Firefox 4 beta promises better broadband experience

Mozilla has unveiled the first beta of Firefox 4, the web browser that has become hugely popular in recent years and improved on each successive release. Such is the extent of the new features along with a refreshing redesign of the user interface that it’s jumped from the current 3.6 incarnation straight to the big 4.

Firefox 4 is expected to get an official release later this year, possibly late summer, once the web browser has been through the beta testing phase. Commenting on a revitalised PC version on the Mozilla blog, Mike Beltzner said: "We moved the tabs to the top to make it easier to focus on the web content and easier to control the tools in your web browser."

"Also, if you have Windows 7 or Windows Vista the Menu bar was replaced with a single Firefox button so you can get to the most used options with just one click. These changes will be coming soon for Mac and Linux.”

More importantly for broadband users there are numerous features that will enhance the web browsing experience. There's HD video support that allows people to watch HTML5 content on sites like YouTube using the WebM format. Crash protection will come as a built-in feature, hopefully meaning an end to the problems experienced on current examples of the surfing tool.

Firefox fans can also expect leaner and meaner performance than previous versions too, “We know that performance is important. In this version, we focused on improving responsiveness at start-up and during page loads. This is just the beginning for performance improvements in Firefox 4,” Beltzner added on the Mozilla blog.