Expect 22.8% performance boost from next week's Firefox 3.6 beta

Once again, our rendering test shows that Google Chrome 3 appears to have been intentionally developed with Windows XP in mind -- the version of Windows many believe best suits netbooks, which is where Google is still seeking to break through. But Chrome 4 does not follow suit; on average, it actually falls behind the latest stable Apple Safari 4 build.

The Celtic Kane test is the one that last year called out Opera as the "fastest browser," much faster than Firefox. If the CK test alone designated speed, then Firefox would actually be the champion over even Chrome. Firefox tends to be faster at simpler tests; when the loads get tougher, Firefox gets weaker and Chrome and Safari march right on.

Acid3 compliance scores are unchanged for the last several months. We may not see Mozilla attempt to close that last standards compliance gap until the first daily builds of Firefox 4, which may not come until next year.

Chrome loves heavier workloads; and here in the SunSpider battery, we see it surging ahead, better than doubling Firefox's scores. The dev build of Chrome 4 has closed the gap here somewhat against the stable/beta Chrome 3.

Next: The four new tests in our CRPI battery...