Firefox or Chrome (Criteria: Speed, Privacy, functionality)

[Beskar]

Much of it was born out of some particularly vocal users' frustrations with the new rapid release cycle combined with lots of bluster and hot air. The response of some of these users was to switch to another browser which has a rapid release cycle... work that one out...

Chrome downloads and updates in the background with no prompting, you only notice when there is a slight change and a pop-up explaining a new feature, other than that, it was very hands free and manages by itself.

With Firefox was the severe bloat, then constantly getting demanded to be updated with in your face notifications, then you had to wait for 5-10 minutes for it to download, go through the entire install menu, ad-block and no-script being disabled and having to wait for them to update too, it was too tedious and aggressive.

This was around Firefox 4-6 like being mentioned, it might have been sorted now, but the switch already occurred and Chrome is still marginally better.

[drone]

Chrome downloads and updates in the background with no prompting, you only notice when there is a slight change and a pop-up explaining a new feature, other than that, it was very hands free and manages by itself.

For most users, this is fine. I actually prefer to control the update myself, and IT departments like to control updates to verify compatibility. So there is a reason for the Firefox method. There might be an automatic update feature now, but it will be opt-in.

With Firefox was the severe bloat, then constantly getting demanded to be updated with in your face notifications, then you had to wait for 5-10 minutes for it to download, go through the entire install menu, ad-block and no-script being disabled and having to wait for them to update too, it was too tedious and aggressive.

This was around Firefox 4-6 like being mentioned, it might have been sorted now, but the switch already occurred and Chrome is still marginally better.

After updates, it asks if you want to restart, and that's it. The disabling of add-ons was caused by the switch to the stupid numbering scheme, the makers of the add-ons didn't expect the major number (the '3' in, say, v3.2.16) to change on basic updates like it does now. Major number changes usually imply large changes that would require an add-on to be updated to work. Once the add-on developers adapted to the new scheme, no problems.

[caravel]

Chrome downloads and updates in the background with no prompting, you only notice when there is a slight change and a pop-up explaining a new feature, other than that, it was very hands free and manages by itself.

Which is how Firefox works.

With Firefox was the severe bloat

Do you actually understand what bloat is? Are you talking about "feature creep" are you talking about poor memory utilisation, are you talking about the program having a large memory foot print? You do know that software which uses a lot of memory can still execute quickly? You do know that browsers keep a cache which grows as you browse to different sites?

then constantly getting demanded to be updated with in your face notifications

I don't really remember this, but as with drone I don't see a huge problem with being notified that there is an update. Obviously you prefer software that does it's own thing behind your back - horses for courses...

then you had to wait for 5-10 minutes for it to download, go through the entire install menu, ad-block and no-script being disabled and having to wait for them to update too, it was too tedious and aggressive.

Can't relate to that either. I've used noscript from the start and cannot ever remember having it disabled after an update.

This was around Firefox 4-6 like being mentioned, it might have been sorted now, but the switch already occurred and Chrome is still marginally better.

"Chrome is still marginally better" is subjective. Typical tech press benchmarking proves nothing either - browsers have pros and cons and depending on what you do, a particular browser will be better for you, other browsers not so much.

[Furunculus]

many friends did go to chrome, but i stuck with firefox and it's been perfectly satisfactory.

Ad-Block/NoScript (+https everywhere) = awesome, and i don't like giving google that kind of power.

[Tellos Athenaios]

Hmm, if it's the Googles of this world that give you the creeps you might want to try something like privoxy.

[Husar]

Or buy a mug.

Or a shirt or a cap.

[edyzmedieval]

Chrome. Fast and clean design.

[Tellos Athenaios]

Well whatever your choice it can hardly be worse than Chrome via VMWare View in VirtualBox (don't ask), or ehrm, anything over RDP, really (please don't ask).