Web Browser Grand Prix Results

**Aguda** · 05-03-2010, 01:27 AM

I have been thinking of changing my web browser mainly for security reason as I am on Internet Explorer. Some users on this board seem to prefer Firefox for some purposes and Chrome for others. Being a newbie at most things computer I have been doing a bit of research and found a great site that may be of use to other members.
They tested the major browsers and Google Chrome seems to have won out. I will give it a try this weekend and see how it works for me. Anyways here is a link to the site and test resuls:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/firefox-chrome-opera,2558.html

**dirtydog** · 05-03-2010, 01:40 AM

Download opera and firefox whilst your at it, you may prefer them.

**bedtime** · 05-03-2010, 04:58 AM

I moved to Firefox about a year ago, never have any pompems. A mate of mine at work is a bit of a computer buff, builds his own and all sorts of other shit, advised me to move away from Microsoft years ago, after all the publicity about dodgy back door entry (

) I am glad I did.

**Muadib** · 05-03-2010, 05:02 AM

Firefox is good, except for the memory leaks from hell that cause it to shutdown periodically... Usually after it's grabbed 1+ gb of RAM...

Chrome is lean & mean, no frills and only uses about 40K - 50K of RAM per instance...

**mr Fred** · 05-03-2010, 07:02 AM

Originally Posted by Muadib

Firefox is good, except for the memory leaks from hell that cause it to shutdown periodically... Usually after it's grabbed 1+ gb of RAM...

Chrome is lean & mean, no frills and only uses about 40K - 50K of RAM per instance...

I'm using Firefox and have the same problem.
I wondered what the hell was causing it.
I really like it but that is making me consider a change. I've downloaded opera and crome so it's play time when I feel like it later.
Wonder if either of those have that handy tab bar that firefox has.
That and how the hell do you import favourites into crome. Tried and failed.

**Fondles** · 05-03-2010, 07:08 AM

Originally Posted by Muadib

Firefox is good, except for the memory leaks from hell that cause it to shutdown periodically... Usually after it's grabbed 1+ gb of RAM...

Chrome is lean & mean, no frills and only uses about 40K - 50K of RAM per instance...

I run both FF and Chrome, I find Chrome shuts down at least once a day, FF maybe once a week.

**Fondles** · 05-03-2010, 07:12 AM

Originally Posted by mr Fred

That and how the hell do you import favourites into crome. Tried and failed.

IN FF install the Xmarks add-on, set it up and merge your stuff, then open Chrome and install the Xmarks add-on, enter your login details your created with the FF setup and merge again.
Xmarks has the benefit of storing your favourites online, no matter where you are in the world, add Xmarks then do the merge, its a handy little add-on.

**Aguda** · 05-03-2010, 07:23 AM

Originally Posted by dirtydog

Download opera and firefox whilst your at it, you may prefer them.

Originally Posted by Fondles

run both FF and Chrome

So I gather I can run multiple browsers. Do I just click on the icon on the desktop for the browser I want to use at the time?

Originally Posted by bedtime

after all the publicity about dodgy back door entry ( )

What is wrong with back door entry?

**jandajoy** · 05-03-2010, 07:27 AM

Originally Posted by Aguda

What is wrong with back door entry?

Depends if you're the enterer or entered I suppose.

**Butterfly** · 05-03-2010, 08:13 AM

Originally Posted by Muadib

Chrome is lean & mean, no frills and only uses about 40K - 50K of RAM per instance...

sounds like my kind of browser. I quite like the interface but have only used it with Gmail, which was not really a pleasant experience. Will give it another chance.

Originally Posted by Fondles

Xmarks has the benefit of storing your favourites online, no matter where you are in the world, add Xmarks then do the merge, its a handy little add-on.

Tried downloading that one, but you need FF 3.5 or some other non-sense. Very convenient utility though.

**panama hat** · 05-03-2010, 09:47 AM

Originally Posted by Muadib

Firefox is good, except for the memory leaks from hell that cause it to shutdown periodically... Usually after it's grabbed 1+ gb of RAM...

Chrome is lean & mean, no frills and only uses about 40K - 50K of RAM per instance...

The reason I switched to Chrome . . . and it works a charm, takes some getting used to, though

**dirtydog** · 05-03-2010, 10:01 AM

Originally Posted by Aguda

So I gather I can run multiple browsers.

Yep, you can also use them all at the same time if you want and just click between browsers.

**slackula** · 05-03-2010, 10:59 AM

FF seems to have fixed the memory issues, it was the best when 5 or 10 tabs were open.

Text in case the hotlinked pics don't show:

Bing, Google, Hulu, Twitter, and Wikipedia make up the 5 Tab test pages.
Firefox uses the least amount of memory in this test.

Opera places last with Chrome not far behind, both almost doubling the memory usage of Firefox.

For the ten-tab test, we visit craigslist, Facebook, Tom's Hardware, Yahoo!, and YouTube from our Page Load Times benchmark, and add them to our five-tab test consisting of Bing, Google, Hulu, Twitter, and Wikipedia.

Firefox again uses the least amount of memory. Chrome and Opera give us another pair of upsets, again finishing fourth and fifth (respectively). This time Opera utilizes more than twice as much memory as our winner: Mozilla Firefox.

The big surprise here is Opera's and Chrome's poor showing in the multi-tab tests. Overall, Firefox delivers the best memory usage results. It comes in first place for the five- and ten-tab usage tests, but fourth in the single-tab metric.

**Muadib** · 05-03-2010, 11:07 AM

^ Not in my experience...

FF gives you cute message when it craters and prompts you to restart... It says "Oops we're experiencing technical problems"... Happens 2 - 3 times a week to me on multiple PCs... Could be the multiple addins I have added to the core system, of which FF do not write or control...

**Marmite the Dog** · 05-03-2010, 11:53 AM

I use FF as my main browser because of all the plug-ins.

I've started using Chrome for my Sharepoint window, it's supposedly faster, but I've not noticed any real improvement speedwise.

**Butterfly** · 05-03-2010, 12:16 PM

it could also depend on the version of FF,

latest vs legacy version,

quite happy with version 2 because I have a few plugin that couldn't find for later version

**harrybarracuda** · 07-03-2010, 08:43 PM

A lot of the Firefox crashes are down to people who write non-compliant web sites that look pretty but try and do the most ridiculous things.

What I like about Firefox is that it remembers where you were when it crashed and can reload the tabs and windows.

**Butterfly** · 07-03-2010, 08:48 PM

^ tell me about it,

some of those sites are unbearable, developed by clueless Indians, no doubt

**melvbot** · 10-03-2010, 12:56 AM

Tried Chrome myself and I can agree with the chart Slack posted. I took a look at my activity monitor and noticed "Google Chrome Helper" had five seperate processes of up to 50mb, this is Googles "tab per process" i.e each tab runs as its own process so if one tab crashes it doesnt affect the others.

If youre using 3 or 4 tabs its OK but anything heavy is going to gobble up a load of RAM. Im going to try it on the horrible bit of my computer (XP) to see what the difference is.

Firefox used to be a decent browser but I just cant get on with it anymore, peaking the CPU and using way too much RAM has put me right off it. The amount of bloat they are adding to it will be its downfall.

**Muadib** · 10-03-2010, 01:18 AM

FF just drove another death knell for me... Flash 10 has stopped working with FF on my primary desktop... It won't update and / or correct, so I've had to switch to chrome as my portfolio manager uses flash for charting...

**panama hat** · 10-03-2010, 08:51 AM

Originally Posted by melvbot

f youre using 3 or 4 tabs its OK but anything heavy is going to gobble up a load of RAM. Im going to try it on the horrible bit of my computer (XP) to see what the difference is.

My little Ersatz-laptop uses XP so I'd appreciate any further info on this. Cheers

**melvbot** · 10-03-2010, 11:08 PM

This is in XP, 5 tabs open so 5 processes running

**panama hat** · 11-03-2010, 09:07 AM

That's a lot of resources . . . so, that's one open Chrome application with a few tabs open within? The logic escapes me as that would mean it is like having four Chrome apps open instead of one with several tabs . . . am I understanding this correctly?

In other words, Chrome uses less resources if you only have one or two tabs open but uses, comparatively, more the more tabs are open?

**Camel Toe** · 11-03-2010, 09:22 AM

I wouldn't put much faith in Tom's chart. After all everyone has an agenda. I've personally tested FF and Opera side by side and Opera is indeed faster, much faster. But their apps are dwarfed by FF's. IE is barfable.

**melvbot** · 11-03-2010, 12:01 PM

^^Check your task manager, it might be lighter on RAM on different setups similar to how some people say FF is using loads and others saying it's fine.

The logic behind having a tab as a seperate processs is if one tab crashes for any reason the the others aren't affected and the whole browser won't crash

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