September 2nd, 2008
Google Chrome: a First Look
By Michael Santo
Editor-in-Chief, RealTechNews
For those of you who were anxiously awaiting the release of Google Chrome, the new browser that Google just announced yesterday, Google had an 11 AM PDT press conference, and dished the details, as well as the download.
The download is available at http://code.google.com/p/chromium/ (which is the main site; actual download is at http://www.google.com/chrome. The link went live at 12 PM PDT.
For those wondering, as I was, how the comic came about, Google said:
Scott McCloud is “a legend in the comic world,” and has handled complex topics. He was “embedded with the team.”
After trying it out for just a short while, here are some impressions:
- It’s pretty sparse, meaning it functions well as a browser, but some of the niceties I like about Firefox are missing (such as ad blocking, tab sessions, and the like).
- Oh, come on: double-click to close a tab should at least be an option.
- Incognito windows (AKA private browsing, AKA porn mode) are available.
- Did I mention no ad blocking (of course, there are 3rd-party blockers that work as proxy servers that would work).
- For the life of me, I didn’t realize how much I would miss the lack of a “Home” button to take me to my Home page.
- Check out the way a new tab looks (click the logo above). The program will “learn” your favorite sites and put them as shortcuts in a new tab. Pretty cool, though I’d like the option to override that if I want.
- It’s fast. How much of that is the lack of bloat due to the relative barebones-ness, though? Will all that speed disappear as Chrome becomes more feature-laden?
- The Omnibox is much like Firefox 3’s Awesome bar, but Tab-to-Search (which allows you to type a site name and then a search term) is pretty cool.
- I’d like some 3rd-party toolbar support, such as (for me) the oft-used Roboform.
Clearly, Google still has plenty of work to do. But as a first cut (not even sure I’d call it a beta) it’s decent.
Any readers out there have some comments?
shobber says:
It’s fast….Really Really Fast. May be a good part time browser. I love firefox but sometimes its just to much. Going to keep testing. As will the whole world.
September 3rd, 2008 at 3:25 am
Ryan says:
Its not bad, I have tried them all and still find OPERA to be the best browser, just as fast but easier to use and more functions.
September 3rd, 2008 at 4:02 am
Dave says:
I like how fast it is. Keeping each page in it’s own process really helps keep the memory footprint down, even with all the web pages I visit during the day.
It’s still beta. I won’t use it for anything serious (ie financial activities) until after the source code is evaluated for security holes and such.
On the whole, it’s the most impressive new browser I can remember seeing.
September 3rd, 2008 at 7:27 am
media boy says:
i’m willing to try it out just to see if it works more efficiently than FireFox… if it’s faster than Firefox and isn’t IE, then i’ll use it
September 3rd, 2008 at 8:05 am
Spacetech says:
I like it a lot. It’s good for a beta. Once they start working on it more it’s going to be really good!
September 3rd, 2008 at 10:16 am
John says:
I tried both Chrome and IE8 Beta yesterday and I’m not impressed. Chrome ripped off my favorites from Firefox when I had it try to import them. I had to re-download Firefox (3) to get them back.
Chrome is way to plain.
September 3rd, 2008 at 2:12 pm
Learn To Play Backgammon says:
Google chrome is the worst browser i have ever seen. When google launched it. May be after a day or two I downloaded it, from the net. It was very promising that time as compared to mozilla and internet explorer. After a few days, it became extremely slow, the site used to take too much time to open. Then i unistalled it.
September 30th, 2008 at 9:29 pm