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Still waiting for a 64-bit Flash Player

By | December 29, 2009, 5:21pm PST

Adobe is hard at work on its next Flash Player release. Or, to be more accurate, it’s hard at work on the 32-bit version of its next Flash Player. The company publicly unveiled the 10.1 release in October at Adobe MAX 2009, and earlier this month Flash Player 10.1 Beta 2 for Windows, Macintosh, and Linux operating systems was made available for download.

Curiously, though, the October press release doesn’t mention 64-bit support at all, and the announcement of the latest beta includes only a passing link to "the latest alpha refresh" of the 64-bit Flash Player 10 prerelease for Linux.What about Windows or the Mac? Sorry, folks, no news to report.

I first commented on this topic, in July 2008 (see Dear Adobe, can we please have a 64-bit Flash player?). Today, exactly 18 months later, the wording on the Adobe TechNote page has changed slightly, but there’s still no sign of 64-bit code. In 2008, Adobe said they were "working on Flash Player support for 64-bit platforms as part of our ongoing commitment to the cross-platform compatibility of Flash Player. We have not yet announced timing or release dates." Today, the updated page still reports that Adobe Flash Player is "not supported … in a 64-bit browser." As for future plans, the company says only, "We expect to provide native support for 64-bit platforms in an upcoming release of Flash Player following the release of Flash Player 10.1."

Given the huge popularity of 64-bit hardware and operating systems these days, I’m surprised that Adobe isn’t more forthcoming with its roadmap.

Apparently Microsoft feels no pressure to deliver a 64-bit version of Silverlight either. As of April, 2009, the company officially said that x64 support would not be included in Silverlight 3, adding "We are considering this for future versions of Silverlight."

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Adobe Systems Inc., Macromedia Flash Player, 64-Bit, Network Technology, Processors, Semiconductors, Hardware, Components, Networking, Ed Bott

Ed Bott is an award-winning technology writer with more than two decades' experience writing for mainstream media outlets and online publications.

Disclosure

Ed Bott

Ed Bott is a freelance technical journalist and book author. All work that Ed does is on a contractual basis.

Since 1994, Ed has written more than 25 books about Microsoft Windows and Office. Along with various co-authors, Ed is completely responsible for the content of the books he writes. As a key part of his contractual relationship with publishers, he gives them permission to print and distribute the content he writes and to pay him a royalty based on the actual sales of those books. Ed's books written prior to fall 2011 have been distributed by Que Publishing (a division of Pearson Education) and by Microsoft Press. As of November 2011, Ed is a partner in the independent publishing company Fair Trade Digital Exchange, which exclusively publishes his books.

On occasion, Ed accepts consulting assignments. In recent years, he has worked as an expert witness in cases where his experience and knowledge of Microsoft and Microsoft Windows have been useful. In each such case, his compensation is on an hourly basis, and he is hired as a witness, not an advocate.

Ed does not own stock or have any other financial interest in Microsoft or any other software company. He owns 500 shares of stock in EMC Corporation, which was purchased before the company's acquisition of VMware. In addition, he owns 350 shares of stock in Intel Corporation, purchased more than two years ago. All stocks are held in retirement accounts for long-term growth.

Ed does not accept gifts from companies he covers. All hardware products he writes about are purchased with his own funds or are review units covered under formal loan agreements and are returned after the review is complete.

Biography

Ed Bott

Ed Bott is an award-winning technology writer with more than two decades' experience writing for mainstream media outlets and online publications. He's served as editor of the U.S. edition of PC Computing and managing editor of PC World; both publications had monthly paid circulation in excess of 1 million during his tenure. He is the author of more than 25 books on Microsoft Windows and Office, including the recently released Windows 7 Inside Out.

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RE: Still waiting for a 64-bit Flash Player
beijing2008 14th Sep
Thanks so much! copy watches
View in thread
0 Votes
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ED: They seem not to care
Randalllind 29th Dec 2009
Someone need to make a Flash killer. I would have thought Adobe would have it working for Windows 7 launch.

They had 5 years to get this working.
0 Votes
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Silverlight
silent.griffin Updated - 29th Dec 2009
Give it time.
0 Votes
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What do you mean they don't care?
ustolemyname 30th Dec 2009
Despite Ed's off-hand dismissal of 64-bit flash flash for linux, I've been using it since it came out (novemberish? Seems like forever ago), and it's been the most stable version of flash I've ever uses. sure, there's still that silly fullscreen bug, but that also affects 32bit linux versions (yes, I can acknowledge the shortcomings of my platform of choice).

All I have to say is, thanks adobe, 64-bit flash is at least as much care as you've ever given linux, and seemingly a bit more.
0 Votes
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Agreed, the 64 bit Flash for Linux is OK
Zogg 30th Dec 2009
I've been using it for over a year, and have had no additional problems with it. Adobe have been keeping it up-to-date wit respect to all their security problems as well.
0 Votes
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Contributr
Offhand dismissal?
Ed Bott 30th Dec 2009
You're projecting. I included the link to the page and everything.

Sheesh.
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64-bit flash does have some problems
drfireman 1st Jan 2010
I've been using the 64-bit flash plug-in with firefox on the last few 64-bit Fedora distributions, and I've had a lot of crashing problems. The latest version seems to have cut that back quite a bit, and the latest versions of firefox seem better at containing the crashes so that only flash dies, not the whole browser. Most of the crashing for me occurs with ESPN's web site. So I would say it's not on par yet with the 32-bit version as I remember it.
0 Votes
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I thought Ed was talking Windows
Randalllind 3rd Jan 2010
When it comes to 64bit windows they don't seem to care when or if it ever get release.
0 Votes
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RE: Still waiting for a 64-bit Flash Player
beijing2008 14th Sep
Thanks so much! copy watches
0 Votes
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64-bit Firefox?
alokgovil 29th Dec 2009
Shouldn't the pressure first be on getting 64 bit browsers? Firefox has unofficial 64 bit version with no claims that it will actually work and no word on whether extensions are supported.

Firefox folks say that 64 bit version would not bring much advantage.
0 Votes
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Contributr
IE8
Ed Bott 29th Dec 2009
Has had a 64-bit version since day 1, as did IE7. The 32-bit version is enabled by default because of add-in support.
0 Votes
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Other apps to 64 bit
alokgovil 30th Dec 2009
Sure Windows OS and IE both appear in 64 bit versions (and I truly appreciate that). The pressure to get to 64 bit should not be limited to Flash however. There is a whole pile of applications that need to get to 64 bit.

Just for example, most video processing applications I have come across are 32 bit. These are able to use currently 1.5GB of RAM out of ~3.5 GB total available in the system, and they tank out on memory very quickly, and most even crash right after. Going to 64 bit OS would allow the system to have more memory (say 16 GB), but the 32 bit app can still access only 2 GB, which is not much up from 1.5GB before.

I do see that Flash needs to go 64 bit, but many others also do, including Firefox.
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Firefox is 64 bit ready
Michael Kelly Updated - 30th Dec 2009
They do not have it for general release simply because plugins (Flash especially) are still mostly 32 bit, but there are plenty of unofficial releases of 64 bit Firefox, or you can compile it yourself from source.
0 Votes
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No problems here with 64bit ...
George Mitchell 30th Dec 2009
The latest versions of 64bit Firefox are working splendid for me along with 64bit Flash. In fact I am really not having an issue with any plugins being missing other than Real Player which I have learned to live without. Pretty sad when there is no 64bit Real Player for Linux, but Windows Media stuff works flawlessly on 64bit Linux. And I believe that even 32bit Real Player could be implemented with nswrapper, but it is easier to just choose a Windows Media stream instead. These latest 64bit Firefox releases have been really totally trouble free for me and fast as lightning, especially when used with OpenDNS. Video, everything, just roles.
0 Votes
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64bit browser useless without flash
Randalllind 29th Dec 2009
Facebook and Youtube is useless cause you need flash.

This is the problem with IE8 64bit it is fast but if you can't access sites that use flash it pretty useless.

You think flash is no big deal until you find news , social sites etc unable to watch videos or play games etc due to lack of flash.
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nspluginwrapper
Yagotta B. Kidding 30th Dec 2009
Or else use a browser like Konqueror which doesn't call plugins directly as subroutines.
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Agreed, 64bit IE8 is much faster ....
babyboomer57 7th Jan 2010
but every time you access a page with flash on it the browser pauses slowing it down drastically.

I am really surprised that Adobe has stumbled on this front. Maybe they need some new programmers.
0 Votes
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Say what?
Yagotta B. Kidding 30th Dec 2009
Shouldn't the pressure first be on getting 64 bit browsers? Firefox has unofficial 64 bit version with no claims that it will actually work and no word on whether extensions are supported.

I've been using 64-bit Firefox for years. Works fine.

In fact, the reason I need a 64-bit version of Flash is because I have a 64-bit Firefox and don't want to use nspluginwrapper.
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RE: Still waiting for a 64-bit Flash Player
The Rifleman 29th Dec 2009
It's not just Adobe. It's the whole mentality of many. I use 64-Bit Linux and 64-Bit Windows Vista and enjoy safe and secure computing in both. Not to mention how fast and stable they both are!

Windows Vista 64-Bit has no evidence of the complaints that plagued the 32-Bit side. I have seen none of that nonsense in 64-Bit Vista.

Where can you find 32-Bit hardware in the mainstream anymore? It's all 64-Bit. So why on God's green earth would you run a 32-Bit O.S. now?

My 2 year old Toshiba Satellite came with 32-Bit Vista. It is much happier with a 64-Bit O.S. even though it has an A.M.D. processor. That 32-Bit backward compatibility in the processor was to enhance the 32-Bit Compatibility Mode in 64-Bit Windows and other Operating Systems. It was not meant to run a 32-Bit Operating System, just enhance 32-Bit program operation.

It's time to say goodbye to 32-Bit stuff and get with the program.
0 Votes
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RE: Still waiting for a 64-bit Flash Player
spark555 29th Dec 2009
I'm still waiting for Adobe to deliver a version of Flash that can accurately index into any MP3 recording made at a rate other than 44.1 KHz CBR.

How can any supposed "media" platform not be able to have their client move forward 30 seconds on an arbitrary piece of recorded MP3 audio, and leave this as a permanent known bug for years?

http://www.longtailvideo.com/support/forum/Bug-Reports/12313/Specific-example-of-the-MP3-seeking-bug-

http://labs.boulevart.be/index.php/2008/12/19/flash-mp3-player-seeking-bug/

http://gotoandlearnforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=29&t=18689&p=92302#p92302

Can anyone at Adobe be bothered to play a file accurately at any rate other than 44.1 KHz as they ponder the far greater complexity of offering a 64 bit implementation (which would likely include this well documented sound object basic design flaw?)
0 Votes
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They have years worth of security bugs to fix in 32 bit first
Johnny Vegas 29th Dec 2009
Wouldn't the world be better off if they tackled those first?
0 Votes
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No
gmclean 30th Dec 2009
If people had that attitude we'd still be using 8 bit software wink. Seriously, security will always be an on-going concern. If you waited until software was foolproof it would never get upgraded.
0 Votes
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RE: Still waiting for a 64-bit Flash Player
dmkahn Updated - 29th Dec 2009
big yawn, Ed. Did you articulate why we should care?
0 Votes
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Why we care
LeoD 29th Dec 2009
You may not care but there are a couple of reasons that other people care.

The main reason I, personally, care is that Flash isn't only used within standalone web browsers. It can be useful to display webpages, or flash files, within the UI of other programs. If that other program is 64-bit you have a problem on your hands.

(I faced this problem and had to spent a lot of time writing a 32-to-64-bit proxy process to let me host Adobe Flash and Adobe Reader in a 64-bit process. Work that Adobe should have done once and for everyone, instead of leaving it up to third parties.)

Until we have 64-bit Flash, nobody can switch to using 64-bit browsers which in turn means nobody can write *other* browser plugins that support 64-bit.

When you have multiple components that need to talk to each other on the same machine, it's a lot easier if they can all be 64-bit on a 64-bit machine. Right now it's Adobe who are blocking that from happening and making other people do extra work.

Given that 64-bit isn't going away, and is now being sold as the default option on many mainstream PCs, it's about time Adobe embraced it.

Having ported several projects to 64-bit now, I don't know what is holding them up, either. Apparently the Flash bytecode was designed around x86 but they've had years and years and years to sort that out now and have really run out of excuses. They also already have ports of at least subsets of Flash for non-x86 machines. It seems like the company fears x64 for some stupid reason. (I can only think of one Adobe product that supports 64-bit: Photoshop CS4.)

I don't even like or want to use either of Adobe Flash or Adobe Reader/PDF. Like RealPlayer and QuickTime before them, they're awful products/formats that people are forced to use because they cannot control which formats others create media in. (At least QuickTime is now playable without installing any Apple junk, and there are other PDF readers too, of course.)
0 Votes
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Can Adobe do 64 bit?
jscott418 30th Dec 2009
What is Adobe waiting for with 64 bit. I mean all three major operating systems have 64 bit. But I guess Firefox is still 32 bit only. Not sure about Chrome. IE 8 has 64 bit. I guess the question is. Does anyone really care?
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Firefox has been 64 bit for years on Linux
bjrosen@... 30th Dec 2009
The Linux version of Firefox has been 64 bits for years and the beta 64 bit Flash plugin works fine. I'm surprised that they haven't officially released the 64 bit Linux FLASH plugin, it's certainly a lot more solid then the leaky PDF plugin which they've been shipping for years.
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Not a problem with Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala
D T Schmitz Updated - 30th Dec 2009
Linux has Adobe Flash 64-bit:
http://labs.adobe.com/downloads/flashplayer10_64bit.html

Folks give Ubuntu 9.10 a try. It's FREE.


Dietrich T. Schmitz
Linux Advocate
0 Votes
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RE: Still waiting for a 64-bit Flash Player
jlward4th 30th Dec 2009
If you want to see 64-bit Flash Player then the best thing you can do is go vote for this feature request:
https://bugs.adobe.com/jira/browse/FP-570

Currently that feature request is not even in the top 35 highest voted Flash Player bugs / feature requests. Showing Adobe that 64-bit is something that many people want is an important step in getting it higher on the priority list.

-James
0 Votes
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64 bit here
BP314 30th Dec 2009
My system is 64-bit, Ubuntu Linux. I have Adobe's Flash
installed from restricted and am using Google's Chrome
browser. I don't know how it all is done under the hood
but it works, I can watch all the YouTube videos I want
with the best of them!
0 Votes
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Good your happy
the_fiddler_on_the_roof 30th Dec 2009
But did you know, you can experience the same with 32-bit Ubuntu? I didn't think so. YouTube videos are not specific to 32-bit or 64-bit.
0 Votes
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Heh.
BP314 30th Dec 2009
You miss the point, my operating system is 64-bit
and whether or not the flash plug-in is is up to
the voodoo of how it is actually implemented.
From my point of view I do not have issues being
in a 64-bit environment which is what this story
is actually about silly By the way, if you don't use
Internet Explorer on Windows in 64-bit then
generally other browsers will display flash
content (in a 32-bit sandbox).
0 Votes
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What the he77 does "have 64 bit" mean?
People 30th Dec 2009
Drives me nuts to read people say that some software 'have 64 bit.'.

Sorry. Just a peeve of mind.
0 Votes
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Most Users Still on 32bit Platform
jpr75_z 30th Dec 2009
I have made the move to 64bit with Win7, but most users/companies are still on the old 32bit platform and will be for some time. Software makers see no rush to create 64bit apps. This is unfortunate, but hopefully we will start seeing more 64bit apps, along with parallel processing support in application software soon.
0 Votes
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MS was slow in adopting 64bit for Windows ...
George Mitchell 30th Dec 2009
Linux distros were putting out 64bit versions long before 64bit Windows arrived on the scene and this, in part, explains why Windows users are still waiting for 64bit apps. Nearly all Linux apps have been available in 64bit for some time now, especially those dealing with video applications. As far as I know all of the major Linux video editing apps have 64bit versions at this point and Fluendo provides a 64bit version of their video player with browser plugins for most of the major video formats, mpeg4, wmv, etc.
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MS too slow in adopting 64-bit?
the_fiddler_on_the_roof Updated - 30th Dec 2009
Your post mentions no hard dates. I guess searching Wikipedia is too time consuming.

For your information, Windows NT was released for 64-bit ALPHA processors as native 64-bit OS, and Intel 64-bit processors received their native Windows Server 2003 version in April 2005. Windows XP 64-bit version was based on the same codebase as Windows Server 2003 64-bit.

So if you can enlighten us about 64-bit Linux distros on 64-bit Unix platforms, give it a rest.

Also, for your information, Internet Explorer 5.x was released for HP-UX 10.x and Solaris 8 (SPARC64), both of them 64-bit platforms.

And finally, since all Linux apps are supposed to be open source, what exactly (aside from deep emotional reasons) held developers from configuring them to build on 64-bit Windows platform?

Do you research any sources before you make yourself publicly a desperate, highly opinionated but highly fact-missing reader?
0 Votes
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You make it sound like Windows was first out the gate ...
George Mitchell 30th Dec 2009
According to Wikipedia:

"Because 64-bit drivers for most devices were not available until early 2007, using 64-bit Microsoft Windows operating system was considered impractical. However, the trend is changing towards 64-bit computing as most manufacturers provide both 32-bit and 64-bit drivers nowadays, so this issue is most likely to occur when attempting to use older peripherals. It should be noted that Linux/Unix operating systems do not have such problems with open source drivers that are already available for a 32-bit OS, as 64 bit builds can be made from them."

In a practical sense, 64bit Windows was vaporware before the driver problem got fixed, but 64bit Linux worked from the get go. The same is true of the apps. Linux has a full set of 64bit apps while Windows is just recently moving to 64bit in the applications world. Windows works well for a lot of things, but making transitions like this is not one of them. But apparently it is difficult for you to acknowledge that Windows might have a few shortcomings.
0 Votes
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pointless argument
drfireman 1st Jan 2010
Both Windows and Linux, so far as I can tell have been doing 64-bit for a long time. I can't see any point to arguing about who was there first, especially as both have had issues. I've been using 64-bit Linux (Fedora) for several years now, and Flash has been the only (very minor) issue. And I was pretty late switching to 64-bit.

Porting code from Linux to Windows (and vice versa) is not always trivial, open source or not. If the code was designed from day 1 to be portable, it helps a lot, because that usually implies the OS-specific bits are relatively contained. But it can still be quite difficult. If the application relies on external code to support portability, that can either make it a smoother or a rougher transition, depending on when that external code becomes 64-bit compatible.

In my experience, updating code to run natively on 64-bit architectures is not difficult, but it can be quite time-consuming, especially if doing so involves coordinating a bunch of interrelated codebases. I'm sure Adobe could make the transition quite smoothly if they wanted to, but it take some commitment.
0 Votes
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Adobe and 64-bit = oxymoron
the_fiddler_on_the_roof 30th Dec 2009
It's time that the Feds started having a look how Adobe's PDF Reader and Web browser plugins monopolized the market and hampered innovation by providing sub-standard, obsolete 32-bit versions, full of holes, and not doing job good enough to fix security vulnerabilities quicker.

Same would go for any "freeware" applications that by default are bundled with Google Search toolbar for IE. At the bare minimum, the "freeware" apps should not install any 3rd party software in "Default" type of installation; it should be punishable by law.

It appears that using Microsoft's tactics from many years ago goes unnoticed by the same political groups so mad about Microsoft's monopoly.
0 Votes
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No 64 bit for Windows?
storm14k 30th Dec 2009
The Linux version works pretty well. They seem to keep developing on that.

All in all I think both Adobe and MS are ignoring 64 bit in RIA because they know this isn't going anywhere. There just really isn't much point in it. What else could it be? The OS's are certainly going 64 bit so not working on it is suicide.
0 Votes
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Great Opportunnity for Silverlight
Narg 12th Jan 2010
This is a big hole that Microsoft should jump on. If they could get a 64-bit compatible Silverlight player out, and quickly then Silverlight could overtake Flash in a very short period of time. Once folks see how much more faster and more stable the 64-bit browsers are, then it'd be a no-brainer on what product to use.
0 Votes
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How about 64 bit Firefox?
jscott418 25th Jan 2010
I am still waiting for 64 bit Firefox too. Yes Flash 64 bit would be great but the lack of many 64 bit browsers almost negates the Flash 64 issue.
0 Votes
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Other Players?
panelshop 25th Jan 2010
Does anyone else make a suitable 64bit flash style player?

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