Opera enables hardware acceleration, matches IE9, beats Firefox and Chrome (video)

After the most pregnant of pauses -- like hot and lazy Spain, things moves slowly in the oil-rich barrens of Norway -- Opera has finally released a build of its 11.50 browser with hardware acceleration and WebGL support.

Like Chrome, Opera has opted to use OpenGL for hardware acceleration -- at least for now: DirectX, and presumably Direct2D, support is coming at a later date. The OpenGL backend means that Opera will be capable of hardware accelerating almost every platform -- including OS X, smartphones and Web-enabled TVs -- unlike IE9, which can only be used with Windows 7 and Vista.

WebGL support is also a nice touch, but with so few examples of it being used on the Web, it's hard to get excited about it. Google Body works just fine, however -- but the awesome Flight of the Navigator WebGL demo, which will blow you away in Firefox 4 and Chrome, doesn't seem to work in Opera.

Anyway, now it's time for the bit you've been waiting for: a side-by-side comparison of Opera, Internet Explorer, Firefox and Chrome. You will probably be surprised by the results. Watch the video after the break.

Continue reading Opera enables hardware acceleration, matches IE9, beats Firefox and Chrome (video)

Opera enables hardware acceleration, matches IE9, beats Firefox and Chrome (video) originally appeared on Download Squad on Tue, 01 Mar 2011 11:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments

Source: http://downloadsquad.switched.com/2011/03/01/opera-enables-hardware-acceleration-matches-ie9-beats-firefox/

At&T Autodesk Automatic Data Processing Avnet