Post by a98 on Apr 9, 2009 16:01:17 GMT 3
can't remember if we already had this discussion but let's do it again.
back in the day i used IE like most of people, it was much better than netscape, always developing while netscape was running still.
then came firefox and i think i used it like 4 years in a row.
but about a year ago i noticed how it started crashing and taking too much resources now and then.
so i moved to opera, and boy was that great, i believe opera is still the fastest browser out there based on all the benchmark tests (except chrome is a bit faster with javascript and css).
but about a month ago opera started freezing a lot, expecially with youtube and other online videos (qtime), it also seemed not to be that light anymore. i don't know if it was a new version or something, but it wasnt' as fun to work with anymore.
so i started to go through all different forums to see what other people think is the best browser, and it's just amazing how popular firefox has become. it's like IE 5-6 years ago, people don't even bother checking other browsers and they don't even really know why firefox is better or safer they just say it because someone else said it to them.
well anyway after all this i thought it was time to finally try chrome. and this browser looks absolutely fantastic (even after customizing my latest browser, will tell you later, i think chrome is the best looking browser ever made, even with all other browser's skins included too)
the biggest plus with chrome is how fast it is, expecially with scripts and how much space you have for viewing your pages, it takes all the unnessasery menus off.
i also loved the bookmark system, and the front page with most visited pages listed was great!
i thought i found the best browser until this week. first i noticed how copypasting from text areas and forms doesn't really work as great as suppose to and there were some other small bugs here and there (like some page not really working properly or i not being able to open right click menu from where i should)
but the biggest one was when i had multiple tabs open (like 10, i usually have a lot) and i noticed my cpu started going really slow.. so i checked the processes, and i found out that chrome opens a new browser process for each tab. so while it might take as less as 15k with one page, when you open 10 tabs, it takes 150k. and that just doesn't work with my surfing.
so now i was back to square one, and this time i thought i should really give a shot to some of the new unknown browser, potential "next firefoxes"
and the one i'm using now for the second day is "Maxthon" version 2.x
and i'm absolutely loving it. it's based on IE's code, but it's been developed a lot further from that. the features are just outstanding.
there's two version, the new Maxthon version 2.x (3 coming soon in the future) with a lot of features and good looks. and Maxthon version 1.6x which is lighter (AND FUCK IT'S LIGHT! my own benchmark later on..) but looks crappier and is less customizable.
what i love most about maxthon is that it's completely customizable!
in version 2 you can remove everything from upper menu (with file, view and all that) status bars, search bars, address bars, tool bars everything. and you can organize everything the way you want, moving even just single buttons like back button to anywhere you want. you can have the tabs above everything (like i have) or below the address bar like in firefox, you can even have the tabs in the buttom if you like.
you can even delete single buttons, like have the tool bar but remove the forward button and add your own buttons like favourites or whatever you feel like.
compared to other browsers Maxthon 1.6x is also pretty customizable, but with 2.x you can change everything...
there's about a 100 skins in maxthon website, and i downloaded about 15 and found 10 of them really worth using and good looking (although none can top google chrome still )
here's a screenshot how my browser is looking atm:
www.radiocluster.com/maxthon.jpg
i also love how you can adjust sites to open with quick buttons, like when i press F1 about 10 tabs open right away, from the sites i usually go through when i'm online.
so at the moment this seems really good, and everything seems to work just how it's suppose to, but i've only used it for two days so you never know.
oh and like i mentioned before i made a cpu usage test with all the browsers, using 14 tabs open, here's the results (the less the better)
chrome - over 200k!!
ie - 128k
opera - 120k
maxthon v2 - 117k
firefox - 100k
maxthon v1 - 15k !!!!!!!!! (WINNER)
it seems maxthon v1 has some sort of smart disable feature, meaning regardless how many tabs you got open it will only use as much resources as the one being active is. yet i noticed absotely no difference in performance when browsing through the tabs.
so yeah, the question is what browser are you using, and why you love it and why you don't love some other browser. also which different browsers have you tasted and your opinnions of them?
back in the day i used IE like most of people, it was much better than netscape, always developing while netscape was running still.
then came firefox and i think i used it like 4 years in a row.
but about a year ago i noticed how it started crashing and taking too much resources now and then.
so i moved to opera, and boy was that great, i believe opera is still the fastest browser out there based on all the benchmark tests (except chrome is a bit faster with javascript and css).
but about a month ago opera started freezing a lot, expecially with youtube and other online videos (qtime), it also seemed not to be that light anymore. i don't know if it was a new version or something, but it wasnt' as fun to work with anymore.
so i started to go through all different forums to see what other people think is the best browser, and it's just amazing how popular firefox has become. it's like IE 5-6 years ago, people don't even bother checking other browsers and they don't even really know why firefox is better or safer they just say it because someone else said it to them.
well anyway after all this i thought it was time to finally try chrome. and this browser looks absolutely fantastic (even after customizing my latest browser, will tell you later, i think chrome is the best looking browser ever made, even with all other browser's skins included too)
the biggest plus with chrome is how fast it is, expecially with scripts and how much space you have for viewing your pages, it takes all the unnessasery menus off.
i also loved the bookmark system, and the front page with most visited pages listed was great!
i thought i found the best browser until this week. first i noticed how copypasting from text areas and forms doesn't really work as great as suppose to and there were some other small bugs here and there (like some page not really working properly or i not being able to open right click menu from where i should)
but the biggest one was when i had multiple tabs open (like 10, i usually have a lot) and i noticed my cpu started going really slow.. so i checked the processes, and i found out that chrome opens a new browser process for each tab. so while it might take as less as 15k with one page, when you open 10 tabs, it takes 150k. and that just doesn't work with my surfing.
so now i was back to square one, and this time i thought i should really give a shot to some of the new unknown browser, potential "next firefoxes"
and the one i'm using now for the second day is "Maxthon" version 2.x
and i'm absolutely loving it. it's based on IE's code, but it's been developed a lot further from that. the features are just outstanding.
there's two version, the new Maxthon version 2.x (3 coming soon in the future) with a lot of features and good looks. and Maxthon version 1.6x which is lighter (AND FUCK IT'S LIGHT! my own benchmark later on..) but looks crappier and is less customizable.
what i love most about maxthon is that it's completely customizable!
in version 2 you can remove everything from upper menu (with file, view and all that) status bars, search bars, address bars, tool bars everything. and you can organize everything the way you want, moving even just single buttons like back button to anywhere you want. you can have the tabs above everything (like i have) or below the address bar like in firefox, you can even have the tabs in the buttom if you like.
you can even delete single buttons, like have the tool bar but remove the forward button and add your own buttons like favourites or whatever you feel like.
compared to other browsers Maxthon 1.6x is also pretty customizable, but with 2.x you can change everything...
there's about a 100 skins in maxthon website, and i downloaded about 15 and found 10 of them really worth using and good looking (although none can top google chrome still )
here's a screenshot how my browser is looking atm:
www.radiocluster.com/maxthon.jpg
i also love how you can adjust sites to open with quick buttons, like when i press F1 about 10 tabs open right away, from the sites i usually go through when i'm online.
so at the moment this seems really good, and everything seems to work just how it's suppose to, but i've only used it for two days so you never know.
oh and like i mentioned before i made a cpu usage test with all the browsers, using 14 tabs open, here's the results (the less the better)
chrome - over 200k!!
ie - 128k
opera - 120k
maxthon v2 - 117k
firefox - 100k
maxthon v1 - 15k !!!!!!!!! (WINNER)
it seems maxthon v1 has some sort of smart disable feature, meaning regardless how many tabs you got open it will only use as much resources as the one being active is. yet i noticed absotely no difference in performance when browsing through the tabs.
so yeah, the question is what browser are you using, and why you love it and why you don't love some other browser. also which different browsers have you tasted and your opinnions of them?