XO1 | Same hardware, slower internet [Devel Digest, Vol 62, Issue 25]

[Yioryos Asprobounitis]

> ------------------------------
> 
> Message: 5
> Date: Wed, 13 Apr 2011 19:52:55 -0500
> From: Mikus Grinbergs <mikus at bga.com>
> Subject: Re: [Sugar-devel] [DESIGN] XO1 | Same hardware,
> slower
>     internet
> To: Anish Mangal <anish at activitycentral.org>
> Cc: Lucian Branescu <lucian.branescu at gmail.com>,   
> OLPC Devel
>     <devel at lists.laptop.org>,   
> Sugar Devel
>     <sugar-devel at lists.sugarlabs.org>
> Message-ID: <4DA64567.20907 at bga.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1;
> format=flowed
> 
> > Hmm, it'd be interesting to see how much of a
> performance improvement
> > webkit offers.
> 
> It's no big deal to run webkit-based browsers on the
> XO.  For instance, 
> all of my XO-1s have Midori installed.
> 
> The question is - what is this "performance improvement"
> that you are 
> looking for?  I believe that in practice, it is the
> "usability" of a 
> browser that is noticed the most, not the
> "performance".  What Midori 
> has is a smaller footprint -  what it does not have is
> a richer 
> experience than Firefox - the result is that I myself
> prefer using 
> Firefox on the XO-1 to using Midori on the XO-1.  [In
> my opinion, the 
> "performance" of the two is roughly equivalent (e.g., in
> showing YouTube 
> videos).]
> 
> It is worth noting that the Google Chrome browser, which
> *does* have the 
> reputation (in the general public) of better performance,
> does not stand 
> out on the XO (perhaps because its footprint is large).

Performance is indeed a preference but speed is not. And Midori really blows away Firefox both in F11 and F14 XO-1 builds.
Google Chrome is also considerably faster than firefox on the XO-1 and on the XO-1.5, Iron is is no-contest (too bad it does not run on the XO-1).
So webkit does look faster than gecko on both XO-1 and XO-1.5.

Of course none of them will improve youtube/flash performance on the XO-1. But maybe the new geode-driver, being currently discussed, will.