I downloaded the portable version of Firefox 3 the other day to test out the new browser.  It seems to work fine and offers what seems to be, a speed boost over Firefox 2 when it comes to loading websites.  I personally didn’t measure this, but it does feel faster.

The first thing I notices was how many of the add-ons I use that are incompatible.  A few notable plug-ins as of this posting are:

1. All-in-One Sidebar
2. Auto Copy
3. Exch (a currency coverter)
4. Fingerfox
5. Google Browser Sync (this is a biggie)
6. Google Pagerank Status
7. Google Send to Phone
8. Google Web Accelerator
9. Minimize to Tray
10. Tab Effect
11. Tab Preview
12. Tabbrowser Preferences

Some of these plug-ins are totally unnecessary (tab effect), while others have become integral in my decision not to use Internet Explorer.  The other thing I was surprised about is the Noia 2.0 Extreme Theme is currently not compatible with Firefox 3.  I am sure some, if not all of these add-ons will be updated in the near future, but others such as the Google Browser Sync will not (according to Google).  A suggestion is to use Mozilla Weave, but at the time of writing this the site is down and I can not test it to post my opinion.

My general opinion of Firefox 3 is that its a bit of an improvement over V2, but I people should give the developers a bit more time to get their plugins running before you make the switch permanently.  Hopefully this happens in weeks rather than months.