FireFox and Google Chrome are two popular alternative Windows Web browsers to Internet Explorer 10 for Windows 8. In my experience running Firefox, and Google Chrome in Windows 8 is pretty good even on my older computer with only 1GB of RAM, and a 1.8GHz CPU. They both seem to run faster in Windows 8 than on Windows 7 on the same computer because Windows 8 runs slightly faster.
They are both easy to install in Windows 8. I just need to download them from Firefox.com and Google.com/chrome , and install them by double clicking on the installer file with my mouse.
Firefox in Windows 8 Experience
Firefox is a good web browser if you use a lot of toolbars like the Yahoo Toolbar, extensions like Facebook sharing extensions, plug-ins like Adobe Flash Player and themes to customize your web browser experience. Firefox loads websites pretty quickly, and is easy to use since there is also a lot of features like a dedicated search box, and most recently opened web sites in the new tabs page. You can also search the internet from the address bar by typing in your search phrase like “Fish”, and hitting the enter key on the keyboard. Adjusting the settings in Firefox like disabling add-ons, plug-ins, and themes, and emptying the history and temporary internet files seems easier in Firefox.
Firefox works for most of my favorite websites like WordPress, Tumblr, and YouTube.
Firefox is my most used web browser if I need to use a toolbar like the Yahoo Toolbar since Google Chrome does not support third party toolbars, and Internet Explorer 10 seems slower when I load it up with a toolbar enable. I also don’t like the new user interface in IE10 since it looks kind of plain, and less modern.
I also like that it is easy to hide the tabs toolbar in Firefox in the settings, and if I want to, I can hide the Address/Navigation, Menu, bookmark, and other toolbars in the Options menu on the Firefox button.
Firefox is also easy to update since it notify you when new updates are available, and ask if you want to install the updates.
Google Chrome in Windows 8 Experience
Google Chrome seems to start up a little bit faster and run faster. There are a lot of Extensions, Plug-ins, and themes for Google Chrome, but not many toolbars for Chrome. There also is not a dedicated search box which makes it easy for you to search with different search engines like Firefox. Although, the user interface in Chrome is more simple, and uses slightly less screen space then Firefox.
Google Chrome works good on almost all websites, and seems to work better on Google websites like Blogspot which sometimes take longer to load on Firefox than Google Chrome which loads Blogspot post editor/creator almost instantly.
I find it slightly more difficult to adjust the settings in Google Chrome like Disabling plug-ins, and extensions, and emptying the history and temporary internet files is more difficult then Firefox. But, once you get used to Google Chrome’s settings, it can be as easy as Firefox. I also like the Task Manager in Google Chrome to see which plug-ins, extensions, windows and tabs in Chrome is using the most RAM.
Google Chrome updates to the latest version automatically, so you are always using the latest version of Chrome.
Both Firefox, and Google Chrome is they both rarely crash and freeze in Windows 8 unless I have a lot of tabs opened, or you installed a lot of plug-ins, extensions, and toolbars which can slow down your computer and web browser.
Google Chrome and Firefox both let you sync your bookmarks and settings between multiple computers by signing into them with your account for Google Chrome and Firefox.
I think it is best to have both Google Chrome, and Firefox installed on a computer since they both have pretty good features, and are easy to use.
Both Google Chrome and Firefox are also available for Linux, Mac OS X, iOS(Google Chrome only) and Google Android operating system, so you can use and access your bookmarks on multiple computers and mobile devices with different operating systems.
You can download Firefox at Firefox.com Google Chrome at Google.com/chrome
My experience with both Firefox & Chrome is they run similarly as far as system resources, until you begin opening many tabs… In Chrome, you get an additional .exe file each tab you open, Firefox on the other hand, doesn’t operate in this manner.. So as far as economy of resources, Firefox wins in the long run.
Same for me, I notice Firefox and Chrome behave similarly. I think once HTML5 video and games become the standard way to display games and videos instead of Flash or Java then they be a lot faster. I notice Flash and Java both use a lot of RAM when they are run on multiple tabs like running 2 Flash video at the same time.