Chrome 28 Gets Rich Notifications And New Blink Rendering Engine

Google Chrome 28 was released today with Rich Notifications, faster page load speeds and many stability, security and bug fixes.

This latest Stable Channel version (28.0.1500.71) is available for Windows, Macintosh and Chrome Frame platforms.

What’s New in Chrome 28? The official changelog lists 18 security fixes in detail – they include 2 rated critical and 5 rated High. Total rewards of $34,901 were paid to the finders.

Removed Ability To Change White Menu Style – last year Chrome’s context (right click) menu and Bookmarks appearance changed. It used to display a grey background but switched to a white background with much larger gaps between the text. As I wrote at the time, the new user interface with its huge spacing may help touchscreen users (perhaps 1% of all desktop Chrome users) at the expense of usability for the other 99%…

Chrome 28 has removed the special “disable-new-menu-style” switch which (appended to Chrome’s program shortcut) previously disabled these new larger styles.

However, there is now another switch which can fix the problem – if you want to revert back to the larger menu/bookmarks style again, see our updated article on how to disable Chrome’s big menu spacing.

Rich Notifications – Chrome apps and extensions can now show rich notifications with a revamped user interface. You can read more about how this feature works (and how to disable elements of it) on Google’s blogpost.

chrome28

New Web Page Rendering Engine (Blink) – Chrome used to use the WebKit rendering engine to display webpages but Chrome 28 and later use a new forked version called Blink – designed to provide faster page loads. According to a Verge report, Google yanked more than 8 million lines of programming from Blink in about a month which gives an indication of just how streamlined Blink is by comparison – having less accumulated detritus should also help make it more stable and secure.

Flash Player – The newest version of Adobe’s Flash Player plugin (11.8) was released yesterday but Chrome 28 still has the older 11.7 version – Google promise to update users to Flash Player 11.8 via Chrome’s component updater in the near future but it is surprising that it was not included in the release.

HTML5 Score – The HTML5 test score remains the same with a total of 463 which keeps Chrome in second place, behind the longstanding champion Maxthon. For comparison, Firefox 22 scores 410 and IE10 (for W7 and W8 only) scores 320.

IE9 for Vista drops to a lowly 138 whilst IE8 for XP scores just 42 – neither are well suited to modern HTML5 websites. Vista and XP users should switch to a more capable modern browser such as Chrome or Firefox.

Upgrading To Chrome 28 – Existing Chrome users can get the latest version by clicking the ‘hotdog’ (3 lines ‘Menu’) icon then ‘About Google Chrome’ to check for updates – the version 28 update will be downloaded and installed automatically if you don’t already have it.

New users can download and install Chrome 28 directly here. Alternatively, a full standalone offline installer is available here – this may be useful if you want to save the Chrome installation file e.g. to put on a flash drive and install on multiple computers without having to re-download it each time.

Conclusion

The main improvement in Chrome 28 is the Rich Notifications feature – it’s not used by many apps or extensions yet but does have potential to further increase Chrome’s adoption as a one stop shop for apps, drawing from the experience of Chrome OS.

However, the removal of a way to bypass the new(ish) menu style is a step backward – it takes choice away from the majority of users who are not using touchscreens to browse the net.

The rest of Chrome 28 changes are mainly technical stability and security improvements but welcome nonetheless.

6 thoughts on “Chrome 28 Gets Rich Notifications And New Blink Rendering Engine”

  1. Because I’m using IE8 and Google Chrome over top cause I’m using Windows XP Pro(OS) and cannot get updates..I think I can run IE9 on google chrome?…If I can I should get updates?…My main question is will IE9 run with Google Chrome without any errors?…Will it act as it did when I ran IE8 and Google Chrome?…Should I uninstall IE8 before downloading IE9…Do I need to run IE8 or IE9 or can I just run Google Chrome by itself and If I can which is the best Google Chrome to run?…Also should I uninstall IE8 and IE9?…I hope you can understand what I’m emailing you…I’ve got a lot of BS in this email…SORRY… I’ll try and make it easy-er…I want to uninstall IE8 & IE9 and just run the best version of Google Chrome…Since Google Chrome Browser is in Google’s operating system, do I need a lot of the stuff thats in IE8 or IE9…Please try and understand what I’m trying to do…I’m disabled and I’m home most all the time…Any help will be appreciated a lot…If you have a better way, I’m all ears!…I know I need a new OS, which I’m going to get as soon as I get some cash…Disability does not pay crap…Please respond…

    • @Bruce – you can’t install IE9 or later on XP (it is not compatible) so you’re stuck with IE8. However you can use Google Chrome which is up to date – the equivalent to IE11 in performance and security.

      Therefore you should always use Chrome for safer web browsing – it updates itself in the background every few weeks too. You should leave IE8 installed – just don’t use it anymore. For best security of course you should try to update to a W7 or W8 PC if possible.

      Ps I deleted your email address and phone number – never post them in a public forum on the internet or you may be inundated with spam or crank calls…

      • Hi , Thanks for your comment and help back in August…Seems like you know your computer “stuff”…I know my hardware fairly well “2 years NEC school, back in the 80’s, but very poor on software”…I’ve been using Windows XP Pro for around 10 years, since I’m old school, I’m realy hating to change my OS…I guess it’s time to do it…My question is Which OS do I buy?…I’ve been thinking of Windows 7 because it is suppose to be similar to XP Pro?…Windows 7 will probaly be out-dated by the time I learn it…Or should I get Windows 8 and the update to 8.1?…Should I wait for Windows 10 to come out?…Very confused…I think my system can run any of the OS…I just switched to an SSD hard drive, one of my best updates I’ve done…Have a WD 1TB HHD for storage…Any help or advice would be very helpful…Thanks…

      • SSD is great but not so much on XP (no TRIM support etc) and XP is very insecure now. W7 is supported until 2020 but W8 is a bit quicker/more secure so personally I’d go for a clean install of W8.1 (64 bit if your pc isn’t ancient).

        Microsoft have said W10 will be a free upgrade if you have W8 or W7

        To make W8.1 more like XP/W7 you could add the free Classic Shell – straight to desktop, ‘proper’ Start button/menu, no hot corners :-)

        Remember you’ll need 2GB RAM minimum, 4GB is better.

  2. Looks like I am becoming a fan. You sent me an update on your article how many websites there might be in the world and I got the bright idea of looking at some other parts of your site. I landed on this page and did a good read AND ALSO came away with what is Maxthon? Hello? I had never heard of them before this.

    I have avoided Google Chrome cause they track their clients and I figure they already know too much about what I do or do not do and they don’t need to know anymore. A bit “hillbilly” I guess but that is how I feel. Then, which is totally illogical I download Maxthon. Whoo. Whoo. I am impressed. I had everything set up and ready to go in about 5 minutes or less. No kidding. The only thing I think needs improvement from what I have seen so far is how they render web pages of private sites. Mine suck in Maxthon. I can change the font to suit myself but what are other viewers going to do. Well nothing actually. They will just look at my stuff and think it sucks. I am planning on living with that.

    I deleted Firefox from my computer because they were so invasive and kept hanging wanting permissions for even my breathing it seemed.

    I have been trying to stick with Opera but their last update is irritating. They have a google search built right into the browser window if you hit the open menu configuration. They already have a Google search box to the right of the browser window – just too much Google for me.

    Thanks TechLogOn

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