Yesterday, Adobe labs released a 64 bit Flash player alpha for Linux. I kind of wish where is the state of the flash player for Windows. Last Fall, I had upgraded my desktop to Vista Ultimate, and bought a new laptop with 64 bit Vista Home premium. Obviously there is an emergence of the 64 bit operating systems that come along with new windows-based systems.
It is a nice step for Adobe to persue 64 bit computing and media development. (e.g. Photoshop CS4 64 bit) But there is one thing that I wish for is to have a 64 bit Flash player. I do not delight realizing that IE’s default browser is its 64 bit equivalent and I cannot run a single embedded Flash element in it while I am developing my e-learning courses when my default browser opens IE 64 bit. There is bound to be a greater demand very soon.
For now, Adobe suggests that we use the 32 bit version of IE. I suppose I will need to uninstall 64 bit IE until Adobe comes out with a 64 bit player.
But as I ponder about this, if Silverlight manages to penetrate the browser market with 64 OS’s that is shipped with new laptops and desktops, they can put more pressure on Adobe to release a new 64 bit player. (Of course, they would need to ante up their marketing for the MAC userbase and testing beforehand.)
Maybe an announcement at MAX 2009 would be a good time (or even better at another conference like FITC. 
).
DJ
DJ:
Hi, my name’s Cody, and I’m working with the Internet Explorer Outreach Team to help answer questions folks might have about Internet Explorer.
You’re right, Adobe Flash Player is not supported for playback in a 64-bit browser. You definitely don’t have to uninstall your 64-bit copy Internet Explorer on your computer. Both 32 and 64 bit versions should both be on your PC. Here are a couple of ways to open Internet Explorer’s 32-bit version.
Here’s the first, and easiest one: simply click on the start button, then type “Internet” in the search bar. You should then see three versions of the Internet Explorer browser in the menu bar. The one that simply says “Internet Explorer” is the 32-bit version.
Here’s another way that’s a little more involved, but works well for settiing up the 32-bit version of IE as your default browser: Click on the Start Menu, go to “Computer,” open your main disk drive, and you’ll probably see one folder named Program Files and another folder marked Program Files (x86). Open the “Program Files (x86)” folder, and then you should see an “Internet Explorer” folder. Open that, and click on the “iexplore” icon. This will open the 32-bit version of Internet Explorer.
To make the 32-bit version of Internet Explorer your default browser, simply go into Control Panel, open Default Programs, and then click “Associate a file type or protocol with a program.” From there, find the file extension types you want to open with Internet Explorer 32-bit. Then click “Browse,” and simply assign those file types to the 32-bit version of IE you found on your system earlier. This should ensure that it is the default program for those particular files.
I hope this helps, let me know if you have trouble getting this working!
Thanks,
Cody
Internet Explorer Outreach Team
Thank you for the reply. I think my beef is mostly with Adobe and not with Microsoft. I mostly run on 32 bit applications. It’s just the impression that since 64-bit computing is becoming more prevalent, there is a transition to make.
DJ
DJ:
No worries! I’ve just run into lots of folks that have had the same problem/issue/general complaint about Flash players in their 64-bit machines, and wanted to make sure you had the same info I usually share with them.
Thanks,
Cody
Internet Explorer Outreach Team
What’s going on at Adobe. It is a large company that has only a defined set of things to be responsible for. There are supposed to be some of the most talented, best managed programmers in the world.
I mean, come on guys….really. No excuse.
Adobe has really lost ground with me over this Flash 64 bit issue. I’ve been on Vista 64 and now IE8 for over a year. That’s an entire year with NO Flash working for me. It’s unbelievable how lazy and behind the times Adobe is, they’re gotten too big, that’s for sure.
I don’t understand why this is a sincere problem. 64-bit flash alpha is out on linux because as far as I know it is the only option on 64-bit linux; whereas, it is seemless to run a 32-bit version of something in windows or mac in fact mac is like a constant hybrid system. Every single game on Windows is 32-bit and the vast majority of 3rd party software is as well. It is my understanding that due to the nature of Flash porting it to 64-bit has become far more complex than they had anticipated and more complex than most software ports. Basically Flash runs on everything but the iPhone now so what’s your beef? Sure the optimization of 64-bit will eventually be a benefit but its no reason to get your panties in a wad.
I think what people are trying to say here is that with all the progression in 64-bit technology for one if the most advanced companies in the industry to not have 64-bit is just kind of a let down
I have to agree it is pretty sad a company is big as Adobe cant come up with a 64 bit version of their flash player for Windows. I saw they had a Linux 64 bit version, how do you develop anything for Linux before Windows? Doesnt make any sense to me.
Hey Adobe if you want to be a serious player and taken seriously as a platform for web development, try making your products work on all browsers.
I’m similarly disgusted. Just installed Windows 7 64-bit yesterday, and almost everything worked right out of the box except for third-party **** like Flash Player and Citrix Access Manager. Why these companies haven’t updated their stuff is beyond me..
The biggest issue for is that Windows x64 is using IE x64 as embedded browser. So, I can’t view any flash in applications that uses embedded browser.
Anyone has an idea of how I can switch between them?
Wah, wah, wah. Now you know how us UNIX/Linux folks feel, Windows boy. I can’t wait until Flash dies.
LOL!!!! I am happy now I can understand UNIX/Linux people.
October now and still no 64-bit flash, it’s ridiculous. How long have we had 64bit windows? 2 years? Beats me. I’d be pissed of if it wasn’t for the fact that Windows 7 is such a bloated pile of festering poo I might end up installing Ubuntu anyway…
Windows 7 is officially out and there are many many people who is going with 64bit with the release of Windows 7. I just read in Adobe’s website that they are planning to bring 64bit Flash sometime in 2010.
Well Adobe, just **** you… Pff
@steave Windows 7 a bloated pile of poo? You must not have used it. Not that Im a windows fan boy, but 7 triumphs over vista, and is much more efficient than XP. I get a huge FPS boost playing games in 7 over XP and Vista.
i cant believe that i have been waiting for my win seven 64 bit op. system to com in and then to find out i have to run 32 bit browser if i can help push adobe faster on making it let me know
Windows 7 Rock, I hope Windows Xp goes away, I wish I never have to deal with that 9 year old operating system. Imagine, if people still ran Windows 95! I am pretty sure Adobe doesn’t want to make a 64 bit version of Flash for several reasons. One being Costs-benefit anaylst. Will the investment yield future use of their software, I doubt it. Two performance, most 64 bit software RUN SLOWER when they are forced to work with a mixed 32 / 64 bit enviroment. If it does run faster it doesn’t really matter because most 64 bit enabled CPU’s are fast enough to play that video no problem, AND if you are running 64 bit, that means you most likely have 4 GB of ram. How much faster do you want youporn to load? Finally, I come to my last point. As long as Windows 64 bit machines only make up a small %, they will not make 64 bit flash. We will see 32 bit for a long time to come!
The thing is that many new computers that are being sold are 64bit compliant and Adobe is making the move of creating 64 bit applications like Photoshop and Lightroom. Also they have a 64 bit flash player for Linux on labs. So I am sure that they are putting 64 bit computing. A possible concern is that Adobe just had another layoff, so I am not sure if they would have enough resources to build a 64bit flash player. They can boast about having 90% penetration of having the flash player in every computer, but they would need to include another population set regarding 64bit Windows computing. (Or Mac, or Linux moreover). That data would be an interesting read.
@Kirk Benett I suggest that you can get to the Adobe JIRA bug list site, register, and make your complaint there. There are many 64bit related issues here. URL Link: https://bugs.adobe.com. Click on the “Flash Player” link, and either you can post a new feature request or add more comments.
[...] had already posted this issue on my blog beforehand. Now that Windows 7 has been released, there is a growing demand to have a [...]
Hi guys, just wanted to say I use both Linux Fedora 64bit and Windows Vista 64bit. Before y’all start arguing about whether Windows or Linux is better, please remember that Adobe is testing a cross platform version of 64 bit flash on Linux that is in ALPHA release. ALPHA means totally unstable. The reason they are testing it on Linux first is because the Linux community is full of early adopters who know if they download an ALPHA release plugin that they can expect regular browser crashes.
If Adobe released something ALPHA and Windows users were readily able to install it and it started crashing their 64 bit IE every 5 minutes, y’all know everyone would start screaming and hollering about how Adobe could do this or everyone would start blaming Microsoft, which would just cause an endless hoopla that no-one needs.
They are testing it with the group who knows that an ALPHA release is just that, an ALPHA release, with no promise of stability, and not to be used in a critical work environment or by general users.
And yes, I understand everyone here is probably knowledgeable enough to be careful with an ALPHA release, but you know as soon as that ALPHA version of Flash 64bit for Windows Vista and 7 hits Adobe Labs, it will also go up on all the plethora of Windows download sites like Download.com and Filehippo and then every unknowledgeable user and their dog will start installing it and bombarding Microsoft and Adobe tech support with calls about why this Alpha version of Flash 64 bit is crashing their computer every time they go to youtube or facebook.
As soon as they think the Flash 64bit is stable enough that it won’t break IE, Firefox, Safari, and Chrome, they will start releasing it in Beta and letting more Operating Systems test it. Currently its ALPHA which means use at your own risk.
I been waiting for a x64 version of flash for about a year. They just keep saying it will be in an upcoming release. There are many open source and free programs and apps that come in both 32 and 64 bit, so why is a big company Adobe dragging their feet and slowing down the acceptance of 64bit OS’s. If Im running a 64bit OS I would like to keep as many programs as possible 64bit also.
I just have to say… XP is one of the best OS’s ive used. Ive just moved to 7 x64 (Got it on my college course with MSDNAA:D) and this is just rediculous ive had to install x86 firefox to run it and (astonishingly) it runs slower than ie.. ive been googling for ages trying to find a edited code of flash to run on 64bit but ive had no luck whatsoever… finally microsoft bring out a 64bit version of windows which actually uses the advantage of 64bit to a very high level and simple things like adobe flash arent on it, basically you can have a fast system no videos or slow system and videos is that what adobe are saying? Even apple have brought out a 64bit version of itunes on windows and they have their own OS adobe are just a software company and they dont support it… Adobe are very annoying they must make the 64bit pronto =]
i installed the flash10 and just pressed different os or browser selected vista/xp and then installed the download manager, it then installed the flash player restarted ie and then went to youtube and it ran flash player perfectly
I think the main reason no-one wants to install the 32-bit flash on their 64-bit operating system is that changing them over later may be impossible without re-building the machine. An issue with a previous upgrade to Flash meant that adobe had to release a utility which had to be run by every user who had a profile on the machine … nearly impossible in some instances.
Maybe once the linux beta is over and its stable, it can be easily ported to windows?
Why they can’t simply pad the 32 bit version with 32 extra zeroes is beyond me.
Seriously people, stop getting upset at adobe as they do have teams working on the 64bit edition of Flash.
Adobe had a choice, make a 64bit compatible edition or create the darn thing from scratch to make it fully compatible and able to run at 64bit.
Adobe took the high road and decided to have their programmers do it write instead of just making a crappy compatible copy.
Instead of crying about how Adobe isn’t doing their share why don’t you ask Microsoft (whom expects everyone else to work around them) why they didn’t provide a step down or compatibility mode to their Internet Explorer to work with existing flash???
This is an example of Microsoft expecting other venders to pick up on their slack.