Tangential Musings

I’ll be up front about this, I prefer the Mac OS to Linux and Windows (and obviously all the other operating systems I neglected to mention), so a lot of these web browsers are Mac-only. Below is a list of web browsers I tested on my Apple Power Mac G5 running Mac OS X:

• Amayaw
• Atlantis
• Beonex
• Camino*
• Firefox*
• Flock
• Hot Java
• iCab
• Internet Explorer (discontinued)
• MadFox
• Mozzilla
• NagaraBrowser
• Netscape*
• OmniWeb*
• Opera
• RAFBrowse
• Safari*
• SeaMonkey
• Shiira
• SunriseBrowser*
• surfDude
• WaMCom
• Wazilla

*The asterisk indicates browsers I would personally recommend for Mac users. Here is a short review of them:

1. Safari - Very fast browser, shows little lag even with more than twenty tabs open. Again, it lacks the customization of Firefox. (Note: This is only my favorite browser as of Safari 3 - the moveable tabs go a long way.)
2. Firefox - Great browser, love the extensions. It tends to slow down when I have more than twenty tabs open at once. It is my first choice on Linux. As far as extensions go I would recommend my Encyclopedia of Speculative Fiction Search Engine (bit biased about this of course), the Web Developer Toolbar, SearchStatus, User Agent Switcher, and Leet Key. Firebug is also very useful but can be very buggy.
3. OmniWeb - This would probably replace Safari (as of version 2) for me, except one problem, it is not free, though lately I have been seriously debating whether or not to pay the $30 for the full version (but I don’t like paying for things that have free or open source alternatives). I love how the tabs are organized in this web browser. The default interface is a lot nicer than Firefox and Internet Explorer 7 Beta for Windows, and it is virtually just as fast as Safari. That said, Firefox could learn a lot from this browser.
4. Camino - The third fastest of the lot, very similar to Firefox minus the plugins, extensions, and compatibility with certain media.
5. Netscape - This is the reason it took me so long to switch to Firefox originally, especially on Windows this is an excellent, fairly secure browser. Firefox extensions converted me. Be warned it uses considerably more RAM than the other browsers listed here.
6. SunriseBrowser - Fastest browser I have ever used. Unfortunately, at this point it does not have tabbed browsing. It does have a nifty transparency feature, which I use to watch movies while surfing the net, pretty nifty stuff.

For all you Windows users out there, Firefox is still a wonderful choice. However, if you are not too concerned about security and want something that resembles IE, try Avant.

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