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Shockwave Flash Crashes with Google Chrome

Google Chrome is growing in popularity, with an increase of 84% in users over the last year. However at times with old users, Google Chrome seems to unexpectedly crash and tends to present giant lag spikes. This is because Google Chrome comes jammed packed with so many features and plug-ins, in this case Shockwave Flash, creating duplicates of installations from the host system. When this happens, Google Chrome and Adobe Flash cause a conflict that presents these problems. Personally I experienced lockups, unexpected crashes, lag spikes, “The following plug-in has crashed: Shockwave Flash” and the friendly “Awh Snap, something went wrong while displaying this webpage.” We now know what the problem is, so how can we fix this?

Let’s Get Started With The Shockwave Flash Test

To figure out if it is a conflict with Adobe Shockwave and the separate plug-in that was originally installed into Google Chrome, open your Chrome Web browser.

In the address bar, type about:plugins and press enter. You will see a list of all of the plug-ins, installed on your Chrome browser. Look for an entry that has two Flash files. This is where the problem should be happening.

One of these files needs to be disabled to ensure that Google Chrome can only utilize one of the Adobe Shockwave files and not cause that conflict.

To do this you need to expand the details by toggling on of the Flash files with the [+] Details. This is found in the top-right corner of the browser window. This will expand all of the entries for the plug-ins.

Choose the entries for flash. Once the section is open, there should be two entries – one for Chromes internal installation and one from the OS’s installation.

We found out that if you disable the link for the Chrome’s internal installation that you will not encounter any future clashes with Shockwave Flash and your Google Chrome browser.

Finally click on the Disable link for Chrome’s internal installation of Shockwave Flash.

Once disabled, test to see if the problem is solved by using Adobe’s test page.

Keep in mind that you will no longer get automatic updates with each Chrome upgrade. You will have to manually check for updates at the Adobe’s Flash download page.

Did you find that other ways to stop, Flash crashing in Chrome? What steps did you take to solve this problem? Please share your experiences and comment below!

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Matt Valvano

Author Matt Valvano

Matt has a very extensive experience of print and web design. He is an effective team player known for creativity, flexibility, distributing skills, managing, working with others and producing high quality, effective works of art within a deadline.

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