Google's new browser, Chrome, is now available for download on Windows XP/Vista only.

First impressions are that it's a very fast install, and imported all of my Firefox bookmarks with no issues. Loads much quicker than any of my other browsers, and looks quite nice. The address bar is a bit thick for my liking, but that's just me being picky. None of the usual "File", "Edit" menus, etc as the entire interface is pretty simplistic. Exactly what we've come to expect from Google products. It's got the usual Google feel about it, a nice clean interface, no status bar showing useless information, etc. When the status bar does show, you can move your mouse towards it, and it'll drop below the window so it's not in the way of the page. A nice touch.

Some things are noticeably missing though, such as a "home" button, which is a feature common to most browsers. It is available, but not enabled by default. It's an option on the "Basics" part of the options page. I guess it depends on how much you use it whether that will be an annoyance or a blessing.

Sites are loading pretty fast, as I would expect from something based on WebKit. One feature I have noticed, is that when you're on a page with a download link, it gives you a list of the available downloads at the bottom of the page. I've already found this useful.

They've taken a page from IE8, and fade out the rest of the URL that's not the main domain. I'm not really sure why this is becoming common, and I don't really see the point. Regarding the address bar though, it's also a search bar. You can either enter a URL, or a search term and it will search Google. This combines the two bars you get in Firefox quite nicely. Of course, in FF you can choose the dropdown for various sites (for example I have a Wikipedia one), and I haven't found a way to do that easily in Chrome yet.

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