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Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols

Cyber Cynic

Firefox 3.5: Back on top... for now

30 comments

TAGS:Chrome, Firefox, Linux, Review, web browser, Wndows
IT TOPICS:Desktop Applications, E-Business & Web 2.0, Internet, Open Source, Software

Sorry Opera; too bad about what happened to you, Netscape; and Internet Explorer, please, don't make me laugh. The best Web browser on the planet is Firefox 3.5... for now.

I've been using Firefox since day one, and, for the most part, I've liked it. And, folks, since I've been using the Web since before there were Web browsers I know what I'm talking about.

The new Firefox is fast, filled with new features, and solid as a rock. I've been working with this latest update since its beta days on a pair of PCs. The first is my dependable Windows XP SP3 system, running on a was a Dell Inspiron 530S with a 2.2-GHz Intel Pentium E2200 dual-core processor, 4GBs of RAM, a 500GB SATA drive and an Integrated Intel 3100 GMA (Graphics Media Accelerator). The other is my Fedora 11 PC. This Linux box is a Gateway GT5622 desktop with a 1.8GHz Intel Pentium E2160 dual-core CPU, 3GBs of RAM, a 400GB SATA drive, and an Intel 950 GMA.

Windows or Linux, Firefox, and its extensions worked like a charm. Unfortunately, while Firefox is back to being a fast browser, it's not the fastest browser. First place continues to go to Google's Chrome.

When it comes to rendering JavaScript heavy pages, and many Web sites are now laden with JavaScript, Chrome still leaves Firefox eating its dust. Once more, I found that Chrome 2.0's V8 JavaScript engine lops by Firefox's TraceMonkey engine without breaking a sweat. Using the SunSpider JavaScript Benchmark on the XP PC, Firefox 3.5 was almost twice as slow as Chrome 2.0 at the benchmark with a recorded time of 1,274.8-millisecond to Chrome 2.0's 716.4.

Web browsing isn't all about speed though. While Chrome is finally making progress with adding extensions, it's still way, way behind Firefox. Heck, even Internet Explorer 8 does better with extensions than Chrome does at the moment. If you want a Web browser you can easily customize with extensions to work just the way you want it to work, you really want Firefox

Now, some people might say that the forthcoming Opera 11 with Unite gives you far more power to set up a browser just the way you want it to be set up. And, then they're right. But Opera 11 Unite is also perhaps the most insecure program I've seen introduced this century. I wouldn't use it if you paid me. For the best combination of having it your way while staying safe, you'll still want Firefox.

Firefox also has some very useful new features. But one of them, Open Video and Audio, much as I'd like to like it, I really don't see as being that important. While Firefox 3.5 now incorporates video and audio content by using HTML 5 for Web page embedded video and audio without the need for an Adobe Flash compatible plug-in. Sure the idea of direct audio/video integration in the browser sounds great, but it only works with the open-source Ogg formats.

I like open formats, but, there's very, very little media out there in the Ogg formats. The hope is that Ogg will replace Flash and Microsoft's Silverlight proprietary formats in the same way that the PNG image format has largely replaced GIF on the Web. I'm not convinced that will happen in this case though. The media companies have a vested interest in controlling their content and part of that, as Sony PlayStation 3 owners discovered this weekend when Hulu cut them off from its videos, is making sure they call the shots on how their video is seen.

That can be overcome though. What's a more important problem is that while open-source programs and formats are usually better than then proprietary competition, that's not the case with Ogg. As Robin 'Roblimo' Miller pointed out in Linux.com the Ogg formats aren't good enough to compete with Flash, MP3, and the other popular, but proprietary, formats. The Ogg formats, and the tools that will let content creators use them, still need a lot of improvement before they see many people using them.

I feel much more sanguine about Firefox's new privacy controls. In the Private Browsing mode noting is left on your PC from your rambles around the Web. . They're also a new tool, Forget this Site, which I believe is unique to Firefox 3.5, that lets you zap every trace of your visits to any particular site from your browser's history.

So, with all this good stuff, why do I think Firefox 3.5 has only seized the lead for the moment? Primarily, it's because Google Chrome, especially on Linux, is getting really better, really fast. Chrome already has the speed advantage, and I can see it catching up and surpassing Firefox in features in the near future. Apple's new Safari 4 is also looking mighty good, and it looks to me like Apple finally has a grip on Safari's endemic security problems.

For us, the good news is that all this competition--after all even Microsoft's latest Internet Explorer has become a decent browser--means that no matter what browser you use, it's going to be a lot better than the one you used just last year.

Browser wars

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FireFox 3.5

Submitted by Amazon Thyrteen on July 26, 2009 - 7:12 A.M.

I too have been using FireFox since it's inception and up until now have had no problems what-so-ever. I updated to 3.5 and it ran fine until a few days ago, when it went totally berserk, it started freezing and giving out error messages that I needed to close the open Firefox window or restart my computer. I've done everything including uninstalling and reinstalling the software two times to no avail. Each time I restart FireFox the previous tabs, all of them are trying to load even though when shutting down my instructions were to close, not save and close. I have now reinstalled version 3.0.12 and the problem went away, it's running just fine. I was under the impression that the new version of FireFox was the final version and not a BETA, what's the deal here? I'm still an advocate of FireFox, this just took me by surprise, I guess I've been spoiled!

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Until Chrome gets an

Submitted by jmacg on July 4, 2009 - 3:42 P.M.

Until Chrome gets an ad-blocking extension it won't begin to compete with Firefox for me.

A Lamborgini could run rings around my Ford Mondeo, speedwise, but if I had to share the Lambo's windscreen with distracting, dancing adverts, the Mondeo would remain my choice. Even if you gave me the Lamborgini for free.

I feel the same way about Chrome.

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Firefox 3.5

Submitted by Kevin Pan on July 2, 2009 - 9:26 P.M.

I use Firefox 3.5, Safari, OmniWeb, Opera, IE on Mac OS X, Windows XP / 7, and OpenSolaris. In terms of raw speed, OmniWeb (www.omnigroup.com) is still the best but it is only available for the Mac. Firefox would be a good browser for Windows and OpenSolaris platforms.

Kevin Pan
Open Source Developer
http://ObjectsOnClouds.org

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Firefox 3.5

Submitted by billfranke on July 1, 2009 - 8:21 P.M.

You are not the only one around who was using the Internet before Web browsers. There are lots of us still kicking who were.

For some of us who use Windows (I have to for lots of reasons that have nothing to do with the current OS religious wars), only Chrome is on top. It keeps upgrading its abilities to deal with stuff on the Web.

Frankly, while Firefox 3.5 is measurably better than its predecessors, it's still too slow for me. And now that I'm no longer teaching, I no longer need all those wonderful FF add-ons, other than Xmarks, that is.

I started using FF from day one also and loved it until Google Chrome came along. Call me fickle, but it was love at first sight. Clean, lean, and mean, Google Chrome is *my number one*; Firefox 3.5 is *yours*. There is no best browser for everyone, just as there is no best OS for everyone.

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No 64 bit support for tracemonkey

Submitted by sankaran on July 1, 2009 - 11:23 A.M.

I downloaded and installed Firefox 3.5 on my ubuntu 64 bit box from ubuntu fta ppa.

True firefox 3.5 added lots of features, but TraceMonkey the JIT javascript engine is not ported to 64 bit and firefox 3.5 runs only as fast or maybe slower than firefox 3.0.11

http://hacks.mozilla.org/2009/06/tracemonkey-demo/

You can see tracemonkey has not yet landed on final build by reading comments from above link

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I'll try it again

Submitted by Mark Everett Hall on July 1, 2009 - 10:05 A.M.

Okay, SVJN, I'll give Firefox another try on my Mac. I have to use it to post blog entries on Computerworld's site. But that's the only time I use it...because I am forced to. I find that Firefox doesn't handle fonts properly, drops live feeds to Web pages, and is relatively slow, especially compared to Safari on the Mac.

So, on your recommendation, I'll give it another go. But, having used Firefox on the Mac since its 2.x days and have always returned to Safari (with all its flaws and warts) because of its lackluster performance and bigger flaws.

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Still not convinced...

Submitted by Josh Newton on July 1, 2009 - 5:58 A.M.

I am still not convinced about Firefox. It used be my browser of choice before I found Opera. Then when I moved to Macs I became a big Safari fan (not on windows...). At this point I can't get myself to move away from Safari. On windows you can't get me away from Chrome. It is far better than Internet Exploder, which goes without saying, and it runs much better than Firefox on my two windows boxes.

On OS X I feel like Safari is lighter and faster than Firefox. The Mac version of Chrome definitely has my attention though. Sorry Opera!

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Hope they provide 64-bit linux version

Submitted by Anonymous on July 1, 2009 - 2:33 A.M.

When I was using 32-bit Linux, I always had a chance to download the latest firefox before it was available from distribution repositories. Not to mention that I had full control on when to standardize to the same version of firefox across Linux and Windows platforms.

Now I have to wait for 64-bit Linux version from the distribution repositories before installing on Windows at the same time.

Reason is, the firefox configurations are shared across platforms on the network, so users can login to either Linux or Windows and still see the exact same web interface, personal bookmarks, etc.

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Firefox is the worst browser

Submitted by Kevin on June 30, 2009 - 8:09 P.M.

Firefox in Safe Mode or without any add-ons loaded is OK but a very bland browser. Add a few Mozilla recommended add-ons and Firefox turns into a resource hog with terrible memory leaks. Example below:
- Opened Firefox with 9 recommended add-ons active. Left sitting open without use for 3.5 hours. Checked with Process Explorer and Mem at 117,000 going up by 1 MB with every 30 seconds. Virtual RAM at 509,280 stable. When I clicked on Firefox to bring it back to the focus app there was a delay of about 15 seconds, but once Firefox was useable, the mem had dropped to 62,000 and virtual went down to 440,000.
- Closed Firefox and re-opend and disabled 3 of the add-ons. Tested with similar results as above.
- Closed Firefox and re-opend and disabled 3 more add-ons. Tested with similar results as above. So with only 3 Mozilla recommended add-ons active the serious memory leak problem still exists.

I checked the Mozilla help and support forums and found several entries related to memory leaks. No solutions though. A Mozilla engineer simply said that add-ons can cause memory issues and to re-start Firefox to fix the problems. Come on, is that a real solution?

So if you want a browser that does the basics (by todays standards) reasonably well, has reasonable performance, and is fairly stable, by all means use Firefox (without add-ons). Of course Internet Explorer is already in Windows and does the same things so why bother.

If you want a faster browser that does the basics really well and handles certain tasks in very innovative ways, go with Chrome.

If you want a browser that is just as fast (possibly faster) has led innovation for years (what you now see in other browsers was here first) and has multiple features not included in other browsers, then go with Opera.

For the record I was using Firefox 3.0.11 with all the latest updates for the tests including all the latest updates for the add-ons. I have not used Firefox 3.5 yet but it appears the issues occur with add-ons so probably the same issues remain in version 3.5. Version 3.5 does have some additional features built in but is it more than IE8? Probably not.

I use Opera version 9.64. It is fast, stable, and comes loaded with features meaning there is no need for add-ons, although add-ons (widgets) can be added if desired. I used the built in e-mail client for all my e-mail for a few years as it is fast, efficient and removed the need for a separate e-mail app. Unfortunately the text only layout (for sending and forwarding e-mails) became too restrictive but I await the new version of Opera which will have full HTML e-mail support built in. Will probably switch back from Thunderbird at that point.

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