Firefox 3 Beta 4 An Improvement?
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For the past couple of days I have been giving Firefox 3 Beta 4 a test drive to see how it is in comparison to Firefox 2. In other articles and on blogs I had previously read about performance and memory improvements being the biggest benefits of the new version. There was also some mention of the new Firefox being built on a Gecko rendering of some type and also depending on what you read, some 900 improvements over beta 3. With all of this in mind, I wanted a look-see for myself.
This was also a good time to test the newest FF since I also have the beta of IE 8 on my system. To be fair, I have to admit to myself that I am a Firefox lover and have to be careful in expressing my views. It is simple to say IE8 sucks beacuse of bla-bla-bla, without providing any proof. This seems to be norm rather than the exception some times in reading reviews about any software. It makes one wonder how much XXX reviewer or their company was paid to give a glowing review on any software.
Enough BS and down to business. Performance difference between FF 2, FF3, and IE8? I don’t see any here folks. All three seem to be about the same. Though I didn’t sit with a stopwatch in my hand, I based this on perception only. All three browsers render sites I visited about the same.
Memory usage. FF 3 users will rejoice. Finally the memory issues that have plagued previous versions of FF have now seemed to have been solved. Though IE 8 still uses less memory. 
Bottom line. FF3 continues to improve. Once the final hits the street we will be able to take another look and see what happens.
Comments welcome.
5 Comments
Jamie Earl
March 14th, 2008
at 2:46pm
i have used fire fox but i didont like it so i have sticked with ie7 i am useing safari pc aswell but i still think ie7 is mutch easia to use than any of them
FearedBliss
March 14th, 2008
at 4:32pm
I tried the first alpha of firefox 3 and it was sweet. To me it seemed like it looked better. Code name “Gran Paradiso” if I’m correct. That translates to “Grand Paradise”.
Xplunger
March 14th, 2008
at 7:41pm
I liked it alot, of course I’m not sure if it’s just because I’m a firefox fan boy, but, i really prefer it to safari, and ie7, but that’s just my opinion.
Wayne
March 15th, 2008
at 9:25am
FireFox I think is the best—Avant Browser , SlimBrowser, and Maxon I know they depend on Explorer to work but are far better than —strait up Windows Explorer , The new Explorer to me is junk because I will not even work untill you have an internet connection , and then every Tom Dick an Harry , want’s a ride on your Explorer toolbar this suck’s.
Alvin Brinson
March 16th, 2008
at 3:59am
Seriously, with 3gb of Ram, the memory usage issues of FF 2 have never bothered me. A few hundred meg here or there are not a big deal compared to the extensive functionality I receive.
As far as IE, it doesn’t “suck”, it just doesn’t do what I want. I have seriously considered IE7, but most addons that do what free firefox extensions do are payware and don’t work as well as firefox does in the first place.
That said, performance and efficiency improvements are nice. I will upgrade to FF 3 *when* most of my extensions are converted, which hasn’t happened yet. A number of extensions I’ve tried worked in beta 3, but no longer work in beta 4 or the pre5, regardless of using nightly tester tools to allow them to install. There seem to have been some extension breaking changes during the betas, which seriously is slowing down updates for the extensions.