Google Chrome in Windows XP - Am I missing something, or is it crap?

I know that Google Chrome is supposed to be so gosh, darned fast, but on the Dell Optiplex GX520s with Windows XP, 3 GHz P4 processors and 512 MB of RAM (yes, we're stuck in 2005, thank you for asking), the Chrome browser starts off the session with promise but soon bogs down. Going from one window to another not visited in the past few minutes means slow, painful redrawing of said window.

So any speed or stability advantages over Firefox 3.5.x are ... just not there.

That means if I want to get work done in the browser (and that's pretty much what I do ...), I need to use Firefox.

IE - too slow, but I do use it for development because my readers use it. Opera - it just can't handle my Web-based apps (it's the apps' fault, but I can't change that equation) though it remains super fast. Chrome - those screen redraws are killing me. Firefox - it may be a CPU hog, but I can use it all day and it stays mighty consistent, plus I have my beloved Firebug and Web Developer add-ons.

I'd like to love Chrome, but in my situation, I can't. Firefox wins.