If you have been having issues getting the Flash Player Plugin to work in Internet Explorer 7 or 6, then I might have a solution that works…at least it did for me! I gathered the following steps from various Adobe technotes and have rearranged the order of them finally worked on my setup with Windows XP.
My original pain began when I upgraded to Adobe CS3 Master Collection. As soon as I upgraded to CS3, Flash Player stopped working in Internet Explorer while it worked perfectly in Firefox…..aaaahhhhh Firefox….how I love thee. So my search began for a fix. I uninstalled, reinstalled, clean uninstalled, removed the ActiveX control, etc etc. I scoured forums, blogs, technotes, etc only to end up with the same result…Flash player working perfectly in Firefox but not Internet Explorer 7.
I FINALLY got everything working perfectly after a few simple steps, which I outline below, but I will say that I uninstalled IE7 and did the steps with IE6 and then reinstalled IE7 after everything was working. I don’t know if this helped to fix the situation, but I wanted to mention that before we get started. If the following steps don’t work, then try uninstalling IE7 (by going to Add/Remove Programs and removing Internet Explorer 7 from there).
Alright…here we go!
*DISCLAIMER*
Proceed at your own risk…I accept no responsibility for any outcome (good or bad) from the following steps as these are directions and files straight from Adobe and Microsoft. If you still feel froggy, let’s roll.
First off…go ahead and download the following files and save them in a folder so that you don’t have to open your browser until all steps are completed: (All links are to Adobe, Macromedia, or Microsoft for your ease of mind in knowing their legit)
- Flash Player Uninstaller
- SubInACL tool
- reset_minimal.zip file
- “Install Flash Player 9 ActiveX.exe� file from Adobe
Next, completely uninstall the Flash Player Plugin. This will remove the pesky Active X Control that seems to get in the way of getting Flash Player to work properly in Internet Explorer. The following instructions for completely removing the Flash Player Plugin is from technote kb402435 on Adobe’s site.
(You should have already downloaded this file from above….just place it in your root Local Disk folder…most likely C:\ ) Download the uninstaller for Flash Player from “How to uninstall the Adobe Flash Player plug-in and ActiveX control” (TechNote tn_14157). Note: The uninstall_flash_player.exe file must be saved to the same directory that the command window is in, for example C:\.
- Select Start.
- Select Run.
- Type cmd
- In the command window, type the following:
uninstall_flash_player.exe /clean- This will remove all entries in the system registry.
The next step was what seemed to do the trick for me. This is somewhat hidden on Adobe’s site as technote fb1634cb
Using the SubInAcL tool from Microsoft to fix permission issues in the registry has solved installation errors for several products including Flash Player.
Warning! The following solution involves the Windows System Registry. Editing or manipulating the registry incorrectly can result in serious system damage which may require reinstallation of the operating system. If you are not comfortable editing the registry, then take your system to a professional. If you choose to proceed, then it is essential that you create a complete system backup and a Windows System Restore Point before proceeding. Adobe Systems cannot be held responsible for damage resulting from this information.
You must have administrator privileges to successfully complete these instructions.
- (If you downloaded the files above, you can skip this step) Follow the instructions to download the SubInACL tool from the Microsoft Download Center.
- Install SubInACL.
- (If you downloaded the files above, you can skip this step) Download the reset_minimal.zip file .
- Extract the reset_minimal.cmd file to C:\Program Files\Windows Resource Kits\Tools\.
- *Important: Be sure that both the subinacl.exe and reset_minimal.cmd files are in the same location here: C:\Program Files\Windows Resource Kits\Tools\.
- Double-click reset_minimal.cmd.
- This will open a command window and execute the SubInACL tool.
- Do not use the machine while SubInACL is running.
- When it is finished you will see “Press any key to continue”.
- *NOTE* This 10th step is mine…I downloaded the Install Flash Player 9 ActiveX.exe file from Adobe (which you downloaded from above as 1 of the 4 files I mentioned) and ran that and went to the next step.
- Install the Flash Player from www.adobe.com/go/getflashplayer.
Once I did that, everything worked great in Internet Explorer 6!!! I then downloaded IE7 and installed it and everything continued to work perfectly. If these steps worked for you also, please share your success in the comment sections below. If you have another solution that works, please share that as well!
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Shane Eubanks is the founder of The Art Institute Online Student Community and dedicates his spare time to giving the students every possible opportunity to earn a quality education.Visit Shane Eubanks's Website
THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU for this fix. I suspected that installing CS3 was the problem for me with Flash Player. I tried Adobe’s suggsted fixes but none worked.
You are a lifesaver.
Dave
Sweet! Glad it fixed your issue. I tried all of Adobe’s suggestions as well and nothing worked…I finally managed to figure out the combo above did the trick.
Spread the word…I know others are out losing hair over this.
Thank you so much for finding a solution for this problem…it worked like a charm! I have been having this problem for about a week now and could not figure how to fix it! I’m not sure what I did to cause it, but your worked great!
Thanks Again!
Phil
Glad to hear it worked! I spent WAY too much time trying to figure this out on my own…hopefully this saves others a lot of wasted time!
Thanks for this fix as a novice this was driving me nuts
This fix seemed to work on one machine, on another though no such luck. Loading the swf file in Internet explorer 6 still leaves us with a blank page.
I did notice that subinacl had 1 failure ? Anyone have any suggestions ?
Thx
Hello,
I have the same problem, but cannot unzip reset_minimal.zip. Can someone, please advise. When trying to unzip it, it gives me the following error, : Cannot create reset_minimal.cmd, access is denied. And I am the administrator. Does not even ask for permission. Just an exclamation mark! I would be garteful if someone can send me the unzipped version of the above file (reset_minimal.cmd) to my e-mail: el_yaneva@yahoo.com . I searched for days on the internet cannot find it. I guess my problem with the Flash Player came when i installed the Flash CS3 Professional, but this is just a guess.
Thank you everyone and Happy Holidays!
Hi i am using the new vista and i have tried your way with the windows xp is there a way to fix the vista issue it wont reconized the unistall command you have there
You would think that MS would be more helpful in fixing bugs with their software. Thanks for the fix which worked a treat and enabled me to see my own web site in ie 7.
thanks very much
This is what i did and upon opening up the web page i was formerly on it immediately began to display the previously unseen images.
Close all Internet Explorer windows and related applications.
Run Command Prompt (as an Administrator if you’re on Windows Vista).
Go to C:\Windows\System32\Macromed\Flash (or C:\Windows\SysWOW64\Macromed\Flash on Windows 64-bit).
Run FlashUtil9f.exe (or similar executable file inside the folder) and follow the instructions to install.
If it doesn’t work on restarting internet explorer then try restarting your pc.