Adobe Flash Player 10.1 and AIR 2 betas are out, multi-touch and video acceleration are in (video)
By Thomas Ricker 
posted November 17th 2009 3:25AM
posted November 17th 2009 3:25AM
Here we go: Adobe just made its Flash 10.1 prerelease packages available for download in fulfillment of its Open Screen promise. The download is available for Windows, Intel-based Mac, and Linux systems with a smartphone version coming later; notably, while no other mobile OS is specifically mentioned, Adobe says that a beta for Palm webOS is slated for "later this year" on its Flash Player 10.1 page. At the moment, however, only the Windows release includes hardware-based video acceleration for H.264 video. And this is beta-ware kids, so there's more than the usual level of hazard with installing. Update: As noted by reader ZeroK2 in the comments, the release notes [warning: PDF] specify which GPUs will benefit from the hardware acceleration. These include ATI Radeon HD 3xxx and 4xxx series, Mobile Radeon HD 4xxx series, select FirePro products, Intel 4 series chipsets, the Broadcom Crystal HD decoder, and most NVIDIA ION and GeForce 8/9/1xx/2xx powered PCs. In other words, the vast majority of netbook owners with integrated GMA950 graphics need not apply.
[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
Nice! Can't wait to try this on the 4770 and Macbook Pro's Failvidia 9400M (in windows obv,)
So anyone know if it is stable? I don't flash making firefox crash every 2 seconds.
whats the point in video acceleration in these higher end chipsets..any system running these would most likely have a cpu that could decode the video fine anyways..the gma950 netbooks are the ones that need the most help arent they?
Hulu desktop on a 1080p tv required a very high end CPU , this will help fix the issue so you can build with lower end parts 8400gs are good HTPC cards because there small and cheap but they work great at h.264 support so hopefully they do a good job at this
It would be great if Engadget staff comments was visibly marked so that they're easier to notice.
I like the way he demonstrated multi touch in the browser with no multi touchi interaction what so ever and demonstrated mostly single touch gestures in the air demo.
adn I have been using multi touch in flash via TUIO for almost a year now, however its nice that adobe added support for gestures and raw data.
very cool
WHAT ABOUT FOR MY DROID?
YES - 10.1 MOBILE WILL WORK ON DROID - YAY CAPS!!!!
I use Matrox cards. I never understood why some seem to think, "IF 3-D acceleration isn't a priority, THEN 2-D probably isn't, either."
Thanks Adobe for once again screwing PPC Mac users and leaving us with a youtube that lags even in streaming SD.
If you're a PPC Mac user you've already been shafted by Apple with 10.6. So Adobe figures hey, why not screw over them PPC Mac users, Apple's already done a good job at it.
So this will help speed up Flash content on Atom based Netbooks?
Only if the netbook doesnt use the GMA 950 or 500 graphics. :)
If the Palm Pre edition has multitouch that might mean some cool apps could be made with it.
I installed 10.1 on my Macbook Pro and selected GPU acceleration but I can't tell if it helps any. It hits the GPU either way it seems.
Hmmmm.....strange.
Dell D630, X3100 (GMA965) Windows 7 Pro, I know its not supported but updated anyway just to see. Just using task manager to measure cpu usage, playing this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DUM1284TqFc&fmt=37
IE 8:
Before: 96-98%
After: 96-98%
Chrome Dev 4.0.249.0:
Before: 89-96%
After: 65-85%
Thanks for posting that, I have a D630 with X3100 and positive reports on the previous pages from people w/out a supported card got my hopes up that maybe, just maybe, they overlooked this still popular chipset...guess not.
*sigh* Another reason to kick myself for not going with the nVidia, even if it meant having to deal with the card eventually frying itself (would have been a 8XXX series equivalent Quadro card)
I'll now return to watching choppy, barely streamable SD youtube that pegs my CPU. Thanks Adobe! /sarcasm
I tried this on an Acer Revo with ION. With the windowed Hulu it works fine but go to full screen and it gets jittery.
So will my IMac with the Integrated Nvidia 9400M benefit from this update with Hardware acceleration?
Isn't it a bit... monopolistic of Nvidia and unfair on Adobe's part to have GPU-acceleration of H.264 video on select ATI and Intel chips, yet support a wide range of GeForce-based mobile and desktop GPUs?
This is supposed to be the next version and next iteration of Flash-- version 10.1. This isn't supposed to be an Nvidia-mostly-exclusive software upgrade. And, according to the other article on Engadget, this only benefits the most those who have Nvidia GPUs, especially ION-based chipsets.
There is already GPU-acceleration in the current version, but it's still not much. And, version 10.1 is supposed to be a marked improvement over it. Now, it's looking like the only improvement will benefit Nvidia more than its competitors.
http://forums.adobe.com/thread/525880
I decided to ask Adobe themselves about that compatibility list for GPUs, and why a lot more Nvidia GPUs are supported than ATI or Intel.
It has been my experience that Flash runs much, much better on Nvidia than ATI, even before this update. I know that after fighting to get full screen flash (hulu) to run smoothly, I finally swapped out one of my ATI cards for an older Nvidia and it worked much better. Since then I have switched to using Nvidia for all my media machines. Maybe there is some sort of back deal arrangement going on, I know flash performance was enough to get me to switch.
> The big advantage of the 10.1 version would be h.264 GPU acceleration. Unfortunately the Flash player needs
> a video driver that supports this. Currently, on the Mac the only driver that supports this is for the 9400M and it
> seems unlikely Apple will release drivers for the older video cards/chips they supplied in the past (such as the
> 8600/8800/etc which have h264 acceleration).
>
> Perhaps owners of such cards (including myself) can ask Nvidia nicely for new drivers..?
>
> (I expect Linux users will have similar problems with the h264 acceleration support)
Nope. The Linux drivers are more complete than that. The question now is when the relevant features will appear in the Linux version of the Flash plugin.
I just loaded it on my HP Mini 311 and and ran hulu desktop full screen at their highest quality and it worked flawlessly. This is what I have been waiting for to push this netbook into the realm of perfect. I have two powerful desktops to supplement it but the Mini 311 will not do pretty much everything I want it to.
They say (http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/flashplayer10/) that there IS 64-bit 10.1 alpha for Linux, but they'll not release it until port to other OSes...
I hate Adobe.