I can recall the day, about two years ago, when Firefox 3 was released. I was ready for a change in my browsing experience — and so it was. I enjoyed using FF3… until Google Chrome came along. Since then, I had been an avid Chrome fan, never looking back at Firefox. Until last week that is. I had heard that Firefox 4 was being released, so I downloaded it to see what all the ruckus was about.
When I finally got around to using it, I liked it. I liked the interface; very sleek. Then I started to notice the little things. The things that sucked.
For instance, downloads are kind of slow to start, and that annoying little pop up comes up and is in your face, screaming for attention. In chrome, I was so used to being able to click download and have the download bar come up. No annoying pop up, just the little bar. That’s it! (Might I add, downloads just seem so incredibly slow compared to Chrome!)
In addition to this, there was a bug. When dealing with heavy sites or flash (like the flash uploader in WordPress), Firefox stalls. In order to make it un-freeze, I had to right click the tab on the taskbar and click ‘Open new tab’. Then I had to close the new tab to continue what I was doing. Now, don’t even ask me how I figured this out, but it’s a tedious and very annoying process.
On Chrome, the bookmark bar was crucial to my browsing experience. It had all of the important links I use on a daily basis. So, when adding bookmarks to FF’s bookmark bar, links are not draggable! This meant that I had to visit the webpage I wanted to mark, press the little star, press it again, and choose ‘Bookmark Bar’ from the dropdown list. Then, I had to position it in the spot I wanted it to be. (By the time I did all this, I forgot what I was doing and became engrossed in the site I was visiting, trying to bookmark) This was too much for me. In chrome, I could highlight the URL and drag it to the bar. Simple. (When I reopen FF after closing, the bookmarks don’t save!!)
These things combined made my browsing experience very… ahem… bleh. But there were things that I liked as well! For instance, sometimes FF is supported by sites that oddly don’t support Chrome. I also like the fact that I can easily see the full title of a webpage if need be.
In Chrome, I also like the fact that the extensions are easily accessible and add to my browsing experience. The themes were also very nice :3
Alas, here we come to the end of this review and I find myself using Chrome. I switch back and forth and back and forth. Sigh
So, what are your thoughts on Chrome and Firefox 4?
PS: Didn’t the Awesome bar used to be more… awesome?
