Chrome is fast, but speed isn't everything

Google's new web browser, Chrome, must be the most talked about on the internet and a huge number of words have been written about it. Most people are praising it, saying how wonderful it is, how much faster it is, and so on. But is it really that good?

Google reckons that it is 10 times faster than Firefox 3. Some speed tests reported at Cnet show Chrome to be what looks like hundreds of times faster than IE7 and perhaps 10 times faster than Firefox 3. However, Firefox developers have produced test results that show that Firefox is faster. It just goes to show that the results of speed tests depend on the test, so don't believe everything you read about Chrome.

Someone else posted figures that show how many milliseconds it takes to display a web page and Chrome was something like 50ms and IE7 was more like 250ms. So what? When you have to wait 10 seconds or more for a web page to download because of the amount of internet traffic, the fact that Chrome shaves a few milliseconds off the rendering time isn't that important. Forget speed tests, just try it. It certainly feels quick, but it is nowhere near as fast as the speed tests suggest and it only feels slightly quicker.

If you run online applications then having a fast JavaScript engine is certainly an advantage, but other parts of Chrome are disappointing. For example, there aren't any add-ons. This isn't surprising because the project was top secret and the browser has only just been released. Add-ons will probably come in time, but till then you are best sticking with Firefox. Bookmark handling is awful and there doesn't appear to be any form of bookmarks manager. You can't delete more than one at a time, and moving them around and reorganising them is awkward.

There are Open All Bookmarks and Open All Bookmarks in a New Window commands. I must have hundreds of bookmarks and Chrome just crashes if I try this. They are pointless commands and only work if you have less than a dozen bookmarks. Chrome's creators obviously don't like or use bookmarks. They should look at Firefox 3 to see what you can do with a good bookmark manager.

Other stuff is missing, like print preview, shrink to fit printing, security (go to eBay or PayPal using Firefox 3 and see how much more reassuring it is), RSS feeds, notes, widgets, blocked content, links list, browsing without images, and so on. Google Chrome is a beta and the version number is 0.2, which is all you need to know.

You need more than a fast JavaScript engine and crashproof tabs to make a good browser. Firefox is much better. Even Opera is better. It's one to watch because it will no doubt get better. For the moment though, it's best avoided.

*Update: New versions have fixed bugs, but it could still be better.