Experimental Minefield browser from Mozilla is crazy fast

Filed under: Internet, Windows, Macintosh, Linux, Mozilla, Freeware, Open Source, Browser Tips, Beta, Browsers

Experimental Minefield browser from Mozilla is crazy fast

by Jason Clarke Oct 25th 2008

I'm in love. With a browser.

Nope, it's not Firefox, and not Safari, though I've had flings with both in the past. Not Camino, not even Chrome.

My new thing is with Minefield, from Mozilla. Okay, so Minefield is essentially an early build of the next version of Firefox. But the latest version has a drastically improved Javascript engine under the hood. Is it fast? Let me tell you - it's crazy fast. In fact, Ars Technica is reporting that Minefield is 10% faster than Google Chrome.

Faster than Chrome, available on Windows, Mac, and Linux, and oh - it supports your Firefox add-ins, as long as you're willing to force compatibility using Nightly Tester Tools. Minefield is an alpha release, so it's likely to still be buggy. So far I've been lucky though; all of the add-ins that I've activated have worked fine right out of the gate.

Let me guess, you're in love now too, eh? Well, there's more than enough Minefield to go around. Go get some. Minefield, that is.

[via Ubuntu Unleashed]

Tags: Camino, Chrome, Firefox, javascript, Minefield, Mozilla

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)

Brian said 10:10AM on 10-25-2008

How do you force compatibility using Nightly Tester Tools?

Brian said 10:22AM on 10-25-2008

Never mind, Found out how to.

Ethan said 10:12AM on 10-25-2008

It'll presumably get slower though.

Ted Mielczarek said 3:10PM on 10-28-2008

I don't see why you would assume that at all. We have performance tests and we are very strict about regressions. In general, javascript performance has only been getting better.

DeoWulf said 10:44AM on 10-25-2008

To force compatibility, install Nightly Tester Tools, right click the extension you want to force, and select the "Override Compatibility" option. There's also an "Override All Compatibility" option on the add-ons list.

This is a great browser. Thanks, Jason.

Tomer Cohen said 10:56AM on 10-25-2008

In case you are a bit less adventurous you may like to use the latest beta release and not the nightly. The last stable Firefox 3.1 is 3.1b1, while the nightly are currently a bit more newer, tagged as pre-b2.

http://releases.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/3.1b1/

Molly said 11:48AM on 10-25-2008

don't hold your breath. how often have minefield releases and nightly builds been touted as the best thing since the bread slicer, yet the final releases failed to deliver.

Evenio said 11:59AM on 10-25-2008

If the SunSpider Javascript test is to be believed, the latest nightly build of WebKit on OS X 10.5.5 is still 1.17x as fast as this build of Minefield (for Javascript performance, at least). The Minefield build is, however, 1.77x as fast as the current release version of Safari.

macboy14 said 12:23PM on 10-25-2008

This pre-release is a lot faster on a Mac than previous Firefox builds. Firefox has always been painfully slow on a Mac. Woo!

Jash Sayani said 12:53PM on 10-25-2008

I love Chrome but it gets stuck when many flash-based sites are opened together... Is there going to be a 0.3 or a newer version anytime soon....?

Loois said 1:29PM on 10-25-2008

I decided to download minefield last night, and am really impressed.
-Pages finally load as fast if not faster than Opera, and browsing is smooth.
-Adblock plus works without issues (only plugin I care about)
- No crashes or freezes so far!

mgthantzin said 1:38PM on 10-25-2008

any portable version? :D

Jason Clarke said 3:19PM on 10-25-2008

While not exactly the version I'm referring to here, there is a portable version of beta Firefox builds available:
http://portableapps.com/apps/internet/firefox_portable/test
I don't think that version has the same Javascript engine, but it might still be worth trying.

emellaich said 1:32AM on 10-26-2008

The beta has a similar javascript engine, but its deactivated by default. An article on Lifehacker explains how to activate it:
http://lifehacker.com/5063202/firefox-31-beta-1-now-available-for-download-first-look

I said similar, I'm not sure but AFAIK I think the minefield version has even more improvements than the beta version. I can report much faster js on the beta version. It seems 'fairly' stable. There are a few crashes, but I'm running a lot of extensions (27) and most of them aren't compatible with 3.1 yet so I'm not so sure whether the crashes are a fault of the beta or the extensions. The speed difference is enough that it is not that big a deal to reopen the browser when a crash occurs.

mgthantzin said 10:15AM on 10-28-2008

thx for the replies but i wanna test minefield js engine. but, you all know.. i have 3.0.3 installed and 3.1 beta in portable mode.

so, i also want minefield to be portable... i don't wanna mess up the installed (stable) firefox by all means.

Brice Beach said 11:25AM on 10-26-2008

have searched this site and mozilla's and can't find out where to download-like chrome, but faster is better-where can I get it???

DeoWulf said 1:59PM on 10-26-2008

Click the link that says "Minefield from Mozilla" in the article text. It will take you to a list of files. If you are running windows, click the file second from last (it's a .exe). Download and run it.

Glenn Tobey said 11:36AM on 10-26-2008

Hey it scores a 92/100 on the acid 3 test

Lennie said 2:47AM on 10-29-2008

It scores 93/100 in the acid3 on the one I downloaded yesterday.

nivektrio said 9:50PM on 10-26-2008

I dont think so that its more faster than V8. I just tested it using the ExtJS Framework with 6 Ext.Window overlapping each other, in Minefield; when i drag the 6th Ext.Window, its not smooth at all. In Google Chrome, its still smooth at 15th Ext.Window.

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