Adobe Systems launched today the public beta version for Flash Player 10. It is code-named Astro and it offers a whole new set of features to the platform.

The add-ons include native 3D animation, graphics processing unit (GPU) hardware acceleration, transformation support, new custom effects, filters and also a bunch of new rich text layouts.

David Wadhwani, general manager and VP of the Platform Business Unit at Adobe, expressed his strong belief that the Flash Player’s launch will raise the bar once again on the technology market.

The new version can be downloaded from the Adobe Labs site and is available for Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista, Windows 2000, Mac OS X and Linux. The beta software testing version was released in particular for web developers to use it on their applications and provide a complete feedback. It is the first version of Flash that offers developers the option to use custom filters and effects.

Flash is generally known as the most popular and most widespread web browser-enhansing software.

Offering a public beta version, company official expect users to encounter a series of bugs and errors. This is why they invited all users to submit their feedback to Adobe’s developers or express their opinion and present their issues on the public forums.

The final release date for the new Flash Player hs not yet been set and for now all attention will be focused on the users’ positive and/or negative responses.