NetFront 3.3 Technical Preview 1.04 released

[Alexander Turcic]

I'm sure there's a perfectly reasonable explanation as to why Access keeps on releasing "technical previews" of their upcoming NetFront 3.3 browser, but it's not going to help them winning back their disgruntled customers who went already over to Opera Mobile and Opera Mini. The only new "feature" I can detect is official support for Windows Mobile 5.0.

You can download the latest technical preview from here.

[Alexander Turcic]

Werner Ruotsalainen has reviewed this preview and also pointed out the difference to earlier versions:

http://www.pocketpcmag.com/blogs/ind...3&p=502&more=1

Overall he seems rather pleased about NetFront and calls it the "second best browser on WM5" (after Opera).

[Alexander Turcic]

English version of TP 1.04 can be found here: http://www.access.co.jp/nfppc/dl_v33e.html

[AkiraXXX]

I must, humbly, disagree on this point.

After finding that my previous Netfront 3.3 Technical Preview (1.03) had expired, I was compelled to use IE on my Dell X51v (had a guest in the room where my PC resides, so I couldn't update right away). Needless to say I was pretty pissed at the crappy performance of IE. When I did get the chance to update to TP 1.04, I also installed Opera Mobile 8.5's 45 day preview. I gave them side-by-side comparisons on the websites I often use. I chose three to start: digg.com, downloadsquad.com and the Moleskinerie group on Flickr.com.

I was quite excited by Opera, but found that it didn't quite stack up to Netfront right out of the gate. I will admit that I don't like tweaking software very much anymore (I do it all day at work) since I have so much of it on my PPC. In a nutshell:

I think they are close in performance, but I give the rendering edge to Netfront on those pages I have used (your milage may vary).

I found that Opera didn't render downloadsquad.com correctly.

Opera tries to keep everything on one screen so you don't have to scroll. That is nice, but the results may be helpful or hindering depending on the page you are viewing.

For some reason, Opera allows you to continuously scroll to the right of the page, even when there isn't anything to show.

I felt that page scrolling was slightly sluggish on Opera as compared to Netfront, but didn't care for either one's response.

Opera has better fonts.

Netfront doesn't pester me with a "x days left in your preview" type message like Opera.

This is just based on some simple side-by-side comparisons with my real-life use. I have no axe to grind with any browser (other than IE) and I hope they both do well. The competition only benefits the user. So, PPC browser authors, feel free to continue to fight over my affections.

I will keep an eye on all products, but will choose Netfront as my primary for the time being. After my preview ends on 28 Feb, we'll see what happens.

AkiraXXX