Google puts its foot on the accelerator with Chrome 2

 

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By Barry Collins

Posted on 22 May 2009 at 08:05

Google is attempting to pull away from the browser pack with the launch of Chrome 2, which it claims is 30% faster on Javascript-heavy pages than its already nimble predecessor.

Version 2 of the browser is by no means the major overhaul normally associated with new version numbers. In fact, casual users would be hard pressed to notice the difference.

However, the major refinements have been going on under the bonnet, with Google claiming significant improvements to the browser's V8 Javascript engine.

The company claims Chrome 2 is 30% faster than the previous stable version of Chrome 1 in its own V8 benchmark suite, which has been conveniently tweaked to accentuate Chrome's improved handling of large object heaps.

In our very brief tests using the Google V8 benchmarks, Chrome scored 3095, Firefox 3 scored 259 and Internet Explorer 8 - which interrupted the benchmarks to report that Javascript was causing the browser to run slowly - scored only 105.

In the more neutral SunSpider Javascript benchmark Chrome 2 was still way ahead of the pack, recording a time of 1410ms, compared to Firefox's 3475ms and Internet Explorer 8's 6499ms.

New features

Other new features are remarkably thin on the ground for a browser that's leapt a version number, although even Google admits that it "doesn't give too much weight to version numbers and will continue to roll out useful updates as often as possible."

The most interesting new feature is the option to remove thumbnails from the new tab page, which automatically pulls in shortcuts to your nine most visited sites. "Now you can finally hide that embarrassing gossip blog from the Most Visited section," Google claims. Or perhaps something a little more embarrassing, for those who forgot to use Incognito Mode?

Otherwise, Chrome is merely playing catch up with features that have been taken as read in other browsers for years, such as form autofill and full-screen mode.