Filed under: Mozilla, Beta, Browsers
Firefox 3.6 reaches beta stage
Version 3.6 beta RC1 is now available for download from Mozilla's servers. As Softpedia mentioned a few days ago, Mozilla is pondering an early exit for Firefox 3.5. Mozilla's Mike Beltzner stated, "It's not 100% decided yet, but if we issue a Firefox 3.6 as a minor update, then yes, we'd stop supporting the 1.9.1 branch at that time." He's referring to Gecko 1.9.1, on which Firefox 3.5 is based. 3.6 is based upon version 1.9.2 of the Gecko engine.
It may not benchmark in the same league as Google Chrome, but Firefox 3.6 certainly feels speedier. Our content management system runs more smoothly than it did for me under 3.5.3, and my go-to web apps like GMail and Seesmic are also more responsive.
A couple of features that appear in the 3.6 beta candidate: control-tab previews (as previously mentioned) and taskbar thumbnail previews on Windows 7 (not just for FF3.7 apparently).
Testers - if you've given 3.6 beta 1 a go, tell us what you think in the comments!

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Yes, amazingly, it's possible to have a sequel to a game called "The World's Hardest Game". It doesn't seem logically possible, since if the first one was actually the world's hardest, how could another one come along and share the moniker? It made me doubt the name in the first place. That is, until I tried the game.
The mechanics of the game are very simple. You are a small red square, ...

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Sjay said 1:35AM on 10-15-2009
Great News!
FireFox is getting better and better. Yes it seems like a quick update.
Sjay
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Josh said 10:17PM on 10-14-2009
Does anyone have non-smooth scrolling in this for Mac? I've noticed the problem in 3.6 and 3.7, and always downgraded to 3.5 figuring that it would get fixed.
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James said 10:56PM on 10-14-2009
Um, no: this is not beta 1. It hasn't been announced anywhere (the fact noone else is talking about it might have clues you in) and the files are pretty clearly in a directory named "candidates" and then build 1. There have been more than one build plenty of times.
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iofthestorm said 1:06AM on 10-15-2009
Yeah, everyone always does this. Note the RC1 appended to the name... But uh, I've been running Firefox 3.6 nightlies for several months and it's been pretty good so far, the nightlies almost always feel faster than the stable branch and the recent landing of Windows 7 tab previews is awesome, although currently a bit buggy.
motang said 11:45PM on 10-14-2009
Running update manager with Mozilla PPA to update it on my Ubuntu machines!
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Trevor Hicken said 12:07AM on 10-15-2009
Firefox 3.6 beta 1's boot up is really slow for me. It is just me?
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Trevor Hicken said 12:11AM on 10-15-2009
You can hide the menu bar without an addon and there's a fullscreen button in customize.
KeegdnaB said 12:07AM on 10-15-2009
How's extention compatibility?
Usually I wait till b3 at least because everything breaks if I do before
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hazard said 2:26AM on 10-15-2009
I'm having stability issues with 3.5.3 so I might check this out.
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Max said 6:41PM on 10-15-2009
pretty decent compatibility, AdBlock, FireGestures, Firebug and Download Statusbar work. Other do not see http://grab.by/9Rx
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sydlawrence said 11:23AM on 10-16-2009
I have been playing around with the accelerometer in firefox 3.6b, check out my youtube video: http://bit.ly/wLGb9 or try out the webpage itself http://playground.marmaladeontoast.co.uk/ff3.6
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erpman1 said 3:16PM on 10-21-2009
A second "candidate" build of Firefox 3.6 beta 1 is available here:
http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/nightly/3.6b1-candidates/build2/
And judging by the latest Firefox Delivery Meeting Oct. 21 notes page:
https://wiki.mozilla.org/Firefox/DeliveryMeetings/2009-10-21
Firefox 3.6 beta 1 is now scheduled to be released on October 28.
bottom line: another DELAY by Mozilla in releasing FF3.6b1.
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nicholasturo said 7:57PM on 10-30-2009
firefox 3.6 beta takes a long time to complete the download of pages . I.E. before you see DONE at bottom left. Opera 10.10 gives you an almost immediate completion of page loading.. Your better off with Namoroka or firefox 3.6 alpha . It has the same rendering Gecko engine. and you can download videos with real player. The download plug-in for real player does not work in firefox 3.6 beta. I'm very disappointed with firefox 3.6 beta 1 .
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