Known Limitations

Known Limitations

What Flashback doesn't do, or doesn't promise, in 0.8.0. It's better to know these up front than to find them mid-match.

Platform

• Windows 11, 64-bit (x64) only. Flashback uses Windows capture, audio, tray, startup and hardware-encoding APIs. There's no macOS or Linux version.
• Built for a hardware video encoder. Flashback targets an H.264 or HEVC encoder that Windows Media Foundation can use, requests hardware encoding, and is designed and tested for it.
• No HDR output in this release.

Capture

• A capture border can appear. When a session falls back to Windows Graphics Capture, Windows may show its capture border. Flashback can't promise a border-free session on every PC.
• A brief gap after a hard encoder crash. If the encoder is killed abruptly, the file it had open can be lost and restarting takes a moment. Flashback never hides that gap inside a clip, but it can't avoid it without running two encoders all the time, which would cost GPU on every frame.
• Not zero-cost. Capture still uses some GPU, encoder, CPU, memory and disk bandwidth. Flashback works to keep that small and measures it, but a literal zero-impact claim would be dishonest.
• Not every GPU can sustain every profile. 4K and 240 FPS depend on your hardware. Flashback warns you when a profile is too demanding.
• Protected content that Windows blacks out for screen recorders is black in Flashback too.

Audio

• Share copies use the Flashback mix. Discord copies and Cloud uploads keep one mixed audio track for compatibility, even though clips carry editable tracks.
• Most players play only the first track. That's the Flashback mix, which is what you want for watching; adjusting the Game and desktop or Microphone track on its own needs a video editor that shows every audio stream.
• With editable tracks off, segment joins lose about 10 ms. The recorder's single mixed track starts each new segment with a short silence, which Flashback fades over rather than letting it click. Editable tracks, on by default, have no such gap.
• Old clips keep their crackle. Voice static in clips recorded with 0.7.22 through 0.7.41 can't be repaired; new recordings are clean.
• App exclusion covers Discord, Spotify and the active browser, uses editable tracks, and removes an app only from the device Flashback records. An app playing on several devices at once is left in, with a warning.
• Dropouts from the device can't be fixed by Flashback. When a microphone or its USB connection drops audio, Flashback tells you, but the sound is already lost before it reaches Flashback.
• Leaks into the microphone. A virtual mic, Stereo Mix-style input or speaker bleed can carry desktop audio into your Microphone track and into voice-command listening.

Benchmarks

• One PC, one GPU vendor. The published comparison was measured on Flashback 0.6.22 with an NVIDIA RTX 5070. Newer versions use a newer capture path that hasn't been re-tested in the comparison, and there are no published AMD or Intel numbers yet. See Benchmarks.

Install and updates

• SmartScreen may still ask. The installer is signed through Microsoft Artifact Signing, but SmartScreen can ask you to confirm while the new certificate builds reputation.
• 0.7.40 and earlier can't update by themselves to current versions, because of the signer change. 0.7.39 and 0.7.40 offer the installer; older versions may not show an update at all. Run the current installer once from flashbk.gg.
• Going back from 0.8 to 0.7.41 or older needs the settings rollback steps in Troubleshooting updates and install.
• Releases only roll forward. Problems are fixed with a newer release, not by reissuing an older one.

Cloud and social

• Cloud opens separately from app releases. The Cloud tab shows whether new accounts and uploads are open; until they are, clips stay on your PC.
• No free Cloud storage, no free trial. Recording, editing and your library stay free.
• Profiles, friends and the feed are United States only for now. Cloud storage and links work elsewhere.
• Not in 0.8: comments, following people who aren't friends, direct messages, a public directory or discovery, and search-engine indexing of profiles or clips.
• Screenshots aren't uploaded automatically. Automatic uploads cover clips only.
• Hosted copies are capped at 60 FPS. Your high-frame-rate original stays untouched on your PC.
• Discord decides inline playback. A link may show a poster instead of playing inline.
• Copies can't be recalled. Once another service has made its own copy of a preview, changing visibility or getting a new link can't remove that copy.
• Uploads come from Windows only. The website and phone browsers can watch, react and manage visibility, but uploading is done from the Flashback app.

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Related pages: FAQ · Troubleshooting · Benchmarks