chrome vs firefox

[Chuck Wintle]

Right now I am in the process of switching to chrome after using firefox for a long time. the main reason is this browser is faster and less complicated. Who is using firefox and who is using chrome and would you switch? I like chrome so far but there are few things that i don't like.

[Jim Koepke]

I have not used Chrome. I have used Firefox. Mostly I use Safari. Each one likely has its own high points and low points.

My only reason for using more than one is sometimes Safari doesn't handle certain websites well. There are still some web site programmers that feel if you do not use their browser of choice you should be able to see their site(s). One example is ebay. To correctly set up an auction on ebay required my using Firefox. At the time Safari didn't work. I haven't tried since then, but it is not likely they changed just because of my complaint.

A friend did mention that the reason he uses multiple browsers is because many of the news sites that only allow so many views per month before requiring payment use the browser's cookies to count your visits. Different browsers have different groups of cookies. This allows him to visit more times than is permitted with a single browser.

jtk

[glenn bradley]

Chrome is my default but, many mainstream websites are picky. I use four browsers at work as different tools are designed (or certified) for different browsers. I.E. is, of course, now almost totally useless except for playing around. Firefox properly "windows" several troublesome products but, Chrome with an Ad-Blocker is always faster for the non-product-specific things I do like visiting this forum. This may not be true for the things you do.

[Paul Saffold]

I have not used Chrome. I have used Firefox. Mostly I use Safari. Each one likely has its own high points and low points.


A friend did mention that the reason he uses multiple browsers is because many of the news sites that only allow so many views per month before requiring payment use the browser's cookies to count your visits. Different browsers have different groups of cookies. This allows him to visit more times than is permitted with a single browser.

jtk

Thanks, Jim,for passing that little tidbit on. I'll have to try it.
Paul

[Prashun Patel]

I used ff, chrome, and ie. Chrome is my favorite. Ie is imho the most intuitive but its fat and bloated. Chrome has stayed lean and mean for me.

[Mike Henderson]

I use Chrome, and like it.

Mike

[Christopher Clark]

+1 I use chrome on all my devices. The big bonus is your Google account will sync everything between devices, very convenient.

[Larry Frank]

I am another Chrome user. I have very few problems with it compared to a couple of others like FireFox

[Mike Cozad]

I use FF and chrome at home. Mostly chrome because it syncs between my laptop, phones and tablets. I do have to use FF on my android devices if a site has flash content, like a news site with video...

At work I'm forced to use ie and I feel like I'm being punished by having to use it...

[Jim O'Dell]

I tried Chrome with the anticipation that it runs faster than the others. I didn't find that to be true. For the past 2+ years I've used WaterFox. It is the 64 bit unofficial version of FireFox. Fast and seems to be very clean for me. (Note: I'm not a techie, or a heavy user.) I have to use IE for my GM training sites as they won't work properly with anything else. I still have Chrome installed, but haven't used it since a contest last winter where a site would allow me to vote twice on each of the 3 browsers every 4 hours, once in regular mode, and once in private mode. There is another contest ongoing now, but I haven't done the multiple voting this time. Guess I've gotten lazy. :rolleyes: Jim.

[paul cottingham]

Mostly a Firefox user, ideologically I would use chrome more, but inexplicably, I find it harder to use. Haven't willingly used IE for years. I must admit it drives me nuts that so many websites are not standards compliant in order to render properly in Internet Explorer. So I do keep it around, for all those "broken" sites.

[Matt Meiser]

+1 I use chrome on all my devices. The big bonus is your Google account will sync everything between devices, very convenient.

For you and the NSA. :D

[paul cottingham]

For you and the NSA. :D
Well played, my paranoid and truthful friend! :)
Well played indeed.

[Greg Peterson]

For you and the NSA. :D

Yeah, but then again we all pretty much knew all along that privacy and the Internet are mutually exclusive. You have nothing to worry about. The guy that authorized Prism claims that civil liberties could not be jeopardized. Wink.

[Rich Engelhardt]

FF and IE both crashed and burned on my wife's laptop.
(Under the hood, FF and IE are like two peas in a pod.)
I tried to download Opera for her, but, I forget why that never happened.
I stuck Chrome on it and she's been using that for about a year now.

[Curt Harms]

Firefox on linux. I hear claims that Chrome/Chromium is faster. I don't find that. Firefox has a LOT of useful add-ons. I also find secuity on Firefox more 'granular' though that may be just my feeling. I may find myself installing Chrome because newer versions of Flash are not available for linux. Hasn't been an issue so far though, flash 11.x does what I need it to do. I'm pretty sure Google knows enough about me, they don't need to know more.

[Steve Friedman]

Definitely Chrome. Use it on my PC and work and on my Mac at home. Unfortunately, there are some applications that Chrome won't run. On the Mac, my second choice is Safari, then Firefox. On the PC, my second choice is Explorer then Firefox.

Steve

[John Aspinall]

...
A friend did mention that the reason he uses multiple browsers is because many of the news sites that only allow so many views per month before requiring payment use the browser's cookies to count your visits. Different browsers have different groups of cookies. This allows him to visit more times than is permitted with a single browser.


Nothing against running multiple browsers, but it's a lot easier to just delete the cookies.

[Charles Wiggins]

I use both, at work and at home. FF has more add-ons that I like and use but Chrome is cleaner and faster. I only mess with IE if something won't load in the other two. I do a lot of research and online technical writing so using two browsers makes it easier to keep the dozen or more pages that I often have open more organized. I'll usually use FF for my writing and Chrome for my research.

That said, I am slowly becoming more and more disenchanted with FF and their new updates every 35 seconds. Given my history, I will probably never go "all in" on any single browser.

[Jason Roehl]

They're all free because you're not the consumer, you're the product. That's especially true with GOOGLE Chrome. I've been a long-time FF user, but it's definitely had its ups and downs. They'll have an awesome version that will eventually fall victim to code bloat, then they'll redesign and start over with a leaner, faster release. However, at the rate computers are getting faster and cheaper, that bloat is becoming less noticeable to me.

[Jim Koepke]

Nothing against running multiple browsers, but it's a lot easier to just delete the cookies.

I think I have more cookies than all the bakers in North America.

I could delete them all but then many sites will start asking for passwords, some of them are from accounts started with different ISPs as far back as the early '90s. I am not sure I can recall all of my old email addresses and 20 year old passwords.

To paraphrase one of my favorite lines from a television program, "When making things secure we make them more complex. Making things more complex makes them more vulnerable."

jtk

[David Weaver]

I have all three on my PC at home. Wife uses IE and FF and I use Chrome. The only real reason we use all three is because she has two email addresses and I have one, and it's easier to just leave them all logged in on different browsers.

The only thing I don't like about Chrome is the lack of ad blocker on it (admittedly I haven't looked that hard). I doubt most places love ad blockers since they pretty much wipe out google ad sense ads and yahoo ads, but I sure like them.

[David Weaver]

spoke too soon, I see there's an ad block for chrome now.

[Myk Rian]

spoke too soon, I see there's an ad block for chrome now.
Always has been.

I've been a Chrome user for years, but it's been getting so bloated (aren't they all) that it started giving be problems.
Also have it on the phone, but stopped using it. Went to the installed browser, although that is also a Google product. But it works better.
Using FF on this desktop now.

[David Weaver]

I literally replaced my last PC laptop because the browsing was too slow. That was with only one AV program, disabling all of the add ons, and removing the garbage toolbar the AV installed, etc. The thing just wasn't able to handle all of the bloated visuals on web pages now.

I suspect that the current PC (now about a year or two old) will probably also be made obsolete due to slow web browsing.

[Brian Elfert]

I used IE for years and switched to Firefox about three or four years ago because at the time Firefox was faster. I still use IE at work. The corporate standard was IE until maybe 18 months ago when we finally started letting folks officially use Firefox and Chrome.

[John Aspinall]

I think I have more cookies than all the bakers in North America.

I could delete them all but then many sites will start asking for passwords, some of them are from accounts started with different ISPs as far back as the early '90s. I am not sure I can recall all of my old email addresses and 20 year old passwords.


I'm not suggesting you delete all the cookies, just the ones that are tracking you in an unwanted way.




To paraphrase one of my favorite lines from a television program, "When making things secure we make them more complex. Making things more complex makes them more vulnerable."


Agree with the sentiment completely. For me, having my hands/brain cells directly controlling my passwords is simpler and more secure.

[Jim Matthews]

They're all free because you're not the consumer, you're the product.

I said the same thing about Facebook in 2004; if an application is offered without purchase price, recurrent fee or advertising - your data is the only valuable thing it manages.
In 2010, when the first inkling of privacy (or the absence of same) was made public, it became obvious what these aggregators all do - they're mining us for data.

The real question I have with any of these offerings is, who is buying that data (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1298600/Facebook-privacy-fears-details-millions-users-published-Pirate-Bay.html)?

[Curt Harms]

Nothing against running multiple browsers, but it's a lot easier to just delete the cookies.

Or set the browser delete them on exit, 3rd party or all. Firefox lets me select which sites get to store cookies, my list is pretty short.

[Brian Elfert]

If you use websites on the Internet it is pretty hard not to give up privacy unless you are extremely selective about websites and only visit a very few. Plenty of websites plain don't work without cookies enabled.

[Curt Harms]

If you use websites on the Internet it is pretty hard not to give up privacy unless you are extremely selective about websites and only visit a very few. Plenty of websites plain don't work without cookies enabled.
True, but most sites I use don't care if I delete their cookies when the browser closes. The only exception I have is Chase. They set a cookie and if it isn't present, I have to go through a procedure to prove I'm me. I guess that's not a bad idea from a security point of view but so far no other credit card issuer I know of has followed suit.