Hasta La Gadget!

Google has admitted that its Chrome browser is the cause of MacBook stability problems, with an incompatibility between the app and the integrated Intel graphics leading to crashes. “Work is proceeding to find and fix the root cause” a Google spokesperson told Gizmodo, though the company does splash a little of the blame onto Apple itself and the way OS X Lion is handling kernel issues.

“Radar bug number 11762608 has been filed with Apple regarding the kernel panics,” the Google spokesperson continued, “since it should not be possible for an application to trigger such behavior.” Apple is yet to comment on the issue.

Google is taking a two-pronged approach to dealing with the glitch. Chrome users should have already received a patch on Thursday afternoon, that temporarily shuts off some of the browser’s use of GPU acceleration on machines with the Intel HD 4000 graphics.

Meanwhile, work is underway to come up with a more lasting fix with full GPU acceleration functionality still in place. There’s no timescale for its release, however.

Yesterday, at its second Google IO keynote, Google confirmed that Chrome now has 310m users worldwide, making it the most popular browser around according to all the metrics the search giant said it could find.

Google Statement:

“We have identified a leak of graphics resources in the Chrome browser related to the drawing of plugins on Mac OS X. Work is proceeding to find and fix the root cause of the leak.

The resource leak is causing a kernel panic on Mac hardware containing the Intel HD 4000 graphics chip (e.g. the new Macbook Airs). Radar bug number 11762608 has been filed with Apple regarding the kernel panics, since it should not be possible for an application to trigger such behavior.

While the root cause of the leak is being fixed, we are temporarily disabling some of Chrome’s GPU acceleration features on the affected hardware via an auto-updated release that went out this afternoon (Thursday June 28). We anticipate further fixes in the coming days which will re-enable many or all of these features on this hardware.”

Google admits MacBook Chrome crash bug is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

We’re adding another Google Chrome-related story before you go to bed tonight. But this one’s unfortunately negative. If your MacBook has been crashing lately, Gizmodo thinks that Google’s Chrome browser is to blame. Apparently the publication has been pointing out the freezing and crashing issues on MacBook Air models used by their staff. When they switched to Apple’s very own Safari browser, strangely, the issues were nowhere to be found. (more…)

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Google Chrome for iOS is now the most downloaded free app in the App Store, Google introduces Chrome browser for the iPhone and iPad,

In a statement issued directly to Gizmodo this evening, a spokesperson for Google has confirmed that Chrome is indeed to blame for our frozen and crashing new MacBook Airs. More »

Today’s Google I/O keynote was, as expected, all about the Chrome. Easily one of the biggest among the company’s laundry list of announcements surrounding the browser-turned-operating-system has to be its arrival on iOS, bringing the functionality that an ever-growing number of users have come to know and love to the iPhone and iPad. The list includes, perhaps most notably, its cross-device syncing, ensuring that you can pick up where you left off on the desktop version of the program, taking your pages and tabs with you on the go. So, is Google’s fancy mobile browser enough to get us off mobile Safari altogether? Check out some impressions of the iPhone version of the app after the break.

Continue reading Google Chrome for iPhone hands-on

Google Chrome for iPhone hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 28 Jun 2012 17:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Chrome for iOS, announced at Google IO just a few hours ago, has already begun to hit the App Store, though there’s a sting if you’re expecting the full Google browser experience. The new browser is the latest iteration of Chrome, bringing features like tab sync to iPhone and iPad; however, it’s not built on the speedy underlying engine of Chrome on other platforms, such as Android.

In fact, it’s more like a reskin of what Apple is already offering in iOS, dressing up the existing WebKit engine with a shiny new Chrome UI. One of Apple’s limits for iOS apps is that they’re unable to change those underlying components:

“It’s not the Chrome rendering or JavaScript engines — the App Store rules forbid that. It’s the iOS system version of WebKit wrapped in Google’s own browser UI. The pressure for Apple to allow users to specify a third-party app as their default browser is going to increase significantly after this. (As I type this, it’s not yet in the App Store.)” John Gruber

There’s also no support for setting anything other than Mobile Safari on the iPhone or iPad as the default browser. That means every time you click a link in an email or app, Safari will leap up to load it rather than Chrome for iOS.

It’s unclear whether the inevitable increase of pressure on Apple to change its policies will have any impact in the long run. The company has proved reluctant to allow other browsers to occupy the space that Safari currently does, rightly assuming that controlling the web experience is an important aspect of the “walled garden” ecosystem.

You can download Chrome for iOS here [iTunes link].

Chrome for iOS hits US App Store is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.