Apple rolls out Safari 3.1 browser

Apple on Tuesday announced that version 3.1 of its Safari browser is available for both Mac and Windows users.

The Web browser now supports a number of new Web standards: HTML 5's latest audio and video tags, as well as CSS Animations. Apple claims that page load times in Safari 3.1 are 1.9 times faster than Microsoft's Internet Explorer 7 and 1.7 times faster than Mozilla's Firefox 2, and that JavaScript runs as much as six times faster in the new Safari than in other browsers.

Safari 3.1, Apple's latest Windows cross-over

(Credit: CNET Networks)

Apple offers Safari as a free download. The browser, in its Safari 3.0 iteration, was first made available to Windows users last June.

In order to run Safari 3.1, Mac users will need to be using the Mac OS X Leopard or Mac OS X Tiger version 10.4.11 operating systems; Windows users will need to be running Windows XP or Windows Vista.

[edgedesign]

FAST!

It's quite fast AND supports the latest web standards!

I hope this motivates MS to get it's browser development in gear.
I've heard the forthcoming IE 8 passes the Acid2 test. I hope it
really does have better support of web standards and is also
speedier.

In the meantime, Windows users should check out Safari 3.1.

http://www.webstandards.org/action/acid2/
http://www.apple.com/safari/

[FellowConspirator]

MS Users and Safari...

Safari's (Webkit) is a great browser, but I'm not sure that the
Windows version is as carefully vetted and optimized as the OS X
version. I think it'd be hasty to assume that it would be quite as
slick under Windows (lots of feature are missing too, you can't
just drag a chunk of a web-page off and have it become a
sidebar widget like you can with the OS X dashboard, for
example -- and there are honestly useful toolbars for FF and IE
under Windows).

That said, I do understand that there's talk at MS about using
Safari as sort of the standard for browser comparison in
developing IE8. Not because of the merits of the browser itself,
but rather because in researching mobile-based web-traffic
they've found Safari on iPhone accounts for almost 80% of
mobile web-browsing. If MS wants to take a big slice of that pie,
they're going to have to work for it.

[zephryn]

FF3 Beta 4

I see on the Apple site they compare Safari 3.1 with Firefox 2. Has anyone tested it against Firefox 3 Beta 4? there were supposed to be speed improvements over 2.

[Penguinisto]

Recent Browser tests...

I'll prolly go to Firefox exclusively once I get done upgrading my Mac.

Safari works quite well, don't get me wrong, but FF3 looks to be more efficient than anything else alive (and Internet Explorer majorly sucks the big one in memory usage)

proof here: http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080317-firefox-3-goes-on-a-diet-eats-less-memory-than-ie-and-opera.html

/P

[iBuzz]

These tests show Safari is better than Firefox

Check out:
http://bdn.backbase.com/blog/sjoerd/performance-is-everything

They show the opposite conclusion: that Safari/Webkit is the fastest web browser engine with Firefox 3 in second place. In running my own code, that's been my conclusion as well. Firefox 3 is actually quite good. But the latest Safari is turning in the best performance numbers right now.

[kelmon]

Firefox Is Not a Mac Application

The problem with Firefox is that it is a cross-platform
application. Some people will say that this is a good thing and
that because of this Firefox is the same application on Windows
as it is on the Mac and Linux. Unfortunately, this also means
that Firefox does not behave like normal Mac applications and
does not take advantage of the services available. For example,
in order to browse using a network proxy server you need to
manually configure the server within Firefox whereas native
applications will get their network settings from System
Preferences automatically, and change when you select a new
Location. If it wasn't for things like this then I'd happily
recommend Firefox but instead I'd recommend Camino instead -
it uses the same rendering engine as Firefox but wraps it in a
native Mac application that behaves as you'd expect.

At this time I'm trying out Safari 3.1 but Camino 1.6 is pretty
darned good too.

[Fireweaver]

Apple Update to bolster install base

One shady practice that has seemingly slipped past concerns is that Apple is starting to use it's Apple updater to push "add-on" products to its consumers.

When you download and install Quicktime you have the option to have it check for updates. This should be a no-brainer, especially given the
frequent updates for Quicktime.

However, once you do this Apple doesn't just post updates to Quicktime. Listed in the "updates" are Quicktime+iTunes and what did I see today on Apple 'Updater' for my PC? "Safari 3.1"

Maybe they should change the name to the "Apple Marketer". Joe Average User just clicks on all of the "Update Now" button to stay secure and now he has iTunes and Safari on his computer.

[Penguinisto]

Hint: Uncheck the box.

That's all you have to do... there's no push at all, since you have the option to not bother with it in the first place.

/P

[rlockrey]

I have to say I am very impressed with this release of Safari 3.11 for Windows. Its been so stable Im planning switching all the clients across the network to force browsing with only Safari. I have to agree with edge here, MS needs to get there game on now, this is a very slick browser for Windows. I think it could take the top browser easy.