Is anyone else using FF 3.6 beta? It has a pretty cool feature which enables changing the "persona" by adding header images, and there are thousands to choose from.

Perhaps this feature was available with earlier FF versions and I just never knew.

I'm enjoying the simplicity of Google Chrome.

I haven't tried Chrome; and, in keeping to my cranky policy of staying away from Google products, probably won't.

I started with Netscape and have stuck with Mozilla since, both for browsing and email.

Just downloaded FF 3.6. Persona is new.

You can get your hands on 3.7a1, but I'm too chicken to give it a go this early. They put out nightly builds (http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/nightly/latest-trunk/)

3.7 is expected to be out next year between May/June (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozilla_Firefox#Version_3.6)

You currently have to get invited to try Google Voice, but it looks interesting. You can pick a number from lots of US cities and national calls, including Alaska, Hawaii and Canada are free.

" Welcome to Google Voice! Google Voice gives you a single phone number that rings all your phones, saves your voicemail online, and transcribes your voicemail to text. Other cool features include the ability to listen in on messages while they are being left and the ability to make low cost international calls. To start enjoying Google Voice, just give out your Google Voice number. You can record custom greetings for your favorite callers or block annoying callers by marking them as SPAM. Just click on the settings link at the top of your inbox. We hope you enjoy Google Voice."

Persona has been around for a while its preety cool though. I love firefox and use it 90% of the time the other 10% i just use IE for website that don't work well with FF.

I also love FF. My cable company online payment site is the only web site I visit which won't work with FF, so I use Netscape 7.2. The only time I use IE is to be sure my blog is rendering properly for IE users.

I use Firefox 3.6 and have added the Babblefish plugin. When I come upon spanish words I don't know I right-click while holding down the Alt and at the bottom of the screen is the translation. Very, very nice.

I'll have to give the BabelFish add-on a try.

I don't have an "add on", just a bookmark. I love babblefish. I just cut and paste into babblefish and instant have the translation... or a reasonable facsimile. I'm not switching to firefox, so wonder if there is an add on or tool bar for Explorer.

Babelfish is the only add-on that works for me. I installed Surf Canyon and Foxy Proxy and have used neither. I stumble around a lot of blogs written in Spanish and being able to highlight a word and have the translation is invaluable.

Internet Explorer takes too long to start up and every update seems to make it worse. I switched to Firefox and I have been totally pleased.

I used to love FireFox but it runs so slow and often locks my computer up. I removed a bunch of plug-ins/add-ons and it still runs slow. I've timed it taking as long as 7 minutes just to load. Yikes! It's funny how we all have different experiences with things, isn't it?

I also use Adblock Plus, XMarks, PDF Download, and Multi-Row bookmark toolbar. I see no ads with Adblock Plus and XMarks enables me to synchronize my bookmarks between my two computers.

The Add Bookmark Here add-on has not yet been updated to work with FF 3.6.

I assume you are cleaning your computer content regularly.

I use FF which takes less than 5 seconds to load for me. Overall much faster than IE in my system.

Apparently, it's part of the Yahoo Toolbar. I don't have that currently, but when I looked at altavista.com that's what it suggested for Babelfish.

I used to use firefox too. (still do for some things) but now I use Chrome almost exclusively.

I usually have 8-10 tabs open and firefox really slows down when I punish it like that.

Yup, about weekly. And extensive anti-virus/spam/yada yada software with a nightly sweep.

That's my issue, too. Chrome is so clean and quick. Also, I have a pretty small monitor, I think 13". Chrome is spare and uncluttered giving me more real estate for the sites I'm visiting.

Thanks for the tip Chubbs. I have reverted to 3.5 so I can use the "Add Bookmark Here" add-on and can also enjoy the various personas. I find the "Add Bookmark Here" add-on to so very much simplify bookmarking in my Bookmark Toolbar, that I can't live without it.

I have a few addons that i really like. I have a couple different media grabbers so that you can save anything thats in a webpage just by clicking on it.

Funky, what version are you running? Version 3.0 is crap. I went to Chrome for quite a while until I tried 3.5 Beta and was impressed enough to go back to FF. 3.55 is the standard release now and fixes a lot of the problems 3.0 had.

I haven't tried 3.6 Beta yet but plan to.

3.5.3

I had no problems with 3.0

Funny how we all have difference experiences.

Thanks Bogus for the tip as to the BabelFish add-on. I have used BabelFish Translator often as I read Mexican newspapers online, but did not know of the FF add-0n. I installed it when you clued me in and find it to be a much quicker manner of translating. So, thanks.

Did it install an open bookmark toolbar that won't go away? That's what happened when I downloaded it.

What do mean "open bookmark toolbar"? I assume you've checked for activated toolbars under the "view" menu. I use the "bookmark" toolbar with the multi-row add-on and am able to make it go away by unchecking it under the view menu.

Whereas displaying toolbars listed in View is optional, the new toolbar is not. It's now displayed across the top. I don't want it to be and I haven't figured out how to make it go away.

Correction, it describes itself as a tab bar.

The "tab bar" as I know it is right above the content window and enables one to open multiple web pages in different tabs. Is that what you're talking about?

So, does that make me some kind of bad person if I just use IE 8? It works fine for me. I liked Chrome in that it was really, really fast. I didn't like it in that it didn't render pages right. I figure that it's okay to use IE because Bill Gates donates a LOT of money to good causes, and Paul Allen kept my team from becoming the Los Angeles Seahawks. And it's not expensive like Office.

I wouldn't make such a judgment, as it makes no difference to me what browsers others prefer; but, then again, no one in this thread has trashed IE, so I guess I don't understand your point.

Yeah. I use IE and am not looking for an alternative. It works for me.

Really? I've never had that problem. All webpages in Chrome look great to me.

The only problem I have with Chrome is that Shockwave Player is unstable on it requiring occasional closing down and re-opening of Chrome as it slows to a crawl when Shockwave goes whacky.

Google is coming out with a new operating system also called Chrome. A computer is supposed to be able to come to full boot in about 7 seconds from the time you push the on button. It's designed for you to have everything in the cloud, no programs to purchase or download. I'm not sure how comfortable I am with that but it sounds like an interesting idea.

I do like most Google programs, don't know that I would use an OS, though. Too much commitment. I don't think that anyone has trashed IE here, I'm not sure why I'm not into FF, but something about it feels... uncomfortable to me. Like new underwear, I guess.

I've never used IE as my regular browser. I don't really know why. When I've used it a few times, it's been fine. I just went the Netscape-FireFox-Chrome route instead. I don't see any as being better than the other. It's like Coke vs. Pepsi. We all have different tastes and find what we like best.

I appreciate Google's way of doing things open-source. I think it encourages innovation.

Yes.

If you want the tab bar to not appear, you may go into the "tools" menu, then "options", then "tabs", then uncheck the "always show the tab bar" option, and restart FF.

Thank you.

You're welcome. I find the tabs really handy. Right now I have 11 opened.

Indeed they are when I want numerous tabs open. Otherwise, there's enough real estate gone at the top. Do you use the StumbleUpon Toolbar?

http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/

I don't use any add-on tool bars, except for the multi-row bookmark add-on, so I have two rows of bookmark folders.

I used the Yahoo toolbar for a while but found mostly it was just clutter.