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Google Confirms Chrome GPU Acceleration

Posted by timothy on from the browser-as-taskmaster dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Google is already experimenting with GPU acceleration in its latest Chrome developer builds. Chrome 7 can separate different layers of a webpage into CPU and GPU processes and combine those layers using the GPU as long as the browser is now launched with certain switches. Chromium 7 has also a new Labs feature that reveals that Google is thinking about moving tabs from the top of the browser to the left side. It seems that Chrome will be catching up with Firefox 4 and IE9 in terms of hardware acceleration soon."

3 of 186 comments (clear)

  1. Tabs on the left make sense by RichMan · · Score: 5, Insightful

    These days most screens are wider than they are taller. And text still reads better vertically.
    So the height is valuable real-estate while there is side space to waste.
    My desktop has the application bars hide on the left/right.

    The more vertical space the better.

    1. Re:Tabs on the left make sense by DragonWriter · · Score: 5, Insightful

      These days most screens are wider than they are taller.

      Most screens have been wider than tall since well before the first web browsers.

      And text still reads better vertically.

      Text reads better in columns narrower than most screens are wide at the typical viewing distance, but its often convenient to have more than one block of text on the screen. Tabs take up more room on the side than on the top, and do more on the side to hurt the ability to have more usable windows on the screen.

      Tabs on the side are useful for some people in all circumstances, and for other people in certain circumstances, and (I suspect) for some people in no circumstances. So, if Chrome allows the user to move the tabs to the side, that's good.

      If Chrome just moves the tabs to the side, thats bad.

  2. Quick way to speed up your browser by Animats · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If you want to speed up your browser, just block the following domains:

    *.doubleclick.net
    *.polldaddy.com
    *.quantserve.com
    *.google-analytics.com
    *.scorecardresearch.com
    *.gravatar.com
    *.247realmedia.com
    *.likeme.net

    If you block the top 10 ad services, browsing speed improves substantially. Firefox BlockSite is useful for blocking, or you can edit HOSTS.TXT. This alone will make Slashdot pages load twice as fast. AdBlock isn't enough; it still loads the data, but doesn't display it. There's too much ad code out there which stalls page loading until the ad is served. So you get to wait for the ad servers. Sequentially.