Reply to: Chrome or Safari

[Mr.Whippy]

Got fed up with IE being so slow and unreliable.

Which alternative browser do you recommend?

Personally, I'd recommend Chrome.

[NickFitz]

Saying that a browser is slower than another is like saying one make of car is slower than another based upon journey times through central London.

There will be differences in speed of rendering the pages but they will be far lower than the human response time.

That's based on the idea that all a browser does is render a page and then sit there while you read it. That stopped being the only use case for a browser around 1995.

[NickFitz]

IIRC, Chrome does something fancy with java to make it run quicker than on other browsers. Give NF a few hours to wake up, and he'll be able to tell you how it works

JavaScript

As the saying goes, "Java" is to "JavaScript" as "Car" is to "Carpet". Despite the best efforts of Netscape's marketing department circa 1995, the two languages are completely different.

Chrome's V8 JS engine employs a lot of very nifty tricks to boost performance, but the other browsers have also improved tremendously over the last few years - IE has improved but still lags behind the competition by a couple of years, as usual.

The Safari team's SunSpider benchmark is generally accepted as one of the best out there; I can't find a recent results comparison, but this set of results from last year show Safari 4 and Chrome roughly level (Safari is slightly faster), Firefox 3.5 about a third of their speed, Opera 10 Beta about a quarter (although I think it improved for the release version) and IE8 getting on for a sixth. IE6 was taking so long that they gave up waiting for it...

[VectraMan]

IIRC, Chrome does something fancy with java to make it run quicker than on other browsers.

Javascript.

They supposedly have a faster javascript engine than other browsers, which always seems to me a bit like supercharging a 2CV.

[Sysman]

Lynx

I also used to have Links (prior to the graphics version) because it rendered tables better than Lynx.

[minestrone]

Saying that a browser is slower than another is like saying one make of car is slower than another based upon journey times through central London.

There will be differences in speed of rendering the pages but they will be far lower than the human response time.

[TheFaQQer]

Knock Knock

Who's there?

.....


.....


.....


.....


<long pause>


.....


.....


..... Java.




Eeeeh, the old ones are the best.

I read that one on the oraclewtf blog a while back. I tried it out on MrsF - she didn't get it.

I guess you need to do some kind of work with computers to understand it

[Durbs]

does something fancy with java to make it run quicker

Knock Knock

Who's there?

.....


.....


.....


.....


<long pause>


.....


.....


..... Java.




Eeeeh, the old ones are the best.

[Fred Bloggs]

Read and enjoy. HTH.

[TheFaQQer]

IIRC, Chrome does something fancy with java to make it run quicker than on other browsers. Give NF a few hours to wake up, and he'll be able to tell you how it works

[darmstadt]

Lynx

[Durbs]

Safari on Mac
IE8 on Win

Prefer Safari out of the two. Found Firefox too slow to open initially. Couldn't see a need for Chrome, tried it and seemed ok but the other two do what i want so no need to switch. Have all installed including Opera (which is good) as i do a lot of web dev work so need them all for testing, but for browsing, the two above are my choice.

[xoggoth]

Chrome certainly opens faster than others seem to. Not sure opening speed is same on all machines, Firefox which everybody else rates, is the slowest I find. Setting maybe.

[doodab]

I use firefox, chrome & occasionally IE as some sites I deal with require it. Opera I have on my phone but I don't really use it on the desktop

I have just typed "sudo apt-get install lynx" into my ubuntu server. I'll probably regret that in the morning.

[VectraMan]

I use IE. Firefox is too slow, Chrome is too basic, and Safari comes from the evil empire so I wouldn't go near it. I suppose I should give Opera a proper try one day.