Chrome - Simply Simple (Google Chrome)

Member Name: calumneilson

Product:	Google Chrome
Date:	06/06/09 (59 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Simple, easy to use, many cool features, very fast

Disadvantages: No add-ons, lack of customisability

Many people gave negative reviews of Chrome when it was first released, and opposite to what was expected it still has quite a small market share.

However, I still use it as my main browser - I think Google Chrome is by far the best web browser, even better than Firefox.

Speed: Google Chrome is incredibly fast at starting, browsing and all of the actions you can carry out in Chrome are fast. Unlike Firefox, which takes a long time to start for me, Chrome starts instantly and you are ready to go straight away. And unlike Internet Explorer, it doesn't take ages for pages to load.

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Compatibility: As you would expect Chrome can handle all websites like Firefox and IE and supports all common things such as Java and Flash - however some sites do not work in Chrome such as TechNet and Windows Update (both of these problems are caused by Microsoft).

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Usability: Chrome is very, very easy to use. When you start it up it is all very obvious - there is a search/address bar, tabs and bookmarks in the toolbar that you can use. There are two buttons that launch menus where you can do everything you would expect from a web browser.

Google has combined the usual search boxes and address bars found in Firefox and IE into one - this is really good as it saves space and makes Chrome look sleek. You can type an address in the bar, or you can just type any search term and a Google results page for your search will be return - this is one of my favourite features.

The standard homepage is also very special and is unlike anything in other browsers. The main part of the homepage consists of thumbnails of your nine most visited sites, showing a screenshot of the site and the site name. You can then quickly click on these to go to the site - as it automatically puts up your most visted sites this is a great feature.

The homepage also consits of a search box where you can search your history, as well as some short lists of you recent bookmarks and recently closed tabs incase you closed something by accident.

Chrome is packed with some very cool features, not found in other browsers - many of these features are very small but incredibly helpful. This includes forms being saved without being submitted, so if you accidentally quit when you load the page again your details will still be there. You can also drag and drop tabs to form new windows and updating chrome is as easy as pie.

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Customisation: Unlike Firefox Chrome does not have an add-ons feature, however there are plugins/add-ons in development to be included in the next major version (which is currently in Beta). However I think that add-ons would slow Chrome down and Chrome is not about tonnes of features - it is about ease to use and simplicity.

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Disadvantages:

No add-ons (as discussed above) means that you can't customise and add features to Chrome on the same scale that you can to Firefox (and partially IE).

Doesn't suit everyone - it took me a while to begin to love Chrome but once you are using it you will never want to go back to another browser.

Customisability - There are not many settings to change in Chrome, all the major ones are there but you get the feeling some settings are missing.

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Overall I think that Google Chrome is by far the superior web browser of today and if more people used it then it would become even better.

Speed, ease to use and huge amounts of very useful features far outweigh any problems caused by lack of add-ons and little customisability.

Summary: Almost Perfect

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