Firefox: official 3.0 Beta 1

at
http://www.filehippo.com/download_firefox/changelog/

i do recommend installing it in parallel with ur current FF2.0.0.9

cheers ...

 

in a nutshell from improvements, taken from changes log
"..
Improved Performance
* Reliability: A user's bookmarks, history, cookies, and preferences are now stored in a transactionally secure database format which will prevent data loss even if their system crashes.
* Speed: Major architectural changes (such as the move to Cairo and a rewrite to how reflowing a page layout works) put foundations in place for major performance tuning which have resulted in speed increases in Beta 1, and will show further gains in future Beta releases.
* Memory usage: Over 300 individual memory leaks have been plugged, and a new XPCOM cycle collector completely eliminates many more. Developers are continuing to work on optimizing memory use (by releasing cached objects more quickly) and reducing fragmentation.
..."

cheers ...

 

Excellent news! Won't be installing it on my new laptop though till it's complete! Will test it on the PC downstairs though!

 

Strange that there's no official notice on the Mozilla website, at least non that I could find. Is this really the official beta 1 release?

 

Well FileHippo are usually pretty reliable, what date does it say it was released on FileHippo?

 

this official beta should be an improvement from 2.0.0.9
it is NOT the same as the minefield version which is still in running test

cheers ...

 

Usually, Mozilla's criteria for a beta is "good enough to use in your daily work". Until they have that, they keep it in Alpha (as far as possible).

I know I've had no problems with previous betas of Firefox, and so far, I can't complain about 3.0 either.

 

http://www.mozilla.org/
It's under "mozillaZine News"

 

Memory leaks have been plugged? I dare say there's probably the 301st that they didn't catch.

Anyway, glad that the best browser out there is getting better. Can anyone do some page load benchmarks to see if the new speed claims are valid?

 

Yep, there it is. I'm pretty sure that wasn't posted when I looked... or I could have just missed it. Thanks for the link.

 

Already knew this but thanks for brining it to the general users on this site who don't have tech sites that give them this news about 2 minutes after it comes out. BTW, how do i run it parallel to my FF 2.0 install?

 

I will test it on my old laptop first

 

After using it a day at work, I have zero complaints. It's fast, stable and much more responsive while loading pages. (2.0 isn't happy about switching tabs or such if another tab is working on loading a page or some such)
So yeah, it feels *much* faster.

Of course, hardly any extensions work yet, but it probably won't be more than a couple of days before most of them catch up.

 

So, do most people here recommend the beta over 2.XX?

 

What?????????? Don't tell me you don't know how to do that. I would have thought you knew everything.

 

No, see i dyed my hair blond the other day...

 

I'm not the one who acts like I know everything. Actually I know very little and I am not afraid to let people know that. They can take me as I am or just ignore me.

 

Yes, unless you have some important extensions that are not ready for FF3 yet or you're paranoid about the possibility of bugs. Most will be ready soon considering a lot of my ones have been following even the alpha releases quite quickly.

Calvin, install both normally and use a different profile on each one. Profiles can be set up on Windows by:
Start > Run > cmd > "c:\path\to\firefox.exe" -p

 

I actually have a pretty significant bug. Under Vista Business on my D630, I cannot complete a download. It almost finishes, or occasionally finishes, then the whole program freezes. Any ideas, other than just submitting a bug report?

 

You know you can delete your double post right wax?

 

Back to Firefox 2? Another option is to use Flashgot for your downloads, at least for the time being.

 

I do now

I'm back with Firefox 2.0.0.9 for the time being, I don't have too many issues with it, but I'll certainly try 3 again when they release a new beta.

 

Something similar happens to me under Firefox/2.0.0.9.

When download is complete it would freeze the browser for a few seconds to a minute depending on file size. Then it unfreezes and everything is normal. Doesn't happen on small downloads at all.

I guess I'll give this beta a try since FF is been causing me problems anyways.



EDIT: Just installed. Weird thing is that after install it told me that all my plug-ins are incompatible, but when I ran FF 3.0 the plug-ins worked just fine.

 

Still seems to have memory issues, they aren't as bad though. I'll probably stick with 2 until more of my extensions are supported. It also seems snappier most of the time, but then there are times where I'm going come on load already.

 

Can u tell me more about memory leaks on FF? & what are the new features in the beta

 

just a small update with a bit more info regarding this latest FF official version
http://www.internetnews.com/dev-news/article.php/3712286

my personal observations, taking in consideration with parallel testing of Minefield:
. the memory handling is much better than in FF2.0.0.9 in terms of ram expanding (hogging). Under Vista it is 20-30% more, but I take it this has something to do with the way Vista manages memory
. it is much faster in term of downloading and page rendering, without even using FastFox extension or tweaks as under FF2xxxx. So we are talking about out of the box performance here.
. for incompatible extensions and addons, one can use the "nightly tester tools" extension - which is being around since 1.5xx - to force install onto the newer FF version if one must have those extensions. Just a reminder that with the latest security architect, this tester tool might not work on all extensions
. regarding the "hesitation/pause" just before completing a large file download - not all the time, might u - I noticed this when testing with Minefield. Can only say that it depends on the download sites, some will cause FF3/minefield to pausem some very fast. Sites have lots or work to do as well if they want to stay away from IE conformed web browsing

cheers ...

 

By default they are installed side by side. So you just start Firefox 3.0beta1 when you want to run that, otherwise you start the regular Firefox. Both are listed in the start menu. (But it looks like you can't run both at the same time. If I have 3.0 open, and try to open 2.0, it pops up a 3.0 window)

Have you cleared your download history? That's always been a major cause of slowdowns with Firefox. If you have a long download history, it freezes for a while when the download finishes.

 

Thanks for the info Jalf. I'm gonna download FF 3.0 beta right now. Plus the nightly tester tools.

 

can anyone post a screen shot of how the new FF looks? Thanks

 

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=906&num=1

or

http://content.zdnet.com/2346-12554_22-176747.html

cheers ...

 

I don't see any difference from 2.0 except for places. I want to wait until they get out those "native" themes.

 

Apparently one of the other new features is that it has color management built in (for photographers viewing their pics online).

Can someone suggest a good resource of how to most cleanly install in in parallel to 2.0.0.9?

 

It's pretty simple. Download FF3.0.

Doubleclick the .exe you downloaded.

Click OK a couple of times.

FF3.0 will now be installed in parallel to your existing 2.0.

There's no special voodoo magic required. It installs in parallel by default (probably because it's beta)

 

Ah good to know - i KNow usually installs are done by default over the top of existing versions.