Best Browser

[hoddy4]

I think that Skyfire probably has the most potential but right now it is better on the Mogul than the Pro because of the resolution issue.

[gobmonster]

Heres the order of use and reasons by application for me

1. Opera Mini - Its my number one forum viewer. I have a full install that gives me the full screen esmertec java. I really like how it leaves the app so you can view and enter text clearly. Its really fast and gets the job done.

2. Picsel Browser - The infamous never share browser. Its faster than opera mobile but has some compatibility errors. I use it when i go to photo intensive sites.

3. PIE - I use this for anything that needs to be secure. Pie gets the job done with out any flashy looks, but its exactly how i want it to be done. If im going to order something from ebay, pay my amex bill, or just update my facebook, i'll use PIE.

4. Opera Mobile - Simply put, it provides a very smooth experience. Its great for showing off. TBH, theres not a lot of benefit in using opera mobile because it is very slow in comparison to my top two.

5. Skyfire - I really like skyfire, but it runs very slow. Its laggy and makes my phone hot. I'll use it when im next to a charger (its a battery killer) or i want to view something in flash really fast. Its the only browser i know that supports hulu.com, so it gets a lot of points with me.

[amw1972]

Not sure which Opera build I'm using...but it was from a link for the Opera build from the HTC Touch HD. This is the most stable and complete Opera build I have experienced.

I, too, use Skyfire for streaming video. I can get over the resolution...being able to stream from Hulu from your phone can get me to overlook lots of other stuff.

I've tried Iris...too unstable, not fast enough, and my only question is WHY?

I still have Opera Mini on my TP, but it is usually dormant...and never really gets utilized.

PIE is still on my phone...but it is probably the back up to the back up to the back up.

I am patiently waiting for the first beta of Fennec for WinMo to come out. Might be awhile, but its coming.

[BigDiesel07]

Originally Posted by deadwrong03

does anybody have a cab for opera mini?

Just go to mini.opera.com from the web browser on your phone... Then you can install it...

[PhilR8]

I'll preface this by saying that I'm not a fan of SkyFire, so I didn't include it here because I never use it. Also, I didn't include Iris, even though I used to use it sometimes on my Mogul; I never did use it that much anyway.

So what I've done is compare three browsers that I use on a daily basis to see how well they render some of my favorite websites. I also picked some heavily formatted sites that I knew would at least give PIE some problems. The sites are:

http://www.engadget.com/photos/is-th...bile-7/561239/
http://www.engadget.com/photos/is-th...bile-7/561273/
http://www.orioles.com
http://cbssports.com
http://www.reddit.com

Not a scientific sample by any means, but a good collection of challenging sites that I would like to be able to browse on my Touch Pro. Let's see what happens!

Oh, but first here be the versions of the browsers I used as well as the rom I'm using (MightyRom 4.9.3 - click images for larger versions):



First, we'll see how Opera 9.5 rendered the websites:



The Engadet gallery loads correctly when I paste the URL directly into the address bar, but when I select another image from the page, it does not load the entire picture. I tried several times with several images and the results were always the same: only the top part of the image would load. The other sites loaded admirably; Orioles.com even behaved like the desktop version of the site, cycling through several news stories as I sat and watched. If you click on the link to the full VGA images, though, you might notice that they seem a bit "fuzzy". This is a complaint that I have with Opera and, along with the unreliable page loads (like the Engadget gallery), it prompted me to find another browser that I liked better.

So with that in mind, let's look at the PIE versions of the same sites:



As you might have guessed, PIE drops the ball and poorly renders most of the sites above. However, PIE is great for mobile versions of some sites, like orioles.com and mlb.com - during the baseball season, I use PIE to follows games using Gameday Mobile. It works much much better than Opera and Netfront in this respect.

Finally, let's take a look at how Netfront behaves:



Netfront renders pages correctly and everything is crystal clear on my VGA screen - images, text, etc. I also like the zoom functionality demonstrated in the engadget gallery above, but a caveat is that you cannot zoom in any further than what you see above. Not a problem for me, because I have good eyes (read: strong contact lens prescription) but text may be a bit small for some.

Netfront is not without its problems, though. There are a ton of popup warnings for some reason, I had to disable javascript on orioles.com so it didn't scroll through the news stories like Opera did, and it is a "concept edition", meaning it expires every month or so and you have to go through the process of re-downloading it. Also, sometimes entering text/clicking on links with your fingers is tedious, but usually navigating with the stylus works well.

So for me, Netfront is the browser I use the most because of how well it replicates the desktop experience. I want to like Opera - really, I do - but it just hasn't lived up to hype for me. I'm really excited to try the new PIE from the Treo Pro, though.

[freeza]

Thanks for the review. I might try Netfront now....

[Sprints700wx]

I have used all except the Opera full and stuck with the mini .. find it to be a little fast and lighter for my taste . Net front has been always a fav since i tryed it on my 700wx ..

[dschoenike]

Nice review, thanks for that. Question for ya about netfront. Do you get the out of memory errors? Im getting that after about 5 web pages or so. With my mogul, i could understand that, 18mb of free ram. But with my touch pro, im getting the same errors with 145mb free ram (well 132mb if netfront is running. I like netfront, and i would like to use it more. Any tips to help stop the errors? Thanks,
dschoenike

[PhilR8]

Originally Posted by dschoenike

Nice review, thanks for that. Question for ya about netfront. Do you get the out of memory errors? Im getting that after about 5 web pages or so. With my mogul, i could understand that, 18mb of free ram. But with my touch pro, im getting the same errors with 145mb free ram (well 132mb if netfront is running. I like netfront, and i would like to use it more. Any tips to help stop the errors? Thanks,
dschoenike

I've pretty much had the exact same experience as you. On the mogul, I couldn't go to sites like Reddit with netfront because I would get out of memory errors... which makes sense on the mogul, like you said.

On the Touch Pro, I've only seen the error pop up two or three times, but it is a little puzzling to see it at all, right? I forget which sites prompted the error, but if I see them again, I'll be sure to post them here. They happen so infrequently that I just put up with them, but yeah, I'd like to not see them at all...

[dschoenike]

I appreciate the reponse. I know i got the errors on ign/xbox360 and cnet. I guess those are pretty heavy sites, but still disappointing. One more quick question about those errors, what do ya do when you get one? Close the browser and start again, or just keep pushing on? I honestly uninstalled it after a day, cause i figured i must have done something wrong. Ill give it another go.