Flash 10.2 Out of Beta

[SR71]

Flash 10.2 is out of beta and if I were you, I'd download it right now.

Excerpt:

Its biggest new feature is the Stage Video API, which promises to drastically reduce the processor load of playing back high-res video. It'll need to be enabled by content-providing sites like YouTube, Vimeo and Brightcove -- all of whom are already on the job -- but once that's done, Adobe says 1080p playback will cost you no more than 15 percent of your CPU cycles.

Source: Engadget

 

[aiqw9182]

It still uses more CPU than HTML5 video in my 1080p YouTube tests and anything other than video sees no noticeable improvement.

Also, I find it odd that they no longer support PowerPC but they still list the download as being a universal binary. Mistake? Me thinks so.

 

[newdeal]

...

yes youtube5 plugin with clicktoflash is still better than this for cpu usage however they did close the gap. I doubt they will ever be able to match html5 because its another software layer so it really can't be more efficient, I have the feeling this is the best they can do

 

[coder12]

Too bad software update doesn't take care of flash anymore--manually updating is a pain!

 

[KPOM]

It looks like it's just the 32-bit version, though. Is Flash Square still in development?

 

[narin]

Tried this out this morning on my base 11.6" Air. The couple 1080p flash videos I tried did not stutter at all like they used to. CPU usage was still 90%+ though, but it's definitely a significant improvement as far as playback goes.

 

[foiden]

Sounds good. I already have the Beta, so I'm happy to upgrade to the official release. The way they make it sound, they sound like some of those sites still need to upgrade their software in order to truly work with the new standard that heavily lowers CPU use.

 

[KPOM]

Sounds good. I already have the Beta, so I'm happy to upgrade to the official release. The way they make it sound, they sound like some of those sites still need to upgrade their software in order to truly work with the new standard that heavily lowers CPU use.

That's definitely the case. I was watching a video stream from Yahoo the other day (360p or 480p) and the CPU usage definitely shot up. Hopefully now that it's official we'll start seeing more sites make use of the hardware acceleration.

 

[Over Achiever]

Do we have to uninstall the 10.2 beta?

 

[zenio]

Just the word flash sends many into a rage.

 

[potentpotable]

Totally noob question, but how does one manually update? Delete the existing file (Flash in this instance), then DL and install the new file?

 

[Stingray454]

I heard that the new Flash version still does not provide hardware acceleration for ATI equipped Macs, can anyone confirm that? If so, big fail..

 

[MR1324]

very good performance boost with the new version of flash. i tried a few 1080P youtube videos that were previously laggy and they are now playing nice and smooth =)

 

[Marconelly]

With 1080p videos I get about the same CPU usage with 10.2 as I get with Youtube5 extension, around 18% on 13" Air, +-1% here and there. Guess it's time to ditch the Youtube5 and its never quite reliable autostart feature.