Google claims 30 percent Chrome speed boost
Google has shifted the JavaScript engine that powers its Chrome Web browser into a higher gear.
The company announced Thursday that an update to Chrome's V8 JavaScript engine, combined with a new version of the Webkit browser engine, should improve the loading speed of JavaScript-heavy Web pages by up to 30 percent. The updates will be automatically downloaded to existing copies of Chrome.
JavaScript engines are one of the new fronts in the browser wars, with various vendors touting the performance of their browsers this year in hopes of unseating the competition. Chrome did very well on CNET JavaScript tests earlier this year, besting Firefox, Safari, and Internet Explorer.
Google also announced a few other changes to Chrome, including the addition of new features that let you erase embarrassing (or NSFW) Web sites from the most-visited list that appears when you open a new tab in Chrome. And Chrome now has a feature found in many browsers: form autofill.
Tom Krazit writes about the ever-expanding world of Internet search, including Google, Yahoo, online advertising, and portals, as well as the evolution of mobile computing. He has written about traditional PC companies, chip manufacturers, and mobile computers, spending the last three years covering Apple. E-mail Tom. 





I'm getting more and more disappointing with Google! I mean is speed the only thing they care about?? what about actually displaying simple webpages before showing off chrome experiments!?
there is not such thing as Chrome vs. Firefox anymore @ this rate!
On a side note, if Mozilla would incorporate NoScript functionality (InPrivate Browsing on IE8) and tap into protected mode or build their own sandbox like Chrome, I might be inclined to switch back. The NoScript/Adblock Plus debacle really turned me off to Firefox.
IE8 starts up almost instantaneously. I doubt that Chrome can start any faster and start time is not a accurate measurement of true performance. FF 3.5b4 is slower to start than both IE and Chrome, yet it is slightly faster than IE at rendering JS and a good match for Chrome on heavy js pages.
You are absolutley wrong about IE8 on Win 7 being the slowest to open. I click thge icon on a cold started PC and it opens immediately. FF takes about 5 seconds to open the first time and Chrome is about as fast as IE8 to open. I use all three browsers frequently and calling me names does not make your post credible.
In other words a simple and clean interface, and it is fast and it is light.
Sure, no extensions yet, but it is lighter and faster to load as a result.
Hopefully future extension capability doesn't slow it down.
--shelly
I don't care how fast it is.
the reason they built chrome is because they thought they could do a better job than the competition, and instead of just copying what everyone else did, they made a new kind of browser.
same goes with google search. and android. and gmail. because they are so big they can afford to risk failure on new and untested ideas, which no doubt results in a lot of wasted time and money, but also the occasional jackpot.
http://v8.googlecode.com/svn/data/benchmarks/v4/run.html
I ran Firefox 4.5B4 and it was inconsistent with scores of 217 and 166.
I ran Google Chrome v1+ and it had a score of 1400 something.
I updated Google Chrome to 2.0.1. and it had a amazing score of 2107!
I also tested IE 8 to see how much it sucks, it came up with a pop-up saying that this page's Javascript might make your system slow (fail much), and had a score of 67 when it finished.
How many cringed as they read that last sentence??
i agree with it all
- by n25philly May 22, 2009 11:17 AM PDT
- still sucks
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