Adobe Unleashes GPU-Powered Flash Player

The latest Flash runtime not only takes advantage of hardware acceleration, but will now infect smartphones and many other Internet-connected devices.

Adobe officially announced today the release of Flash Player 10.1, set for smartphones, netbooks, PCs and other Internet-connected devices (video). The revelation will apparently usher in a new era of an already Flash-laden Internet, providing viewers with truckloads of "expressive" applications, content, and high definition videos across multiple platforms. What makes this new version so special is that it utilizes the local hardware (the GPU more specifically) for video and graphics acceleration.

According to the company, this will be the first "consistent" runtime release of the Open Screen Project. "Using the productive Web programming model of the Flash Platform, the browser-based runtime enables millions of designers and developers to reuse code and assets and reduce the cost of creating, testing and deploying content across different operating systems and browsers," Adobe said. "Flash Player 10.1 is easily updateable across all supported platforms to ensure rapid adoption of new innovations that move the Web forward."

Adobe also said that it plans to release a public beta of the browser-based runtime later this year for Windows Mobile and Palm webOS; desktop versions for Windows, Macintosh, and Linux will also be released in the same timeframe. As for Google's Android and the Symbian OS, Adobe plans to release public betas in early 2010. Wait! What about Apple's iPhone and iPod Touch? Strangely enough, these two devices weren't listed in Adobe's flashy plans.

Earlier today the company announced its collaboration with RIM to (finally) bring Flash to Blackberry smartphones. This will enabled end-users to stream video content on the Blackberry devices such as YouTube videos, TV episodes on Hulu, and more. Adobe also fleshed out its collaboration with Nvidia in regards to GPU and MID acceleration, which we covered right here.