Battle Royale all over again?

Firefox thinks it's showtime,and Microsoft seems to have learned a thing or two.Time for browser war 3.0?
I ran a couple of tests on IE8- beta 1 and Firefox3 Beta 5.Improvements to both browsers were stellar,and seem evenly matched;though that could all change when the final releases are out.

The GUI:

IE8's GUI is very similar(if not the same) as IE7.So if your an IE7 affectionado or a die-hard MS junkie,IE8 might be your side of the war.The domain portions of URLs are bolded to be more noticeable, an effort to thwart phishing schemes. Also, the bottom status bar is on by default.





Changes to the Firefox GUI are stunning.With eye catching buttons,improvements to the url bar and some fancy tab highlighting,the improved layout is comfortable to use, and noticeably different from Internet Explorer, which splits navigation controls between the left and right sides of the browser.Firefox wins this round hands down.


Firefox vs IE: 1-0
New Features:

Prominent in IE8:
WebSlices,a new feature for websites that enables users to subscribe to content directly within a webpage. WebSlices behave just like feeds in that users can subscribe to them and receive update notifications when the content changes. Websites are polled at user-defined intervals, similar to the way RSS feeds are polled.IE8 is also css 2.1 compliant,has improved HTML handling and page-zooming facility.

In Firefox:
The address bar for Firefox 3 supports a much richer type-ahead drop-down;to help pick your destination of choice, the drop-down narrows your recent locations as you type, and shows URL, title, icon, and even whether the address is bookmarked. The address bar also allows for one-click bookmarking and direct subscription to RSS feeds.My task manager,however showed that,though FF3 is lighter than FF2,IE-8 is still considerably lighter.
Firefox vs IE: 1-1

Browsers on Acid:
The Acid tests are test suites published and promoted by the Web Standards Project to identify web page rendering flaws in browsers and other applications that render HTML.The way a web browser displays the test is compared to a reference rendering. If the two match, the browser is considered to pass the test.
This is the reference for the acid test.The test result would come out exactly like this if the browser handles HTML, CSS, and JavaScript properly.The larger image is acid3 while the smiley face is acid2.For now, no browser actually aces Acid 3.






IE8 even failed the Acid2 test (note the happy face's eyes). Also,note the ugly failure notice on acid3.





Firefox has long had good showings in Web standards compliance and this release is no different.Unlike Internet Explorer 8, Firefox 3 handles the Acid2 test perfectly and it also scores fairly well on the Acid3 test,beating the pants off IE.





Firefox vs IE: 2-1
Take the acid2 and acid3 for your browser:)

Page download time:
Finally,the deciding factor:which is the faster browser?I ran Steve Souders' Parellel downloads test; the results were very close.

IE turned up a result of 5985 ms.

Firefox3 did it in 5905 ms.

Result: Firefox was 80 milliseconds faster:)
Not much,but still an edge.Kudos to Microsoft for bringing up the standard of IE.
However,final score: Firefox vs IE: 3-1

Conclusion:Internet Explorer8 is a wonderful browser,and is well beyond what IE7 ever was,however MS has to do a lot more if they want it to become a top priority download in the future.Firefox on the other hand....:)