Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

Cape · 2010-06-11 22:10:55

not a matter of life and death, but a browser is the software that we use most (at least me), so...

I'm a very long time FF user, and always loved it. Recently i've heard 'bout this chromium thing, so i thoroughly downloaded the PKGBUILD from ABS and gave it a try.
Well, after the first 5 minutes when i was very impressed by his speed at rendering complex graphics (transparent backgrounds over an image - see myspace) and nice defaults, I started to realize that's actually slower than FF on several basic stuffs like: handling of http (and no HTTP Pipelining support), back/forward history, opening new tabs and searching through text. Witch basically are the most important stuffs...

Plus it's young and definitely has security flaws, and by the time it will catch up FF on the aforementioned points, i'm sure Gecko will be much faster.

So, the winner for me is FF

alterecco · 2010-06-12 04:09:21

I use both. And uzbl. I use FF for webdevelopment (Firebug). I use Chromium for single site browsing, like gmail and grooveshark, since it has excellent support for an 'app' mode and separate user directories. I use uzbl for everything else (except when I don't).

rwd · 2010-06-12 11:34:27

Chromium sticks out like a sore thumb on my desktop. Also FF still wins in terms of customizability and extensions. I tried uzbl a bit, and I like the minimalist keyboard-driven approach, but I doubt it will ever be my main browser.

Last edited by rwd (2010-06-12 15:02:41)

stqn · 2010-06-12 14:06:33

Firefox is a pain to customise to a state that I like, but it can be done. Unlike Chromium.

Vamp898 · 2010-06-13 14:08:11

Try this with Chromium/V8

and then with Firefox

http://www.chromeexperiments.com/detail/gravity/

even if the Firefox Developers accept that TraceMonkey fails in the full way and switch to JägerMonkey it will be still slower than V8 becease JägerMonkey just uses a lot of parts of Webkits JS Core.

So Firefox will never be faster than Chromium except they use V8

http://shootout.alioth.debian.org/u64/b … racemonkey

count-corrupt · 2010-06-14 17:49:19

As long as it's devs refuse to provide a decent API for extensions like NoScript and AdBlock, chromium is out of question. Those two, Firebug and Vimperator are only addons I'd say I can't live without. For firebug it's OK to start Firefox and Vimperator is merely convenience. But AdBlock and NoScript are mandatory for everyday internet stuff.

ozar · 2010-06-14 17:56:11

I've tried both Chromium and Chrome at least a dozen times and so far neither come even close to replacing Firefox for me. I'll continue to check them out now and then just in case things should change, though.

Vamp898 · 2010-06-14 18:08:49

AdBlock is already there

https://chrome.google.com/extensions/de … kkbiglidom

And to say "Firefox is better becease its plugins" is like to say "Windows is better becease CounterStrike is for it"

That third-party plugins are aviable for Firefox is no breadwinning of Firefox and so no guilt for Chromium that some are not there

Firefox is there since 2002 and Chromium/Chrome since 2010 and the Plugins-Repo of Chromium is growing much faster than the one of Firefox (compared to there time of existing)

also the userbase of chrome/chromium is growing much faster (in adherence of time beeing existing)

its just kiddy and unfair to compare them by there third-party plugins

If we talk about "Which Browser is better" we should talk about "Which Browser is better" and not "Which Browser have more/better third-party plugins"

Last edited by Vamp898 (2010-06-14 18:13:04)

rwd · 2010-06-14 18:58:41

Actually it's pointless to ask which browser is 'best'. Use what works for you.

Vamp898 · 2010-06-14 19:07:44

There are technical specs.

Chromium uses less memory, starts faster, browses faster (especially JS is _much_ faster), is more crash secure (every tab have its own process) and so on

Gusar · 2010-06-14 19:28:58

Vamp898 wrote:

Chromium uses less memory

Not it doesn't, Firefox is much better in this regard. Chrome quite a pig actually, a consequence of it's multi-process approach. Firefox is also a lot more customizable even without extensions but especially with them. Chrome extensions will never allow that much control over the browser. JS speed, that's where Firefox is lacking, but I don't notice this at all in real-world browsing.

Vamp898 wrote:

Firefox is there since 2002 and Chromium/Chrome since 2010 and the Plugins-Repo of Chromium is growing much faster than the one of Firefox (compared to there time of existing)
also the userbase of chrome/chromium is growing much faster (in adherence of time beeing existing)

Eight years ago there were a lot less people online, so you can't quite compare it like that.

Zeist · 2010-06-14 20:09:48

I use uzbl on Linux. I find it to be far better than anything else out there right now.

I find that Chrome is a lot better than Firefox for me these days on Windows where I can't use uzbl. Even compared to pgo-builds it feels far faster and smoother than Firefox. Only missing NoScript a bit from Firefox.

Vamp898 · 2010-06-14 20:53:07

@Gusar

When i have about 5 Tabs opened, some JS Pages with Advertisements and one Tab with Java

Exactly the same on Chromium and Firefox

Firefox needs 25-40% more Memory

So when you say Chromium handles the Memory like a pig, imagine the optimisation.

And i read between the lines "Chromium handles the Memory like a pig" means that Firefox doesn´t so there is not much space for optimizing

Seems like a good future for Chromium

btw. SunSpider JavaScript Benchmark

Chromium: 510.8ms
Firefox: 1238.2ms

Last edited by Vamp898 (2010-06-14 21:03:59)

Awebb · 2010-06-14 21:14:11

I'd like to see a webkit driven opera with firefoxy plugin support. I prefer Chromium over Firefox when it comes to the displaying sites stuff. I also like the idea of having each tab in an own process, how many times have browser windows with myriads of tabs died because a crappy flash animation? The last time I tried Crhome, it still lacked a chrome:config or something alike, I like changing things to my needs.

I also don't know what's with all that talk about memory use. On my laptop, featuring 1 GB of RAM and a horribly slow HDD, I never had real performance issues because of too much memory use and a high swappieness, even with a huge load of open windows of all kinds.

Vamp898 · 2010-06-14 21:27:02

In the most cases its still not fair to compare memory usage in case of Linux´s Memory Management

But Chromium works much better on my Netbook with 512mb Memory but both, Chromium and Firefox, aren´t _that_ memory saver.

choener · 2010-06-14 21:44:10

Chromium needs scriptblocking. I have no desire to see JS crap. And ad-blocking was a bit strange, too. Finally, Chromium crapped on on 20 concurrent tabs loading at the same time.

Once these three things are worked out, Firefox can go bye-bye. Mostly because Firefox likes to stop for 1sec even if nothing is going on. That is really annoying...

Gusar · 2010-06-14 21:55:02

Vamp898 wrote:

And i read between the lines "Chromium handles the Memory like a pig" means that Firefox doesn´t so there is not much space for optimizing

That's some insane logic.

Let me put it in numbers. I rarely see Firefox going over 200MB. Chrome though, with the same browsing routine, over 600MB wasn't out of the ordinary. And I'm talking actual RAM usage here, not buffers and cache.

Also, I don't care about synthetic benchmarks. That's why I said "real-world browsing".

Vamp898 · 2010-06-14 22:10:58

600mb how did you get this?

Even if i open 15 Tabs with a lot of Flash, Java and JavaScript stuff i dont get more than 150-200mb

And about the real-world browsing. Just try Chrome Experiments

http://www.chromeexperiments.com/detail/gravity/

try it with Chromium and with Firefox and now imagine an page adds some of these fancy effects to a webpage and you browse it with Firefox

Last edited by Vamp898 (2010-06-14 22:11:55)

Wintervenom · 2010-06-14 22:42:56

If Firefox is using more RAM than you would like it to, you may want to adjust its memory settings:

browser.sessionhistory.max_entries: the number of pages to remember for going backward or forward though the history of a session (i.e, for each tab and window you have open). By default, Firefox will remember fifty pages.

browser.sessionhistory.max_total_viewers: the number of pages kept ready in memory so it doesn't have to parse the page again when you go backward or forward though the history of a session. By default, Firefox sets this according to how much RAM you have, so if you have one or more gigabytes, it will want to store eight pages, which can use quite a bit of RAM.

memory.cache.memory.capacity: how much RAM will used for keeping images and UI elements in memory so they don't have to be reloaded again later. By default, this is also set according to how much RAM you have. If you have one gigabyte of RAM, it will want eighteen megabytes. If you have four or more, thirty.

Last edited by Wintervenom (2010-06-14 22:45:11)

moljac024 · 2010-06-14 22:45:24

I had about 150 tabs open in firefox for quite a while a week ago. I didn't measure memory consumption, but I don't think it was swapping. Is 15 tabs supposed to be a lot?

count-corrupt · 2010-06-15 08:38:03

Vamp898 wrote:

AdBlock is already there
https://chrome.google.com/extensions/de … kkbiglidom

Adblock for Chrome wrote:

3. We're waiting on a Chrome feature that will allow us to block ads from being downloaded. Until then, we remove them after the fact. This means that even if you subscribe to the EasyPrivacy list, your browser will still be pinging the URLs that track you. Star the issue at http://bit.ly/chromebug35897 to get this fixed sooner!

That's an entirely different thing. Adblock for FF prevents ads from being downloaded, hence makes your web experience faster and less annoying. The 'Adblock' for chromium is just a CSS hack that will hide the ads after they've been downloaded (and sometimes shown for parts of a second which is even more annoying).

So this is not at all a comparison by third party plugins but by existence of lack of an API to support those. The chrome devs choose not to implement such an API because it would ridicule Google's business model.

But you guys could all go ahead and star the issue mentioned.

Last edited by count-corrupt (2010-06-15 08:44:03)

Gusar · 2010-06-15 08:42:35

Vamp898 wrote:

600mb how did you get this?

As I said, my usual browsing routine. About 15 tabs.

Vamp898 wrote:

And about the real-world browsing. Just try Chrome Experiments

Chrome Experiments. *Real-world* browsing. Yeah...

Though I did try. Yeah, it was a bit choppy in Firefox, with one CPU core maxed out. Chrome did better, though still not completely smooth, also one CPU core maxed out. I wonder how Flash would perform with something like that. I kinda think it would actually do better.

Vamp898 wrote:

now imagine an page adds some of these fancy effects to a webpage

Yes, real-world browsing includes imagining and tech demos
Ok, seriously: a page like that, even in Chrome it would grind my machine to a halt. So if I saw a page like that, I wouldn't become a regular visitor of it. If that's the future of the web, ugh! For Flash, there's at least FlashBlock.

archman-cro · 2010-06-15 12:03:41

moljac024 wrote:

I had about 150 tabs open in firefox for quite a while a week ago. I didn't measure memory consumption, but I don't think it was swapping. Is 15 tabs supposed to be a lot?

BAH! 150!! To me, 6 is "a lot"

Vamp898 · 2010-06-15 13:38:28

With 15 Tabs i dont get 600mb in any way
But i dont have 15 Tabs that often becease im unable to read the name on the tabs then (they all get shortened or just get displayed by ...)

kokoko3k · 2010-06-15 14:28:02

An internet browser has to scroll and has to do it fast,
that's the main reason i still prefer firefox over chromium.
While on simpler web pages chromium 'could' beat ff, some tables and divs create serious difficulties to the google product,
Try yourself:
http://sliste.sl.funpic.de/bmark/

My results follows (less is better):

compiz + emerald
chrome: 16674
firefox : 7375
opera :7188

compiz + kde4-window-decorator
chrome: 16954
firefox: 7376
opera 7235

kwin no effects
chrome: 16751
firefox: 7341
opera: 6356

kwin + effects:
chrome: 17277
firefox: 7518
opera: 7242

Screen resolution is 1600x1200 and windows are full maximized or arranged to make scrolling area almost the same on three browsers.

Chromium 5.0.375.55
Opera 10.0-2
Cpu: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU E7300 @ 2.66GHz
nvidia driver 195.36.15
gpu: GeForce 9500 GT
Archlinux i686@32bit

Last edited by kokoko3k (2010-06-15 14:39:00)

Arch Linux

#1 2010-06-11 22:10:55

Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#2 2010-06-12 04:09:21

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#3 2010-06-12 11:34:27

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#4 2010-06-12 14:06:33

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#5 2010-06-13 14:08:11

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#6 2010-06-14 17:49:19

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#7 2010-06-14 17:56:11

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#8 2010-06-14 18:08:49

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#9 2010-06-14 18:58:41

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#10 2010-06-14 19:07:44

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#11 2010-06-14 19:28:58

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#12 2010-06-14 20:09:48

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#13 2010-06-14 20:53:07

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#14 2010-06-14 21:14:11

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#15 2010-06-14 21:27:02

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#16 2010-06-14 21:44:10

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#17 2010-06-14 21:55:02

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#18 2010-06-14 22:10:58

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#19 2010-06-14 22:42:56

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#20 2010-06-14 22:45:24

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#21 2010-06-15 08:38:03

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#22 2010-06-15 08:42:35

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#23 2010-06-15 12:03:41

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#24 2010-06-15 13:38:28

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

#25 2010-06-15 14:28:02

Re: Firefox vs. Chromium - The final verdict

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