Apple's Safari 4 Beta released for download

by TDH | February 24, 2009 at 10:32 am

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Apple has made a Beta version of their new Safari 4 browser available for download.

The new release offers what Apple claims to be "a new way to see the web". Safari 4 boasts an entirely revamped user interface as well as a few new interesting features.

Top Sites, which shows a 3D overview of the user's most visited sites; Cover Flow, which helps browse bookmarks and history iTunes-style; a new history search feature that can find content inside visited pages; a "smart address field" that looks straight out of Firefox 3; and new phishing and malware protection mechanisms.

Apple also claims that their new JavaScript engine (Nitro) is 4.2 times faster than previous Safari versions, making it the "fastest" of any available browser

Using the new Nitro Engine, for example, Safari executes JavaScript up to 30 times faster than Internet Explorer 7 and more than 3 times faster than Firefox 3 based on performance in leading industry benchmark tests: iBench and SunSpider.