Has Firefox Finally Been Beat?

A few days ago, some one leaked information about a project that Google has been hiding for several years. Google Chrome is Google's answer to Microsoft's Internet Explorer. Chrome is a totally redesigned web browser; built from the ground up it aims for speed and security. I have been a fan of Firefox back in the days of 1.0 but after trying Chrome I have to say I'm reluctant to going back to Firefox for several reasons.

1. Speed - Incredible, unadulterated speed! One of my biffs about Firefox has always been the slow start up times. General web surfing has always been faster than IE but the start up times have at times taken longer than 30-40 seconds on an older PC. Chrome is faster than even IE with start up times and surfing is even faster than Firefox 3.

2. Memory Usage - One of the negative things thrown around by IE Fan boys is that Firefox is a resource hog, and to a degree they are right. Most of these problems have been fixed with 3.0, IE has been shown to use more memory than Firefox has ever. Chrome continues to run smoothly even after marathon surfing.

3. Secure - Chrome was built from day one with the thought of security. IE is not secure due to some short sightedness from the beginning of the project. Active X controls allow someone to take control over your browser with relative ease.

Even with these advantages over Firefox I think that power users will really struggle to cross over the the shiny side. One of the biggest disadvantages to Chrome is that unlike Firefox there is no add-ons for Chrome. Also right now Chrome is only available for Windows XP and Vista. Lastly, Chrome has few options available for power users to tweak.

Over-all, Chrome is a very good browser. I will be watching it's development in the future. I think that for the everyday user Chrome will be a perfect replacement for IE. For the power user, I think that it will be a while before we will cross over to Chrome.

If you have not yet tried it, give it a chance before you write it off as a fad or just not for you. Click here to go to the download page.

What do you think? Comment and let me know.


UPDATE:

After having used Chrome for a while I have just a few things to add.

1. Flash is not as fast as in Firefox. I have an older PC that I use at work (2.0 Ghz, 2.0gb RAM, on board video). I found that Chrome makes all Flash (youtube.com, dilbert.com/animation, any flash based games) drop frames.

2. Java based apps are much faster than in Firefox.

3. I miss my Ad block Plus add-on.

4. Spell checking does not work everywhere it should. (such as while I type this blog)

5. It works best in google based apps (gmail, google docs, etc...)

Learn to Geek for Free

I have never had a formal training in computers or web design (except for a short course on the Internet when I was in high school.) I have learned everything I know from three sources.

One: Learn by doing.

When I was in 9th grade I had a shop class that offered a section on computers. It was more or less a joke. There was no books telling you what to do, no teacher who knew anymore than the students did, nothing. What they did have was two old IBM 386 computers. The teacher told me, "If you can strip this down to all of the separate parts then put it back together and have it still working then you can have it." WOW! A real working computer! How could I refuse? I stripped that thing down to the motherboard and then put the whole thing back together and prayed that it would still work. Sure enough, when I pushed the power button it came on and had no errors.
If you want to learn how to geek out then go get an old computer and tear it up. I don't recommend using your new Alienware gaming rig, that would not be a good testing platform. Instead find your old computer that you retired back in 2001 and see if you can fix it. If you start and get stuck, don't worry that's when my next point will come into play...

Two: Learn by Reading

We have the greatest resource that has ever been developed sitting at our fingertips. The internet has how-tos, walkthroughs, and tutorials.
Finding information does not have to be as daunting a task as you might think. Your first and best option is Google. Google is the best search engine ever developed, and most everyone has used it at least once, but most people have no idea about the power it really has. Google has many advanced 0ptions that most people have no idea even exist. For example, your computer gives you an error message, you search for it on google but you get a bunch of irrelevant links that just contain a couple of the words in the error, how do you get only what you want? If you put quotation marks around the phrase, google will only search for that exact phrase. This is only one example but there are many more that you can learn about for yourself here. When searching Google, remember that it looks through websites for the words your are looking for, so think about what might be written in the page instead of asking a question. Ok, I know that was confusing so let me give you an example: Instead of "How do you cook collard greens?" use "collard greens recipes" The latter phrase is more likely to be found on the site you are looking for rather than just asking a question.
Anything you want to know can be found on the Internet somewhere. The key is to look for it. There is even sites that are dedicated to teaching a certain subject. For instance, I've never had a formal lesson on web design but I have built several sites. I learned all of that from a site called W3Schools.com. This is a great resource for everything you would need to make a dynamic website.

Three: Listen to People Who Know

Whenever I find someone who knows more than me on geeky stuff I pick their brain for anything that I can pickup on. Don't be proud, be humble and let them know that you think they are smarter than you are. This will open them up more than trying to compete with them. Also in the last few years a new media has been evolving called podcasts. Podcasts are videos or audio clips that individuals make and post for people to download (usually for free). I subscribe to about a dozen different podcast, most of them are tech podcasts. These help me to learn and stay on top of the news in the tech world. The easiest way of getting these is to download iTunes from Apple then go to their iTunes store and search for podcasts.
Some of my favorite podcasts are Tekzilla, Geekbrief, DL.TV, and Webb Alert. These have a good mix of tech news and how-tos. These will help you to learn and to stay up to date.

I hope this will be helpful for those who want to geek but don't know where to start. Comment below with any questions your might have as well as any other tips you might have.