Prince McLeanThe new Universal Binary Flash 10.1 works with Firefox, Opera and Safari and fixes a variety of outstanding problems. Chrome is notably absent from Adobe's list of supported browsers on the Mac. The 10.1 release is also being offered for Windows, Linux and Solaris users, along with a beta version that works with Android 2.2.
The latest Safari 5 ships with Flash Player 10.0; Mac users wanting to upgrade to the latest version of Flash can do so at Adobe's download site.
Flash privacy failure
Among the new features of Flash 10.1 is support for browser privacy features, which prevent Flash local data and browsing activity from persisting locally if the user has turned on the private browsing feature.
However, Adobe says this feature is not supported for Opera or Safari, meaning that Flash content won't respect users' private browsing preferences.
Another feature of Flash 10.1 is new DRM content protection that limits playback of video content over analog or digital outputs. However, that feature is only enforced on Windows.
Preview support for hardware accelerated video
The new Flash Player 10.1 release doesn't yet include official support for hardware video acceleration, a new feature Apple just enabled Adobe to provide with new Mac OS X APIs.
However, Adobe is making its second preview release of "Gala" H.264 hardware decoding available for download for users who want to try it out.
The new H.264 hardware acceleration will enable new Flash videos encoded using H.264 to play more efficiently on Mac hardware, as QuickTime X already does for raw, non-Flash H.264 video for users with modern Macs (equipped with NVIDIA 9400M or better graphics) and Snow Leopard.
Mobile beta for Android
A second beta release for Android 2.2 was also released, along with the claim by Adobe that more than 250 million smartphones would be able to run Flash Player by 2012, also phrased as 53% of the 300 million smartphones it expects to be sold two years from now.
Adobe also said it plans to bring Flash Player to HP's Palm OS, Microsoft's Windows Phone 7, Nokia's Symbian OS, and RIM's BlackBerry OS at some point in the future. Apple has passed on supporting a version of Flash Player for its iOS devices, with the company's chief executive Steve Jobs saying recently that Adobe failed to ever demonstrate a version of Flash Player that could perform well enough to include on the iPhone.
Charles Martin
Marko Zivkovic
Wesley Hilliard
Andrew Orr
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266 Comments
but the real question is... will it blend?
really, if they can't manage consistency with two of the major browsers out there, what exactly are they doing? Considering what they charge for most of their development software, you'd expect all of their software to be extremely well-maintained.
but the real question is... will it blend?
really, if they can't manage consistency with two of the major browsers out there, what exactly are they doing? Considering what they charge for most of their development software, you'd expect all of their software to be extremely well-maintained.
One would think so, yes. Unfortunately, the Adobe that all feared when they they bought out (crushed) Macromedia has come alive. It's the Microsoft of the early 90's, without the monopoly. An aging giant Adobe is, and it had better get its shit together before long or it will fade into history.
I tried 10.1 on my Mac using my daughter's favorite Flash site, www.webkinz.com.
Unfortunately, it's not a heck of a lot better than 10.0. Running about100% CPU utilization on my Mac Mini (4 GB RAM, 2.5 GHz Core 2 Duo). The old version went to around 110-120% CPU utilization on a MacBook Pro with 2.33 GHz Core 2 Duo and 3 GB of RAM. The reduction in CPU usage is pretty much in line with system capabilities.
If it's still requiring 100% of a 2.5 GHz Core 2 Duo with 4 GB of RAM, why would anyone think it would ever work on an iPhone?
Another Adobe Fail.
Just in time for zero day exploit. flash was removed a long time ago!!
In addition to the other negatives listed, 10.1 cannot run under 64-bit browsers -- so it cannot be installed as a plugin to 64-bit IE.
Jobs is right -- they're lazy.