On June 17, 2008, Firefox 3 was released by Mozilla. I've been using Firefox as my primary browser in Windows for a couple of years now, so I was really excited to see what would happen when version 3 was released. I had used RC1 and RC2 for a couple of weeks leading up to the final release, and was very pleased with both of those.

One thing I have always disliked about Firefox was the memory usage. While at work, I usually keep a browser window (or 2, or 3) open, with each having multiple tabs open. At times, the resource usage of the browser becomes very noticeable. I was pleased when trying out FF RC1 and 2, and in the final release, to find that memory management appears to have been greatly improved. Currently, I have two FF3 windows open, with a total of 9 tabs open to various pages and FF3 is only using around 100 MB of memory. I have also noticed that pages seem to load faster, especially those utilizing Javascript.

The address bar has also been modified. The default functionality now includes searching of history, favorites, and site titles while you type. I have not decided if I like this feature or not. It seems to have it uses, but mostly I just like to have previous pages I've visited appear while I'm typing. I will try it for a little while longer...maybe I'll get used to it.

I would recommend you and giving it a try. You're a little late to be counted in the Guiness World Record attempt, but it's still worth downloading.

Let me know any feedback you have on FF3 and your thoughts!