Remember this post? I was geeking out about the fact that Firefox had so many extensions, and how I could customize it any way I wanted. Namely, I could stack my tabs anywhere I wanted, and I could have my bookmarks appear anywhere I wanted too.
Now? I’m geeking out again. This time it’s all about Google Chrome. The reasons for this are simple, but long. Here is a short list of why I love Chrome more then Firefox, and why you should switch:
- 100/100 Acid 3 test. This means that every single thing should be rendered properly according to the specs as determined by the W3. Firefox isn’t there yet, and certainly not Internet Explorer. Safari is though, so that’s something.
- By nature of its name, Google Chrome aims to use as little “chrome” as possible while still being functional. This means that things like the status bar and the tab bar either don’t exist, or are part of something else. The tabs now appear where traditionally the title bar appeared, and the status bar appears only when necessary, and simply hovers over the page.
- Each tab is essentially in its own world. If that tab crashes, it simply closes. It doesn’t take the whole browser (and by extension, the rest of my tabs) with it. This is a major feature in my opinion, and I love it.
- It’s fast. There are statistics everwhere, but trust me, it’s not slower then Firefox, it is faster.
- It has extensions too!! My favorite extension is XMarks, and it allows me to sync bookmars across browsers (passwords too!), so wherever I am, my bookmarks will follow. Google Chrome even has this feature built-in, but it saves them on Google Docs, so they may or may not be easily transported to other browsers. Either way, most of the other extensions I have were to try to accomplish what Chrome inherently does, which is to minimize the amount of space the browser itself occupies, and maximize the area to view the web page.
If these 5 reasons don’t get you to switch to Chrome, I don’t know what will. 100/100 Acid 3 test alone is almost worth the switch, which guarantees properly coded web sites to render perfectly, and the extensions take it over the top. Some of the most popular Firefox extensions have found their way over to Chrome as well, so there really is little downside to switching.
Even if you want to give it a test-spin, go right ahead. Firefox won’t go anywhere. You can always switch back at any time.
Just please, please, PLEASE, don’t use Internet Explorer. Maybe by the time IE 10 comes out things will be safe, but at the moment, do yourself a favor and use Firefox or Chrome (or Safari, it works on Windows now too, not just Mac).
Peace.