Ah, interesting -- is this documented anywhere? I did see mentions of Chrome downgrading background tabs, but did not find any specific numbers.
And updated the MDC docs on it: https://developer.mozilla.org/en/DOM/window.setTimeout#Minim...
I'll get it added to www.chromestatus.com now.
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=633421
I definitely experienced the same in Chromium.
Once upon a time, I also experienced similar timing weirdness on inactive tabs with .gif animations for some version of Chromium (tab out, wait a few seconds, tab back and suddenly the animation is superfast for a few seconds) but I can't reproduce it with modern versions.
Update: Here's the Chromium one: http://codereview.chromium.org/6577021