Firefox 3 final inches closer

For those of you waiting with bated breath for Firefox 3, Mozilla has just published Release Candidate 2 for Windows, Mac, Linux and Windows Portable. There are no new features to celebrate or examine: what we're looking at is pure, unadulterated bug fixing. Users can expect a somewhat more stable browser, with the regular mix of security tweaks and otherwise minor changes.

Full release notes can be read here.

Seth peers into the deep, dark corners of software so that you don't have to. He has yet to suffer a single nightmare about OS/2. You can follow him on Twitter.

Topics:: Browsers and extensions,; Mac Software,; Windows Software

Tags:: Firefox 3,; freeware,; release candidate

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by 0zSpit June 4, 2008 5:47 PM PDT: i hope they kept the lag feature, i'm getting use to it...; Reply to this comment


by reedjaguar June 4, 2008 8:39 PM PDT: GREAT!! FF is getting better and better every time a new version comes out....; Reply to this comment


by party_girl_56 June 4, 2008 11:05 PM PDT: love it; Reply to this comment


by Art Mori June 5, 2008 4:30 AM PDT: Is there a new way that I'm supposed to install this New Mozilla? After downloading it, it wouldn't let me run it. It asked me whether I wanted to save it or open it. I said 'open it' - nothing. It kept coming back with the same questions - open it or save it? after the download. Am I going nuts here? Thus far since getting Vista, the old Mozilla stalled out and froze while surfing the Web...now this. AAAAAARGH!!!!!!; Reply to this comment


by dmc081 June 5, 2008 5:00 AM PDT: guys stick w/ firefox 2.0.0.14 with addons like "fasterfox" "better youtube" "pdf download" "piclens" "1-clickweather" and a great lookin theme called "aero fox" till they make sure firefox 3 is suit up n ready to b use for sure beause theres alot of addons that are not yet done for firefox 3; Reply to this comment


by Ronnie798 June 5, 2008 1:59 PM PDT: Did you opening a "new" window to install it? Its perhaps still in your tem files...unopened. Install from hard drive; Reply to this comment


by tedgallagher June 6, 2008 5:04 AM PDT: I did not have a good experience with FF3. Adopted it early, tried it for a couple months, didn't like it. It was just plain S-L-O-W. Took forever to load images; often never did finish. Very frustrating. I'm back to FF2 now and will be very hesitant to go with 3. If it wasn't for all the little bells and whistles add-ons, I'd probably use Camino more, as it seems fastest of all to me (on Mac, anyway).; Reply to this comment


by ehbsguru--2008 June 6, 2008 7:19 AM PDT: Scott,

I strongly encourage you to write a brief article on a Firefox Extension
by Todd Long called: Update Notifier. This extension will automatically, on opening Firefox 3
(or 2), search for installed extension updates on your Firefox and tell you which are
now available. Todd could be in line for a Nobel Prize for this.

Barry; Reply to this comment


by ehbsguru--2008 June 6, 2008 7:19 AM PDT: Scott,

I strongly encourage you to write a brief article on a Firefox Extension
by Todd Long called: Update Notifier. This extension will automatically, on opening Firefox 3
(or 2), search for installed extension updates on your Firefox and tell you which are
now available. Todd could be in line for a Nobel Prize for this.

Barry; Reply to this comment


by ehbsguru--2008 June 6, 2008 7:21 AM PDT: Seth Rosenblatt,

I strongly encourage you to write a brief article on a Firefox Extension
by Todd Long called: Update Notifier. This extension will automatically, on opening Firefox 3
(or 2), search for installed extension updates on your Firefox and tell you which are
now available. Todd could be in line for a Nobel Prize for this.

Barry; Reply to this comment

by dustinfrank June 6, 2008 8:15 AM PDT

FF3 does seem faster to me compared to FF2 and i do like the visual changes. BUT, my #1 complaint seems to still exist in FF3 RC2: huge memory consumption! I had IE7 and FF3 RC2 open on the same web site (no add-ons or extensions on FF) and left them alone for about an hour. I watched their memory usage in task manager for a while. I was amazed to see FF3 RC2 hovering around 78MB while IE7 was hovering around 17MB. wow. now sure i have enough memory on my system but that is just way out of line for a web browser. Given that kind of resource consumption i'm still not compelled to jump on the FF band wagon.

Reply to this comment


by Lerianis June 8, 2008 8:11 AM PDT: That is low memory consumption, in all honesty, for a web browser.


by 1001001think June 6, 2008 12:44 PM PDT: Gawd yes, don't lose the lag. When would I find time for a bathroom break without it? Also there's the possibility that I wouldn't be able to distinguish between Mozilla and Microsoft without the lag.
Tighten up your product people. Walk before you run. >:O; Reply to this comment


by 1001001think June 6, 2008 12:45 PM PDT: Gawd yes, don't lose the lag. When would I find time for a bathroom break without it? Also there's the possibility that I wouldn't be able to distinguish between Mozilla and Microsoft without the lag.
Tighten up your product people. Walk before you run. >:O; Reply to this comment


by oocman June 6, 2008 1:38 PM PDT: Good Lord! It is better. I've followed the progression of FF3. The first released really sucked....the latest of off the chain! I can't believe how fast this thing is! AWESOME! I only use I.E. when I in my office only because they WON'T let me use FF3.; Reply to this comment


by dlauber June 6, 2008 2:18 PM PDT: I've had the opposite experience with FireFox 3 in both the RC1 and RC2 incarnations ( could be just plain dumb luck). FF3 has been a lot faster than FF2 and IE7; and quite stable. My only frustration is that my theme of choice (Modern Pinball) doesn't work with it properly (the scroll bars disappear) and the producer of the theme doesn't intend to update it for FF3. Otherwise, FF3 has been working very well in Windows XP Pro for me.

I did make sure to establish a different profile to use with FF3, which I assume everybody else has been doing too.; Reply to this comment


by iQuack June 6, 2008 4:31 PM PDT: Firefox 3 is very slick, but BE CAREFUL! I downloaded FF3 yesterday after Walter Mossberg's enthusiastic comments in yesterday's "Wall Street Journal" and after working very well for a while, FF3 jammed up on the Autoblog.com website. The browser wouldn't force quit nor even quit after I logged out.........I had to use the power button on the back off my OS 10.5.3 iMac to shut down and restart the computer. Fortunately the full restart fixed the hanging browser, but I quickly replaced FF3 with the current FIrefox 2.0.0.14 which works fine. So, use the pre-release with caution!; Reply to this comment


by reggie28 June 7, 2008 5:41 AM PDT: That's Awesome guys your doing a great job. I love to see FireFox going faster and out every Webbrowser on the Internet. With a buildin Security System thats even more better. Have nice days and i am looking forward to it. reg; Reply to this comment


by ptzkiler June 9, 2008 2:30 PM PDT: I found adon call happy checker its great if notify when rapidshare happy hours are active so we do not need to connect to the rapidshare site anymore to check status of happy hours download it from here Rapidshre happy hour hack addon; Reply to this comment


by millzey90 June 10, 2008 6:04 AM PDT: sorry when is the release date for firefox 3 and will it update itself??; Reply to this comment


by au561 June 10, 2008 7:21 PM PDT: DON'T try this till they fix it. None of my add-ons or extentions worked with it. If you do want to try it, put it in a seperate file from your other version. I didn't, and when I uninstalled it, it corrupted my V2.0.0.014 so it wouldn't even open. I had to reinstall 2.0.0.14 and then create a new profile and go thru a long long troubleshooting session before I found the corrupt file. I'll wait a few months after the official release before I try to upgrade again!; Reply to this comment

(21 Comments)