Adobe's Flash Player 'Gala' OS X preview tested: results may vary
By Chris Ziegler 
posted April 28th 2010 11:30PM
posted April 28th 2010 11:30PM
| Gala1 | Flash 101 |
| 2.40GHz Core i5, NVIDIA GeForce GT 330M 256MB2 | ||
| Safari 4.0.5 | 95.4 - 152.8 | 74.2 - 123.5 |
| Firefox 3.6.4 | 83.5 - 148.4 | 89.4 - 130.5 |
| 2.66GHz Core i7, NVIDIA GeForce GT 330M 512MB2 | ||
| Safari 4.0.5 | 59 - 64 | 96 - 132 |
| Firefox 3.6.4 | 69 - 79 | 111 - 140 |
So we just put a few minutes aside to put Adobe's new "Gala" build of Flash 10.1 through its paces on our latest-generation Core i5 and i7 15-inch MacBook Pros here, and the results are a little confusing to say the least. On our i7 equipped with the high-res display and 512MB GeForce GT 330M, processor utilization playing a 1080p sample video on YouTube dropped by a third to a half on average -- not bad -- with Safari 4.0.5 besting Firefox 3.6.4 by a smidge. Our i5 saw strangely different numbers, though, with Gala actually increasing the load on the CPU by as much as about 20 percent. Adobe is quick to note that this is nothing more than a rough preview release; Apple just unlocked access to the necessary hardware a few days ago, after all, and we're sure the company still has plenty of optimization to do. Ultimately, if our i7 figures are realistic, it should make high-def Hulu a decidedly less drama-packed experience down the road.
Notes:
1 Performance measured by processor utilization (note that numbers greater than 100 are possible on multi-core machines).
2 15.4-inch high resolution display, 256GB SSD, 4GB RAM
fiiirst
wow down ranked so fast? i thought all the cool kids where doing this... you know, for the hurr durrs
@Moyg
According to Apple (http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/internet_utilities/adobeflashplayer.html)
"The STANDARD for delivering high-impact, rich web content. Designs, animation and application user interfaces are deployed immediately across all browsers and platforms, attracting and engaging users with a rich web experience."
---
So, who are they kidding?! :)
@Kensai I'm pretty sure that Apple itself doesn't write all of the descriptions of Apps in their Downloads page.
@acslater017
Getting 20-30% CPU decrease on my MBP w/ 9400/9600m
MacBook with Flash? they blew it
@SteveyAyo
From what I see, CPU utilization just went up.
They did blow it.
@Aaquibn
The fact that flash needs to be benchmarked means they blew it!!!!
@SteveyAyo finally dump that laptop with shiny logo and let's talk about interesting news
@SteveyAyo
Damn! Adobe is lazy when it comes to Mac software. ClickToFlash FTW.
@SteveyAyo mmm
On my PC (XP, 2yr old 3Ghz C2D) I'm getting 20% CPU on YouTube Tron Legacy 1080p both on latest Firefox and Safari, and 50-60% on full screen, using Flash 10.1 RC2.
Adobe (or Apple) still long way to go.
I wonder how Mac runs with Windows Flash? Anyone?
@MosesusedaniPad, yeah, how do they dare to release a testing version utilizing new APIs 6 days after they were announced... Lazy bastards!
@mrpixel Just noticed Safari taking up 200mb of Ram (and climbing) with just Youtube open, and Firefox is taking up 140mb (stable) with 6 tabs open (including the same youtube page). Just wondering who's lazy?
@mrpixel Silverlight is awesome... i use photosynth all the time and am getting into pivot to see what i can do with it LiveLabs FTW
@mrpixel
If they are using the acceleration hardware in the GPU, video playback should be no more than 20% of a single core. These numbers are really truely and genuinely sad. They can't be using the Mac equivalent of vdpau or purevideo.
Something is very wrong here...
@jedi
It's a BETA release...chill!
Obv. something is wrong, we can see that from the bench's.
@Aaquibn
Windows had this years ago, why is apple always so far behind? Oh yeah, they are a small company that makes toys.
@mrpixel
Safari on Windows is using 150mb of ram here, 7 tabs open including youtube and it is noticeably faster than Firefox. With 4 gigs of ram who gives a shit?
needs more flash in it
Shenanigans!
Is this good or bad?
Just installed it on my i7, seems good...
Doubt this will improve things.
@Dr Kwame Nkrumah Did you even read the article?
Why doesn't this work on ATI GPU's Apple? (I assume the external developer API is non-GPU specific, putting the onus on Apple, not Adobe)
@Jeff Kibuule - That's sad for the iMac user. But I wouldn't surprise since most of the CS5 apps only support GPU acceleration on Nvidia card. Something to do with CUDA? I don't know.
@Jeff Kibuule
Because the macbook pro's never shipped with discreet ati gpu's. That's all this is doing, letting flash access the discreet gpu for video playback.
@RauBurger
So what, efficiency only matters when battery power is involved? I'd rather use my CPU cycles elsewhere and use my GPU for something besides drawing a few pixels here and there.
@RauBurger
also looking back, it did say supports gpu's such as..., so I guess it really isn't excluding it.
My first post was wrong, I do admit.
@Jeff Kibuule
It's not really about the GPU itself, it's about the GPU having a H.264 hardware decoder. The NVIDIA chips have the H.264 decoder and the ATI ones don't.
@TheNightPhoenix
every Ati Radeon HD GPU has a UVD/UVD2 and with that a decent H264 decoder. Ati was first with decent decoding capabilities, and their UVD2 can decode 2 FullHD Streams simultaniously and unlike the nVidia products has inbuild HD Audio too.
In Windows this works very well with Flash, so it might be Apples fault or even laziness not Adobes.
Not so great on the low end Mac mini. I switched back to regular 10.1 But then I have no problem playing 1080p youtube or high res hulu before the "gala" update
I still think this is more of Adobe being lazy, while it's nice to have GPU acceleration, it should take it to play a 720P video, Quicktime,Stage6, even Silverlight are proof of that
Buggy flash ftw. Runs faster on a slower machine!
@jmaine
lrn2read
lower numbers are better
@guroth
Did you read it? Flash with hardware acceleration (Gala) performs worse in Safari and better-to-wors in Firefox on Core i5.
Is that supposed to be Firefox 3.6.3?
@Chris Ziegler
Did you check to see if the if Flash was using discrete graphics hardware on the 2.40GHz Core i5 mbp?
http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/21/macbook-pros-with-nvidia-geforce-gt-330m-silicon-making-question/
@Tohe I was just about to say this myself. Might this have to do with the computer not switching to hardware acceleration perhaps, Engadget?
@Mach
even the Intel HD is very capable of decoding FHD (Flash player under Windows supports it). In fact the Intel HD video capabilities are somewhat more advanced than nVidias. The switching of graphics in the new MBPs needs some rethinking, because there's absolutely no reason to switch for video playback or photos.
Dammit Adobe. Stop making software for a company that hates you and work on your Linux support.
@p0p0
What's Linux...
How dare Adobe! Too lazy to make perfectly working beta software. What do you think this is, Alpha stage?
@Anatidae Perfectly working?
@Atkins It is sometimes hard to convey the level of sarcasm I want in these comments.
I think Adobe and Flash are attacked to harshly, especially now that Apple has made pop-shots at Adobe.
I get that people might not like ads. Flash or not, advertisement is here to stay and if you know anything about ad production - they are build at the last minute, always rushed, and any code is often a hack job. Flash, Javascript, etc... it often isn't baked well.
And I could care less if the Flash player isn't open source or open standards. It is consistent because of that. The SWF format is open source and anyone could make their own player. But clearly no one wants to do the work to build a lightweight, robust player across multiple platforms for free.
And that is what bugs me most about the attacks on Adobe. Come on, Flash is free. You don't have to install it. I am sure some people claim they don't (what, all 2% of you). But it is not like you are paying for it.
You would think that a company that gives you something at no cost would get more support. Adobe will exist if Flash ever does die off. I can't imagine that they sell more of the Flash authoring tool than they do copies of Photoshop, Illustrator, Indesign, etc... Dreamweaver will be supporting more and more HTML5 quick authoring tools. If anything, if a real alternative to Flash would present itself and take over, Adobe would actually make more money because they wouldn't have to spend so much development costs in supporting a free plug-in and could just focus completely on their authoring tools.
@Anatidae
Oh please. Attacked too harshly? Flash has been a disaster since Adobe bought Macromedia. Adobe just tacks more and more code on old and bloated software and hasn't bothered to develop powerful, efficient software in over a decade. There's no excuse.
Silverlight can play video at a fraction of the CPU usage--I watched the Olympics that way, and did so using the existing APIs available to Mac developers. Flash performance is terrible across the board, doubly so on OS X and Linux, and some hardware acceleration of video playback isn't going to change its performance in other areas.
As for Flash being "free", that's a load of crap. Adobe provides Flash player for free for one reason alone: because it enables them to make huge sums of money. IE is far from worthless to Microsoft for the same reason, and they do everything in their power to avoid losing market share on their "free" product that no one should complain about, according to you. Flash's dominance is a critical part of Adobe's business--if it weren't, Adobe wouldn't care about whether or not Flash is used frivolously for video playback or navigation instead of the one place where it has a legitimate function: games.
@asfdsad
flash support is only terrible on OSX/Linux. Under Windows with the new Flash player it's performing very well even @ low powered machines. So i believe it's a problem with the APIs and drivers under Apple and Linux and not Adobe's fault.
@WiesiAut Exactly!
@asfdsad "Adobe provides Flash player for free for one reason alone: because it enables them to make huge sums of money"
It is true that Adobe makes income from the Flash authoring environment. Which is, in fact, not the only way one can generate a SWF. You don't even have to buy any Adobe products to produce SWF files for the Flash player to play.
Take a look at the Adobe product lineup. Flash is but one of dozens of applications. The big bread and butter is Photoshop. A program that has become a verb, "that image has been Photoshopped".
Adobe makes money selling content creation tools. Flash enabled them to sell tools that enabled artists to create rich media apps on the internet that would otherwise have been impossible within the limits of HTML. In the big picture, Flash has helped the browsing experience far more than it has hurt it. 98%+ adoption rate is clear proof of that. If it sucked so bad, why does almost everyone have it installed on their computer?
Please give me a shout when Flash creates a player for Windows 7 that doesn't crash the browser. I wish I could find one of their old players - those seemed stable.