Google Chrome Beta - My First Impressions

I recently downloaded Google's new web browser which they call Chrome. Google released Chrome to the public as a beta test. Google representatives say that Chrome is faster than any other browser at running JavaScript. Since many web sites use web applications written in JavaScript, Chrome should make noticeable difference in our daily web surfing. 

I should mention that I'm a Mozilla Firefox user primarily. Occasionally I hop over to Internet Explorer to see how my web sites look but other than that, it's Mozilla Firefox.

I downloaded Google Chrome by following the link on their main search page. The you get a small setup file which, after shutting down Firefox, I ran. During the setup, it searched through all of Firefox's favorites, browsing history, and saved passwords and added it. After a few seconds Google Chrome was installed on my machine and ready to go. Absolutely painless.

Google Chrome looks very stripped back and almost minimalistic on first impression but after getting used to the layout and playing with the settings it has most of the bells and whistles that you find in most web browsers.

The proof is in the pudding as they say so I went and took Google Chrome for a test drive. First stop was my Etsy shop to see if I noticed anything. The browser seems more responsive and it's much quicker to go from page to page compared to Firefox. Next I went to check out my Yamaha C3 site. It doesn't seem to load faster or anything but when I went to check out my gallery I found that it didn't display properly in the browser. I know the gallery displays right in Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Opera so I was kind of disappointed.

At this point in time I would like to test Google Chrome some more before I can say that I would switch over to itas a default web browser. It's obvious that Chrome is still in the beta stage but the staff at Google are working hard to make Chrome a leading standard in web browsers.