I have yet run into many sites that do not work with Chrome. Or if I have they are so few and far between it is minimal impact. I do know some sites still do the “Browser check” and say you need IE 5 or better or Firefox, but those sites are slowly catching on that if they keep to web standards that check is becoming less important. I am not a web designer so I cannot say whether the recoding is cumbersome, but I would think not. Day to day, Chrome works well. Well enough I could comfortably recommend someone give it a try.

I do like the built-in search engine feature. As I type into the address bar, I am given the chance to search for the term. You can change the search engine used within options. In other browsers, I have to use the additional “Search..” box. If nothing else this saves time. Embedded videos from YouTube, Stickam and UStream work as expected. Better in some cases than they do in Firefox and Opera.

The Tabbed browsing is the best among the browsers. The good thing is you can drag a tab off the “Tab bar and it will move into an independent window (opera is the only other browser I use that does this). And you drag it back again to incorporate it into an existing Chrome window. The bad- each tab takes up memory space, so if you have limited memory in your computer this could be a problem. Looking at reports provided by the OS Chrome takes more than Firefox and Opera with a similar number of Tabs running. The theory behind this is that one tab can “crash” without taking the whole browser. Fortunately, I haven’t tested that yet.

So right now, Chrome is a pretty decent browser, with some concerns. I will take issue if Google leaves Chrome in perpetual Beta like they have done with Gmail. There will be a point when Chrome will need to be held to the same standard as others. At this point, it is a strong contender in its current state.

The truth is that right now- IE8 has crashed more than Chrome. IE8 works with some sites that Chrome will not. Minefield (the 64Bit version of Firefox) steps in the way of normal FireFox 3 operation. So all the beta programs I am using are having some issues.  Fortunately I can still fall back to using non-beta programs.

Judgement at this point- Chrome is nice, doesn’t add much in the way of headaches, slick UI- looks cleaner and less cluttered than the others even with multiple tabs going. I will continue to use it. Downside- does the world really need another browser?

<UPDATE> Did not get to spend as much time as I would have liked with Chrome- will update as weekend rolls through. I am torn on the whole “each tab is a separate process” bit. It allows additional functionality, sure, but it also burns memory  and CPU cycles which could cause issues.

I downloaded and installed the beta version of Google’s Web Browser called Chrome. Here are some initital thoughts/observations.

Quick download- 475 KB

EULA before you download. Refreshing, haven’t decided yet?  I don’t recall being asked again. Just a couple of dialog boxes to get started. First one is whether I want to import anything and also whether to make it the default browser. Chose “NO” to default browser, but I did want customize import options. I asked it to import from Firefox- it noticed Firefox was open and asked me to close and try again or cancel. Closed Firefox- import worked quickly. It seemed to pause with no indication it was doing anything, but not too long. Soon it was up and running.

Different interface than other browsers I use. Most likely done on purpose. No large borders- no highlighted title. This feels like an application that begins to break away the “borders” that exist between applications and the operating system. This is similar to the way OSX deals with applications

Imported history from Firefox- including passwords- quickly and painlessly.

Some quick opinions-

Seems quicker on some sites. Twitter. But brave new fiction was slower to load.
Plugins that are already installed are working- no additional steps. Flash YouTube stuff etc. Ustream worked. Twitter worked.

The “Find on page” feature is unique. You bring up the “Find” dialog and as you type in your search phrase you see the results pegged in the scroll region with little colored dashes. That way you can scroll down to each result yourself or use the “Next”/”Previous”. I like this because it allows me to scroll through the page and read the context around my search, instead of just using the Next button. The next/Previous options jumps from result to result and will include those results in advertisements and non-relevant parts of the page. Scrolling to a colored mark makes it easier to find relevance. The marks give me an indication of how broad or narrow the search is.

I also like the “Most Visited” option that shows when you create a new tab. Give you quick access to the sites you frequent most- which is handy. For those of you wanting to keep birthday surprises secret check out the Incognito Function. Incognito won’t save your web surfing as far as Chrome is concerned. Yes, you still need to be aware that those things outside Chrome’s control will still track you- outside sites, your work, your ISP etc. Although under the help Google is nice enough to tell you how to turn off the feature of “Web History” if you are using your Gmail account.

And the last feature for now- there are probably many more I have yet to find and explore- is the “Create Application Shortcut”. In a nutshell, lets you create a link on your desktop that will launch a page inside Chrome. This just “feels” like a better solution than putting a shortcut link on your desktop using any of the other browsers. Chrome can place the shortcut in any combination of your Desktop, Start Menu and Quick Launch.

That’s it for my quick and dirty foray into Chrome. Stay tuned as I bang through it this evening. I will also add some screen shots.