Image via CrunchBase
I Moved from FireFox to Google Chrome as my default browser as soon as plug-ins became available on Google Chrome. I tend to only use plug-ins that enhance productivity in web development, but those same plugins seem to slow FireFox to a crawl. I just checked and these are the Google Chrome Plug-ins that I use. They are very similar to what I used on FireFox.
- Development Plug-ins
- Productivity
- Entertainment
Unfortunately FireFox is much slower then Google Chrome both in starting up and rendering pages. The difference in speed is so pronounced that I decided for my own sanity to try Google Chrome, and never came back.
Now it looks like FireFox 4beta will be a real attempt at catching up with Google Chrome in speed and even wisely adopting the top tab layout to better support how web apps appear in the browser. Unfortunately some of the layout stuff like top tabs are not yet available for Mac, though they say coming soon. The good news is that there is a marked improvement in start-up times and page rendering. Not as fast as Chrome yet, but much better then the current stable version of FireFox. Things that I expected (since this is an early beta) without being disappointed are incompatibilities with some of my plug-ins.
I think that FireFox 4 holds some promise in the near future, but it still needs some time in the oven before it will be ready for another poke. For the moment Google Chrome is still secure as my default browser, but the folks at google had better look out. FireFox is starting to catch up.
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