, try http://bugs.adobe.com/flashplayer/
Brilliant!
I have 64-bit Linux with dual monitors, and I can finally play videos full-screen on one of them at good framerates without getting garbage on the second monitor.
Today, after some months being in the dark, so to speak, I am able to view youtube and such. Thanks to SQUARE which easily installed in Ubuntu 10.04 . Works a treat.. Thank you so much for the
Good news: Finally, 64-bit Flash Player!!
Bad news: My browser (Opera) is not doing anything at all to adopt 64-bit natively. Well, I still have IE to test on.
Now I wish I can see the standalone Player in 64-bit. I use it just as frequent as the Web Player.
Please add Pulseaudio support for Flash Player Square
useful information thank
Looks promising the 64 bit plugin. Runs smoothly.
But missing video acceleration on linux could be easily added:
Just use the VA API and you will see all video card manufactors will support their backends for VA API faster than you think.
Atm not all cards are supported but its the most general API and having flash video acceleration is one of the current problems in using linux desktops if you need youtube etc.
I like the flash player features. Very good tool and very good supportive information
Finally! This is an intelligent more. Flash performance should improve a lot if 64 bit support is implemented properly.
Thanks! I was really upset about having to use nspluginwrapper again…
Hurrah to native 64 bit
Hoep the 64-bit Plugin will work fine as i got much problems with windows 7 and 64 bit plugins.
Finally i can use the 64 Bit Plugin and proper good results when watching films on two monitors. Not like before where i just got Crap on the second one.
Yeaha
thanks alot.
Hey, where’s the 64-bit content debugger versions?
Well it breaks about 30% of the sites with flash..that used to play on the older plugins
Firefox 3.6.8, Debian Linux AM64..
When it works, it works well.
When it doesn’t, its a frozen screen.