As Google Chrome has been the fastest browser for a while and the alpha version of Opera 10.50 caught up quite well with Chrome’s performance but didn’t beat it yet, I decided to check the benchmark results given in the blog post by Opera. I ran all the benchmarks with the same settings as Opera did and also tested all four browsers. The only difference is that I used Chrome 5 (alpha) instead of Chrome 4 which is justified since Opera is also using non-stable builds of their browser. I summed up all the benchmark results in a diagram quite similar to the one used by Opera in order to make comparison easier:

The diagram published by Opera looks like this:

As you can see, the latest version of Opera really beats Chrome in Peacekeeper and Dromaeo, but Chrome is far ahead in both Sunspider and V8. I ran all the benchmarks several times to verify my test results and they are perfectly valid, but still differ from the ones published by Opera somehow. Now one has to ask why there is such a big difference regarding Sunspider and whether Opera faked its scores or the latest version of Chrome really improved in this sector.

All in all, it’s quite clear that Opera is really trying to beat all other browsers when concerning JavaScript performance and manages to catch up with Chrome. It will be interesting to see whether the final version of Opera 10.50 will beat Chrome in all tests or not.

In contrast to Opera, I want my  benchmark results to be rock-solid and not to be challenged, so I took screenshots of each result and also created an Excel file that contains all results and the calculations made to create the diagram. You can download the screenshots and the Excel file to check my results.

EDIT:
I spoke to the Opera development team and after some tests, we came to the conclusion that the missing support for SSE4.1 and 4.2 is what makes my Phenom slower than the Core 2 Duo in the Sunspider benchmark.

Related posts:

1. Peacekeeper Browser Benchmark – Safari clearly performing best!
2. Browser Roundup – Opera, Chrome, Firefox, Safari and Internet Explorer tested
3. New version of Opera catching up with Chrome’s performance?

A newly released pre-alpha version of Opera promises to radically improve the browser’s performance and speed of displaying and loading websites. The official developer website even claims that “[Opera 10.50] is fast, more than 7x faster in SunSpider than Opera 10.10“. Since Google Chrome has been the fastest browser on the market so far, followed by Apple’s Safari browser, we may have a new player among the best-performing browser.

I downloaded and tested Opera 10.50 and found out that it actually is much faster than before, but also very unstable. I ran Peacekeeper three times, the first time it went well, the second time it was much slower and the third  time it didn’t start the benchmark and showed just a blank page. I had to re-install Opera in order to fix this problem. But please keep in mind that this is a pre-alpha release and not meant for everyday use.

In comparison to Chrome 5.0.307.1, Opera 10.50 lost by 12.8%, which is actually a big improvement compared to Chrome 2.0.170 and Opera 9.64, where Opera lost by 60.2%. Safari, once the fastest browser, scored 28.6% less than Chrome, thus giving up its second place to Opera.

Considering the fact that Opera is still pre-alpha and that the development team will improve it before releasing the final version, one can expect Opera’s Peacekeeper score to increase again, bringing it dangerously close to Chrome.

Related posts:

1. Browser Roundup – Opera, Chrome, Firefox, Safari and Internet Explorer tested
2. Opera 10.50b claims to be fastest browser on Earth
3. Peacekeeper Browser Benchmark – Safari clearly performing best!

In the Google Chrome Extension Directory you will find many interesting extension, but the one I waited for a long time is one that blocks annoying advertisements on websites. With AdThwart, there finally is such an extension and I will show how to use it. There was a trick to do block ads with earlier versions of Chrome, but using the official extensions is much more comfortable.

1. Make sure you have Chrome 4.0 or later. Click at the tool button (top right corner) and “About Google Chrome” to see your version. If it’s not 4.0 or later, download the Chrome Beta here.
2. Go to the AdThwart page and click “Install”
3. Once installed, you will see the options page. By default, the filters EasyList and Extra filters are enabled. You may choose another filter for your country.
   
4. Now most ads on websites should be gone.
   
5. If there are still some remaining, you can use the  Easy Filter function to block them as well. Click on the devil-button on the right side of your address bar and select “Easy create filter”. Then click on the element you want to block or hover over it and press CTRL + Shift + E. Return to the popup and confirm that you want to block that element.
   

If you for some reason don’t like AdThwart, there is another ad blocking extension called simply AdBlock. I didn’t try it, but looking at its rating of 4.5/5 stars, it seems to be quite good as well.

Related posts:

1. AdBlock Extension for Google Chrome
2. Google Chrome 5 comes with automatic page translation
3. Google Chrome 2.0 Pre-Beta

Although this interface hasn’t been released for the public yet, you can try it already by following these easy steps:

1. Open a new browser window or tab and go to this URL: http://www.google.com/ncr
   By using the “ncr” statement, you make sure that you’re not redirected to a local version of Google (e.g. .de, .cn, .co.uk, …)
2. Paste this script into the address bar replacing the URL:
   javascript:void(document.cookie=”PREF=ID=20b6e4c2f44943bb:U=4bf292d46faad806:TM=1249677602:LM=1257919388:S=odm0Ys-53ZueXfZG;path=/; domain=.google.com”);
   This will set a cookie telling the search to use the new interface
3. Go back to google.com and start searching!

There is also a nice comment on the bottom of each page with customized search telling you that you’re awesome!

Related posts:

1. Google Personalized Search saying “you’re awesome”
2. New “intelligent” search engine Wolfram|Alpha launched
3. Increased Google speed with Caffeine

When you search using Google, you get more relevant, useful search results, recommendations, and other personalized features. By personalizing your results, we hope to deliver you the most useful, relevant information on the Internet.

If you use personalized search and have the new beta search interface enabled (enable the new Google Search Interface), Google will show this message on the bottom of each search results page:

Related posts:

1. Try the new Google Search Interface
2. New “intelligent” search engine Wolfram|Alpha launched
3. AdThwart extension blocks advertisement in Google Chrome

Test and use ChromeOS without installing it:

1. Download a compiled release of ChromeOS. This is the easiest way, you may of course compile it on your own, but that is not part of this tutorial. Use the torrent mirror for fastest downloads. Once it’s done, unpack the image file (ChromeOS-Cherry.img)
2. Connect a USB memory stick (at least 1GB) to your computer
3. Download and unpack Win32DiskImager and launch Win32DiskImager.exe. Click on the little folder symbol and select your image file unpacked in step 1. Select the proper drive letter of your USB memory stick in the Device section. Then click Write and confirm the window warning your about a potential physical corruption on your device.
   
4. Once it finished writing, unplug your USB device and plug it into the computer you want to test ChromeOS on. Make sure your computer is configured to boot from USB devices as first priority. If your computer is a netbook (e.g. Asus Eee PC), try the steps under Prepare the Asus Eee PC to boot from USB devices in my tutorial on Windows 7 on the Eee PC. Most other computers will have a similar BIOS configuration, though.
5. Boot from the USB device and wait a few seconds. ChromeOS shouldn’t take long to boot (around 5 seconds on my Eee PC 900).
6. Login using facepunch as both username and password.
7. There should be three symbols at the top right corner. The first is showing your battery status (in running ChromeOS on a laptop), the second your WiFi and Ethernet configuration and the third some menus. Click the second one and connect to your WiFi/Ethernet network. This is really necessary since all applications in ChromeOS are web-based!
8. Enjoy ChromeOS!

Troubleshooting:

• I am connected via WiFi/Ethernet but can’t open websites.
  This may be due to a misconfiguration in your network settings. Sadly, ChromeOS currently has no GUI to configure it, but you can try to do it with the terminal. Press CTRL + ALT + T to open terminal, and go on using Linux commands (e.g. ip addr to see your network configuration, ping to ping other network devices, sudo bash for root user, …)
• My screen resolution is not at its maximum.
  I had this problem a few times and there was no way of fixing it (xrandr in terminal didn’t work and told me that VGA1 was disconnected). Probably ChromeOS has some problems with the display drivers, but restarting the computer always helped.
• Flash/YouTube videos are lagging.
  This happens probably also due to bad/missing video drivers. I don’t think there is a solution for it except finding and installing fitting display drivers for your device and Linux on your own. Hopefully Google will fix this in the final release.

If there are any questions, please comment!

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2. Install Windows 7 on any netbook (Asus Eee PC 900)!
3. Play StarCraft multiplayer (LAN) on Windows XP/Vista

If you don’t know what Google Wave actually is, check out my post about the Google Wave Preview!

Related posts:

1. Google Wave Preview!
2. Try the new Google Search Interface
3. New Google Translator with improved quality and real-time translating

If you have used Google Translate earlier, you will have recognized that the translations were mostly awful and that bad that it was hard  to understand them at all. This new version improves the quality of translations significantly; now you can actually use it to read websites or texts in foreign languages.

It also adds a dictionary function: Just type in the word you need and it will give you different meanings. Moreover, by clicking on “detailed dictionary”, you have the possibility to see examples of how to use this word in a phrase and listen to the translations.

The real-time translation is also a quite nice feature: You can just type in a sentence, and as you type, it will try to translate it. This reminds me of the live translation called Rosy used in a promotional video for Google Wave. Rosy currently isn’t available for Google Wave users, but the new Google Translate may actually be a testing ground.

Related posts:

1. Google Chrome 5 comes with automatic page translation
2. Google Wave Preview!
3. Free Google Wave invitations for everybody!

Currently, I only have a few contacts to wave with, but it’s already enough to test the features. When somebody starts a Wave with one person like a mail, you can respond to single paragraphs, sentences or words inside that wave (like threaded comments). Other’s can be invited to that Wave and answer, too. You can embed Flash, YouTube videos, images, polls and much more directly into the wave. Moreover, to save time when directly communicating, a Wave can work like a chat, allowing you directly to see what the other person types even before the message is sent.

All in all, Wave looks very promising and I hope that more people will be invited so I can test all the features!

Related posts:

1. Free Google Wave invitations for everybody!
2. New Google Translator with improved quality and real-time translating
3. Google employees created Spreadsheet Art

Warning: Jailbreaking your iPod/iPhone will void your warranty. Downloading cracked applications is illegal and may have legal consequences. It is not my intention to motivate people to do illegal things, everything you do will be on your own risk!

Notice: This will only work with the latest generation of iPods/iPhones with Firmware 3.1.2 or higher! The blackra1n jailbreak will probably not work with the MC models (iPod  touch 3G with 8GB).

1. Jailbreak your iPod/iPhone

Before you will be able to install applications other than the ones from iTunes Store, you must jailbreak your iPod. Please consider the warning above before jailbreaking your iPod.

The easiest jailbreak for the 3.1.2 firmware is blackra1n. This tutorial will only focus on blackra1n.

Warning: blackra1n is a so-called “tethered jailbreak”, meaning that everytime you reboot your iPod (e.g. due to empty battery or after switching it completely off) you will have to run blackra1n again. Running blackra1n again won’t install or uninstall any applications but just enable the iPod to start again.

1. Download blackra1n either from the official website or from this server.
2. Make sure you have installed at least firmware version 3.1.2 in iTunes.
   
3. Close iTunes but keep the iPod connected to your computer via USB.
4. Open the downloaded blackra1n.exe file and click the “make it ra1n” button
   
5. Your iPod will go into recovery mode now and reboot. You should see this on your computer:
   
   
   And this image on your iPod:
   
6. Now wait for the iPod to reboot, shouldn’t take longer than a few seconds. Once done, launch the “blackra1n” application that appeared and install  Cydia and Rock.
   

2. Enable the installation of cracked application

1. Open Rock, the application you just installed with blackra1n.
2. Go to Manage -> Manage Sources -> Edit -> Add and enter http://cydia.hackulo.us to enable downloads from hackulo.us, then click Add Source
   
3. Go to Search, search for AppSync and install “AppSync for OS 3.1″
   
4. That’s it,  your iPod is now able to install cracked applications.
   For the case that cracked apps won’t work, try installing AppSync again with Cydia instead of Rock.

3. Download and install cracked applications

1. The biggest cracked application repository out there is Appulo.us, so you should try getting your desired application there first. The website is quite slow and sometimes offline, so be patient.
2. If Appulo.us doesn’t find the application you want or is offline, you may use downloadipa.info, apps.su or search torrents and rapidshare for “<app name> ipa” (ipa is the extension of cracked apps).
3. If the downloaded app came in a zip file (which is the case with most apps downloaded from Appulo.us), rename it to .ipa
4. Double-click your ipa files to add them to iTunes
5. Sync the iTunes applications with your iPod
6. Launch the application on your iPod!

I hope this tutorial was helpful. If you encounter any errors, please comment to tell me about it!

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1. Install Windows 7 on any netbook (Asus Eee PC 900)!
2. iMovio iKIT: Micro-Netbook as small as an iPod
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