I'm currently running Win 8.1, using Firefox as my browser. I'm been having trouble for some time with Adobe Flash/ Shockwave.  On some pages that want to use Flash, I get a message something to the effect that Shockwave is busy or not responding.  I can either wait or stop the process.  If I wait, it seems to wait indefinitely. Generally, I hit the stop button - multiple times - until the page loads correctly.  Recently, I've tried to uninstall Adobe Flash, restart my computer and reinstall Adobe Flash. This does not help.  I can uninstall Adobe Flash, and my computer works fine - it does not jam up. However, some pages seem to require Flash for content to load.

I got to thinking tonight about going into my my Registry.  So, I went into my Registry to look around. What I found - under HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT, I found 11 separate files for Shockwave Flash: Shockwave Flash, Shockwave Flash 1, Shockwave Flash 3.... on up to Shockwave Flash 11.  (I had uninstall Adobe Flash before doing this.)

I find files for Adobe elsewhere in my Registry, but I don't find files for Shockwave elsewhere in my registry.

I am wondering if these are old files for Shockwave, and if they are causing my problems.  Since, I have already install Adobe Flash from my computer, what happens if I delete these Shockwave files from my registry, restart my computer, and then download a fresh version of Adobe Flash?  Will I create problems for myself doing this?

For the record, I did a google search for Shockwave, and I think I found that the current version is Shockwave 12.2.4.194.    My other question is: what if I just download this Shockwave 12.2 version?  Will it overwrite the files in my registry and correct my problem?  or will these files already in my registry continue to be the problem (if that is what is causing my problems) ? 

Thoughts?