Chrome 4.0 vs Opera 10 vs Firefox 3.5

In a three-way cage match, LifeHacker threw Chrome 4, Firefox 3.5, and Opera 10 into the ring and let the three browsers duke it out to see which would emerge as the fastest app for surfing the web.

Lifehacker conducted the test and said "Like all our previous speed tests, this one is unscientific, but thorough. We install the most current versions of each browser being tested—in this case, Opera 10, Chrome's development channel 4.0 version, and the final Firefox 3.5 with security fixes—in a system with a 2.0 GHz Intel Centrino Duo processor and 2GB of RAM, running Windows XP."

Opera 10 final is out, Chrome just turned one year old, and Firefox 3.5 has settled into stability. It's time once again to break out the timers and speed test today's web browsers.

A number of tests were run, including a "cold start" right after boot, a "warm start" after the browsers have already run once measuring the time it takes 8 tabs to load, a JavaScript testing suite, and memory utilization.

Opera turned in the best cold start time and was slightly slower than Firefox 3.5 with a warm start, while Chrome trailed the competition in both. But once the browsers were open and it came time to load 8 tabs, Chrome whipped both Opera and Firefox by loading up to about 1.5 seconds faster. Chrome also performed best in JavaScript testing, but was far less efficient in memory utilization with 8 tabs open than either of the two other browsers.

See the full results here on Lifehacker

Via:http://www.maximumpc.com/

OpenSource success: Firefox approaching 1 billion downloads

Firefox must qualify as the most successful open-source development project, not because it is nearing 1 billion downloads this weekend, but because the numbers of people it has affected.

And there is a thriving community of Firefox add on developers that help add lots of value to the browser. This is an excellent achievement.

But it’s not without potential problems. There are a lot more competitors to Firefox these days. Companies that didn’t offer a browser a few years back do today (Google, Apple.)

Part of the reason is that there is money to be made in browsers, specifically in the search bar. Mozilla, the organization behind Firefox receives more than 85 per cent of its revenues from Google. Total revenues in 2006 were $66.8 million.

Apple also gets money from Google for featuring it in its search box. It has been whispered that GOOG effectively underwrites the Mac OSX development.

It’s no wonder that Google has created its own browser and is now working on its own operating system — why underwrite these type of key product development at organizations you don’t control!?

Here is more info on the one billion downloads which could be reached this weekend: http://www.spreadfirefox.com/news_events

For More stories like this visit:http://blogs.zdnet.com/Foremski/?p=648

Firefox 3.5 : Faster, Safer, Smarter Way to Browse Web

The latest version of world's second most used browser has arrived today in over 70 languages.According to Mozilla, its new browser is more than two times faster than Firefox 3. Firefox 3.5 is well worth the upgrade for the many improvements and additions that will directly affect your web browsing experience. Let’s see what has the new release in store for the users :

Speed :Firefox 3.5 promised a two times faster browsing performance than the previous 3.0. Firefox has always been fast, but this is the fastest Firefox ever which means, Web applications like email, photo sites, online word processors and more will feel snappier and more responsive. This is a time saver and definitrly the users will appreciate the necessity of getting a stable browser.

Security and privacy options : The latest version comes with an upgraded browsing privacy level. It provides more options like ; private browsing, erase the particular sites from history, clearing browsing history. With private browsing enabled, whatever sites you’ve visited afterward won’t be recorded.

With erasing the particular sites from history, you can remove every trace of that site from your browser—no questions asked!

Location Aware Browsing : Firefox can tell websites where you’re located so you can find info that’s more relevant and more useful. One of the innovative things in Firefox 3.5 is its support for location aware browsing. By authorizing Firefox to share your location based on IP, info on nearby wireless access points etc, you can now make your location transparent to websites that involve Geo-location service, by Share or Don’t Share. You can grant Firefox the permission to figure out where you are based on your IP address and nearby wireless access points, which the browser can then relay to web sites in order to provide you with a more personalized browsing experience.

Support New Web Technology : Firefox 3.5 is now supports various new web technologies, such as creative fonts downloads, CSS improvements for stylizing your pages, web worker threads and more. Just imagining all the cool things you could do to optimize your page browsing, and even incorporate media files for projects like animation etc.

Play Video : Earlier it was impossible to play videos using browser. Now, Firefox 3.5makes it happen while supporting player controls and file saving as well. Just right click the video, and it will all lay out for you. This is a good news for web developers as they could do more, such as including effects or links within the video.

Firefox 3.5 is the first browser to support open video and audio formats, allowing practically limitless new ways for sites to display rich content.