Adobe to Fix Flash Battery Life Issue

By Tuan Mai
published

Adobe's CEO Shantanu Narayen says they are working on an "optimized" version of Flash for the Macbook Air

Photo (Image credit: Engadget)

This tuesday was at the Web 2.0 summit, Adobe's CEO, Shantanu Narayen, commented on the animosity between Adobe and Apple provoking them by saying, "Let the games begin"

In addition to the comments on HTML5 vs Flash, Adobe blamed the entire battery life issue on Apple, stating that it is their fault for not sending Adobe a Macbook Air prior to its release.

Despite blatantly denying the fact that there is a problem with Flash affecting the battery life of the new MacBook Air; Narayen stated there is currently a MacBook Air in their labs running a beta version of an "optimized" flash, designed specifically for the MacBook. 

No details on when the "optimized" flash will be released, but our batteries are hoping it's soon.

Tuan Mai
Tuan Mai
Tuan Mai is a Los Angeles based writer and marketing manager working within the PC Hardware industry. He has written for Tom's Guide since 2010, with a special interest in the weird and quirky.
37 Comments Comment from the forums
  • vittau
    Of course Flash eats up batteries, since Flash eats up CPU cycles. Vector graphics are not exactly a trivial workload, you know...
    Reply
  • mianmian
    I think flash should have a "battery saving" mode: to disable some fancy graphic effects, or limit the CPU usage. While the "Full mode" will enable everything.
    Reply
  • mister g
    Anybody else think that Steve will start blabbing that he was right all along as soon as this news hits his screen? I mean an optimized version had to be specially made for OS X just to fix a battery problem? Sounds like a problem unique to MacBooks to me.
    Reply
  • molo9000
    mister gAnybody else think that Steve will start blabbing that he was right all along as soon as this news hits his screen? I mean an optimized version had to be specially made for OS X just to fix a battery problem? Sounds like a problem unique to MacBooks to me.All laptops suffer from Flash, but MacBooks suffer more because the Flash implementation for Mac OS is just second rate.

    Now all Apple (or Adobe) has to do is educated users that they have to download a new Flash version. Used to be distributed by Apple through the automatic software update, but not anymore.
    Reply
  • lejay
    Just wait until ads come to html5... That'll drain the battery just as bad. Blaming flash is silly.
    Reply
  • rawoysters
    I'm getting tired of this childish bickering between Apple and Adobe. The only losers are your customers.
    Reply
  • aaron686
    It's never big brother's fault...
    Reply
  • dEAne
    Finally it is fixed.
    Reply
  • andy_newton
    ditching flash is the right move
    Reply
  • Scott2010au
    Err, the battery life issue affects all computers that run Flash that are battery powered.

    If the MacBook Air has it's "own special" issue on top of this, then that is news to me.

    They (Adobe) should address both.

    I miss Macromedia, they cared about the end users.
    Reply