The slowness eventually drove me to chrome. And so far, not looking back...
I've been an avid Safari user for years, but switched back to Firefox at 3.6b5. The performance improvements they've made are incredible, and with the GrApple theme applied, it looks just like Safari. Plus, I get back some sorely-missed keyboard shortcuts, Firebug's awesome profiling support, and the "snappiness" that I'm used to in Safari.
But until you've actually tried the latest release (genuinely - not 10 minutes working from a disk image), please consider refraining from commenting. An aspect of the software you used to hate might have been improved.
No Idea what's up with the "hate" terminology. The only browser that can even invoke strong feelings in me would be IE. My comment was simply my spontaneous reaction to the headline, no reason to get all hot & bothered.
You can also read the blog of the lead engineer working on startup time improvement: http://autonome.wordpress.com/
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Chrome/thread?tid=0551...