Safari for Windows’ recent reviews and download numbers reported by Apple are unbelievable. With over 1 million downloads within the first 48 hours of launch, Safari may appear to be popular. But I assure you; once the confetti hits the floor, the crowd will have long vanished, leaving nothing but the residual, intoxicated fanboys who refused to leave the party.

And I’m not at all closed-minded. Yes, I did wait to download the browser, but after reading about Safari being the fastest browser running on Windows, I simply had to try it out.

Who can say ‘no’ to a browser with the potential to be twice as fast as Internet Explorer 7 and 1.6 times faster than Firefox 2? Certainly not I; but after installation, I soon realized that a millisecond here and a millisecond there simply doesn’t matter.

The only scenario where a ‘fast rendering’ browser would make an observable difference would be a mid-nineties computer with a broadband connection, something I could say is a rare occurrence if you live outside a nursing home.

Despite the four denial of service bugs and two remote code execution security flaws found within the first 24 hours, I won’t dog Safari for Windows on security. Our alternatives (not so much Firefox) have had their run-ins with attackers in the past, as well.

I usually wouldn’t complain about the look of a browser, but, until Safari for Windows, I’ve never seen a browser so displeasing on the eyes. I can look past all the buttons which try to look futuristic and fresh; even the toolbars that boast a slight, gradient dog’s lip gray don’t seem to bother me. But I simply can’t bring myself to look at the Internet through Safari’s eyes.

The colors rendered on pages are displeasingly vivid; after a few seconds of gazing at a page, you’re eyes will be burning with the fires of a volcano while erupting with tears due to Safari’s inability to render fonts in a normal manner.

Safari’s font rendering engine allows three options for font smoothing: light, medium, and strong. The visual difference between the three is negligible; however, they all succeed in varying the level of headache after reading just a few blips of text. So, I do recommend the ‘light’ option, but would rather be given the choice for ‘none.’

The most disturbing characteristic with Safari for Windows is the way it’s being played out on the Internet. Features common to every browser such as tabs, integrated RSS, and pop-up blocking are being played up like that one radio at Wal-Mart that “features stereo sound!”

But the little logo on electronics that says “Hi-Fi” just doesn’t cut it for me anymore; I’ve moved on to a new age, and if Apple’s browser doesn’t offer me anything I can’t get from my two, Firefox and IE7 (in particular order), or with a conveniently developed plug-in, I will have nothing to do with it.

And for the time being, there will be numerous reports on how much market share Safari for Windows is receiving; they may even look promising as everyone has to engorge themselves in the new browser.

Burt Safari’s clock is slowly ticking, backwards through time, as it’s journey into opposing territory eventually leads to an inglorious end.

Related:

Entry was posted on Friday, June 15th, 2007 at 6:36 am under Apple.

Read more entries by George Gardner.
Stumble It!