For the past few weeks the tech world has been abuzz with news of Apple and Adobe being at loggerheads, owing to Apple's stand of not implementing Flash support for its handheld devices. Flash, according to Apple, is a closed platform and apparently doesn't do any good for the device apart from making it way slower. In short, the iPhones and the iPads are better off without Flash support says Apple.It is in such a scenario that Google's Nexus One - thanks to the latest update to Android 2.2, the Froyo - has been endowed with Adobe Flash 10.1 support. What better time than now to check if Apple was correct all the way or not?
Well, folks over at PocketNow did a bunch of unscientific tests on three devices, namely, the Google Nexus One, the HTCHD2 and the Apple iPhone 3GS to check if what Steve Jobs said was just hodgepodge or not.
As mentioned earlier, these tests were completely unscientific - and for the same reason gives the user an idea of the Nexus One's real world performance with and without Flash, and how well it compares to the iPhone and the HD2 with and without flash. PocketNow used a Nexus One with Android 2.2, an Apple iPhone running OS 4.0 beta, and an HTC HD2 running Windows Mobile 6.5 for the tests. As for the results, let me just give you a clue, it isn't exactly very heartening. Especially for those of you who supported Adobe and also for those of you who wanted Flash to come to the iPhone.
Let's face it, Flash 10.1, at least in its current iteration DOES make the Nexus One slow. The Nexus One is known to be a fast device and time and again it has proved to be the fastest device out there in terms of page loading time. The iPhone and the HD2 are no match for the Nexus One - until Flash makes an appearance. According to the test results, with Flash installed, the iPhone beats the crap out of the Nexus One in page loading time.
The HD2 on the other hand remains at par with Nexus One with Flash. The story doesn't end there, the flash implementation is a lot buggy and there are lots of things that need to be taken care of. The scrolling is choppy and the only things that seem to work properly are Flash-enabled ads and games, which play quite well. However, the question is, are these advantages worth the loss in speed?
The good thing, however, is that Flash can be enabled and disabled, and acts like an App rather than an irremovable component of the OS that you'd need to put up with. The good aspect about this is that users who choose to have the speed of a Flash-less Android phone can wait until Adobe irons out issues with it, or even better install it and use it only when you think you need it. No iPhone will ever offer you that option.
As for the answer to the bigger question, "Does Flash make phones slower?", the answer to it would be an emphatic "YES". However, the things that need to be noted here are that Flash 10.1 is still in Beta and that you have the freedom to NOT use it when required. But heck, Steve Jobs was right all the way!
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