Firefox 4 has officially ended the beta phase and is now up for download. Those who have participated in the beta version will automatically be upgraded to the release candidate, which is now available for Windows, Mac and Linux.

The latest version not only comes in a new package, but with a lot of treats as well. The interface looks neat, as they got rid of the toolbars and the menu bar. The uppermost portion had been replaced with tabs, with the address bar beneath it. There’s also a search engine and toolbars and browser features can be accessed through icons.

Apart from the physical aspect of it, the new Firefox also features the capability to synchronize your browser’s customizations across multiple Firefox installed devices. You can also rearrange, organize and manage your tabs and add-ons to your liking. It comes with the new JaegerMonkey JavaScript engine for better graphics and faster load speed. You can download it here.

On the other hand, Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 9 followed the clean-cut look of browsers. The IE9 release candidate offers new tab page enhancements, making web navigation and multi-tasking a breeze. From splitting tabs to color-coding them, this new feature will be helpful especially when you have a lot of websites opened.

You can also access most visited sites through the pinned sites feature. Like most improvements, IE9 offers more security in online browsing, hardware-accelerated text, video and graphics, as well as faster installation and loading time. The IE9 will be released on March 14, and you can download it here.

In order to judge which of the 2 RC browsers is better, we need a benchmark test. Luckily, ConceivablyTech provided the necessary data to compare them.  The site had focused on the browsers’ performances in terms of JavaScript, Flash and HTML5. Below is the summary of the tests conducted by the team. You may also see individual test charts at their site.

As you can see, it’s a pretty equal match between the 2 browsers when it comes to Javascript performance, although Firefox gained a little advantage on that area. But the rest, IE9 had completely dominated Mozilla’s browser. The key is on IE9′s more improved hardware acceleration and other system patches giving it a top-notch performance in both HTML5 and Flash.

In closing, Firefox 4 is – hands down – way better than its previous version. However, it still has a lot to improve in order to win against IE9.

Are you familiar of Google’s Native Client? Do you have an idea what is it all about? Well, if you don’t, then Native Client is actually an open source technology that allows its users to build certain web applications that have the ability to seamlessly and safely execute native compiled code inside the browser. In other words, the Native Client is simply a way to run a native code within a browser that will allow the delivery of a performance level that is good enough for running 3D games and the like.

Google has been working with the Native Client for a few months now and according to Google Product Manager Christian Stefansen, the Native Client is getting ready for its release and this can be expected to happen very soon. Google has tried everything that they can in order to make the Native Client module as portable and secured as the JavaScript and it seems that after quite some time Google’s efforts is finally paying off with the Native Client SDK.

Apparently, the new SDK will be called the “Arctic Sea” and requires Chrome 10 or above. The SDK now comes with a support for a comprehensive set of Pepper interfaces for compute, audio and 2D Native Client modules. In addition to this, the security and mechanism for fetching Native Client modules have been also improved.

As mentioned this technology is a fully open source. As a matter of fact, Google has not only worked with the Native Client, but they have also developed other tech as well such as the Pepper Plugin API (PPAPI) which is an evolution of the Netscape Plugin API (NPAPI), which is use in handling plugins by almost all types of browsers except for the Microsoft Internet Explorer which uses the ActiveX.

It would be very exciting to see how the Native Client will evolve into a developer-ready technology. So watch out for more updates.

Mozilla

Firefox developers are concentrating on the following areas for version 3.6

Faster Performance

• Improvement on startup
• (Faster) time to open a new tab
• Improved responsiveness on its UI
• Common user task will “feel” faster

Personalization & Customization

• Integration of the Mozilla Labs Persona project
• Improvements on Awesomebar and form autocomplete

The new release of Firefox is highly anticipated to match against Google Chrome 3. We all know that Chrome 3’s fast jscript loading is totally amazing. And although it still lacks some functions that Firefox has, Chrome is a stand alone and functional web browser.

For sure, the “fox” has aces hidden underneath its sleeves. We’ll see what this beast can bring on the table very soon.

External links to monitor Firefox 3.6’s progress:

Mozilla Developer Center

Firefox Wikipedia

1. Speed

Google claims that Chrome3 is faster than ever. It boasts a whopping 150% increase in speed of loading javascripts and a good 25% increase in overall speed compared with Version 2. V8 and SunSpider were used as benchmarks to measure the javascript performance of Chrome. Here are the results:

2. Redesigned New Tab page

The new chrome not only have a new look but new functions as well. For example, on the redesigned new Tab page, you could drag and arrange thumbnails of your favorite websites for easier re-access. There is also an option to “pin” thumbnails of your favorite websites so that it won’t disappear when browsing a different page.

The New Tab page, google says, is easy to use and easy to customized. What we really like about the Chrome is the simplicity of its design (and still functional) although its first beta version still lacks functionalities. We hope that the following versions would catch up with its browser competition.

NEW vs. OLD Chrome New Tab Page

3. Improved omnibox

We like to think that it as an “all around box”. In the new Chrome, icons were added in the drop down menu to distinguished whether it came from bookmarks of your browser history or if it is a suggested site.

4. Supports HTML 5

One of the latest technology in Web 2.0 is HTML 5 and it is becoming a standard for all web browsers as well. There are many underlying technologies behind HTML 5 but the one good thing to point is the embedding of videos. With HTML 5, video attachment will be comparable to picture attachment. More so, with HTML 5 video playback doesn’t require additional plugins such as flash. A good news for users, bad news for Adobe.

5. Customized browser themes

We really love and appreciate the user-customized Gmail theme (Google’s web mail). Google did a good job to implement the same on Chrome. Now, users will have the option to change the look and feel of their browsers and won’t be monotonous and boring. Themes can be downloaded on Google chrome’s website, but only supports version 3 and up.

It’s also noteworthy to share that Google Chrome currently runs in Windows OS, ever since its release more than a year ago. There were reports that a version for Mac OS is on its way but that is yet to be unveiled. We guess that Apple wouldn’t like the idea to have another rival on its Safari.

For more information about Google’s latest web browser visit their blogspot. And if you’re interested to try the latest version of Chrome, click HERE.