[citation][nom]internetlad[/nom]at this point the difference between the latest versions of chrome (fastest) and opera (slowest, besides safari, which is just crApp) Is 350 Milliseconds. I can guarantee you plop somebody down in a chair and she won't notice any difference.ask any coder and they'll tell you that smushing new code into existing code almost always results in unforseen consequences elsewhere in said code. Take the recent builds of firefox as an example. It prompts to update constantly and, in my opinion, just causes more issues. Fix one thing and it breaks two others. They need to properly test these builds before pushing them out the door, not band-aid the hull and hope it doesn't leak.Although i'll grant you that out of the box, some browsers have more exploitable "features" than others, but bottom line is that any browser is as secure as you make it. You could take IE and disable flash, java, set all permissions to the most secure and the security levels to high, disable cookies etc etc etc.In the same vein you could take a build of firefox with adblock, noscript, etc. and in the wrong hands it would STILL get messed up. The number one security is you.I stand by my original statement.[/citation]
Try IE8 on an average computer, then try a more modern one and see the difference.
The browsers of late DO add a great deal of speed, reliability and security, for example the sandbox approach for tabs and plug-ins, to prevent your entire browser from crashing and to help prevent your computer getting attacked thorough it. Not to mention hardware acceleration and support for more modern scripts, as said in this article.