Rocky 1,224 Posted January 15, 2006 Share Posted January 15, 2006 (edited) So IE has become so slow recently, that I finally gave Firefox a proper try out (ie. I've been using it for about a week). Now when I strat IE by mistake (force of habit) I curse myself for the wasted time. What sold it for me was the google Toolbar for Firefox, that's all I was missing from the IE swicth Like I was saying to NY earlier, I am really surprised that even on a 4Mb connection, FF is clearly rendering pages faster than IE. Granted IE is 2 years old on this machine and showing signs of wear, but there is no room for sentimentality here! Wow, with the FF Google Toolbar, as you type the search phrase, it is popping up how many search results it will show for the phrase!... Edited January 15, 2006 by Rocky Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Dannik 43 Posted January 15, 2006 Share Posted January 15, 2006 If you want really fast, check out Opera. It's free now, so no excuse not to try it. I used to use Opera exclusively, then switched to Firefox due to a few rendering problems Opera had with a few sites I used (banks, that sort of thing). Nowadays, Opera is 99% compatible with the IE-designed web. I'm just sort of hooked on FF, but still leap into Opera whenever FF annoys me (memory leak, anyone?). Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Rocky 1,224 Posted January 15, 2006 Author Share Posted January 15, 2006 If you want really fast, check out Opera. It's free now, so no excuse not to try it. ← NYR uses Opera too, so I will try it out, but to make a fair comprison I'm going to run FF for another week or two, then do a total switch to Opera and see how I get on. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Dannik 43 Posted January 15, 2006 Share Posted January 15, 2006 Don't get me wrong: Firefox rocks. The only real issue I've ever had with it is the enormous amount of RAM it consumes, if left running for extended periods. The funny thing is, after using Opera for so long, and then switching to Firefox, I had to install about half a dozen plugins to get FF to emulate Opera before it felt right. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Rocky 1,224 Posted January 15, 2006 Author Share Posted January 15, 2006 Wanna know the really funny thing. I just installed my first FF tweak, guess what it was, a speed tweak! Yeh, I've just finished ranting about how much faster FF is than IE, and what do I go and do first, edit a config file for a speed tweak. Thing is, it made a difference, pages just cannot physically load any faster than what I'm getting now. Like, WOW. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Avey 0 Posted January 15, 2006 Share Posted January 15, 2006 Welcome to how the Internet should be. I use Opera and have to agree with what Dannik says about it. Its my prefered choice. However, I also like FF; simple, secure, extensions, W3C standards. Just IE that annoys me. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Avey 0 Posted January 15, 2006 Share Posted January 15, 2006 Some useful extensions for FF that I use (mainly web development): HTML Validator Web Developer Toolbar Edit CSS and see the results on-the-fly IE Tab - Open a page in the IE engine (Useful for testing a sites compatibility with IE or visiting IE-only sites without leaving the fox) Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Rocky 1,224 Posted January 15, 2006 Author Share Posted January 15, 2006 Cool thanks Avey, I'll be checking those out! Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Dannik 43 Posted January 15, 2006 Share Posted January 15, 2006 And a few more extensions from the typical end-user side of things: Ad Block <- allows blocking of any media, from any source. FasterFox <- Speeds up browsing/load times. There are so many more great extensions too. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
ghostrider68 0 Posted January 16, 2006 Share Posted January 16, 2006 Ive used FF for a long time love it especially all the different themes you can get talking about Opera how in the world does a guy download it? I have tried dozens of times with no luck. anybody that could help? always comes back with an error message.anybody with suggestions? Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Dannik 43 Posted January 16, 2006 Share Posted January 16, 2006 Opera 8.51 download for Windows. If that doesn't work, I'll put up a simple mirror in case you are having issues with the perl on the server. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Specter 0 Posted January 16, 2006 Share Posted January 16, 2006 I like them both, but like FF so much more. Plus it has alot of nice features available that Opera doesn't. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Dannik 43 Posted January 16, 2006 Share Posted January 16, 2006 Direct download to the latest build of Opera for Win32 systems. Edit: Specter, which features are you referring to? Opera is just as extensible as FF, although not quite as simply as the Extension menu adds. If anything, I find I have to heavily modify my FF settings to get it to emulate perhaps 90% of what Opera has, out of the box. Considering Opera is a smaller install, and renders significantly faster in most cases, why should someone consider FF over Opera. Of course, I'm primarily a FF user, but for the sake of argument, I'm curious. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
element11 0 Posted January 16, 2006 Share Posted January 16, 2006 I used to use IE and nothing else, untill a friend showed me firefox. I continued to use it cause i really like the google/ebay/amazon toolbar Then I realized how much slower IE was, and I have been using it ever since. The only problem i have with firefox, is that on websites with a windows media player on the page to play a video, i cant see that video. Java and flash and quicktime are all fine though. Also, when browsing through older posts in this forum, sometimes the posts are messed and the text dosent show up. I havent tried opera though, mainly because i got nothin to complain about with FF. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
pz3 338 Posted January 16, 2006 Share Posted January 16, 2006 (edited) Firefox with Tweak Network extension.... its awsome pages load faster... who thought that could be possible most pages load in under 4 seconds.... most forum pages in 1.5 seconds Edited January 16, 2006 by Prozac360 Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Cpl Ledanek 247 Posted January 16, 2006 Share Posted January 16, 2006 I added FasterFox and now its so fast my eyes freak out I get nauseated. Wow, this forum loads in 0.59sec. ***hurls*** now I know how jet pilots feels Quote Link to post Share on other sites
pz3 338 Posted January 16, 2006 Share Posted January 16, 2006 on reloads ya, i got .484 when i pressed refresh Quote Link to post Share on other sites
CR6 0 Posted January 16, 2006 Share Posted January 16, 2006 NYR uses Opera too, so I will try it out, but to make a fair comprison I'm going to run FF for another week or two, then do a total switch to Opera and see how I get on. ← I personally always run two browsers. I pretty much use IE for Hotmail and GR.net, and the tabbed browsing in Firefox for the regular news sites I visit. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Avey 0 Posted January 16, 2006 Share Posted January 16, 2006 Edit: Specter, which features are you referring to? Opera is just as extensible as FF, although not quite as simply as the Extension menu adds. If anything, I find I have to heavily modify my FF settings to get it to emulate perhaps 90% of what Opera has, out of the box. Considering Opera is a smaller install, and renders significantly faster in most cases, why should someone consider FF over Opera. Of course, I'm primarily a FF user, but for the sake of argument, I'm curious. ← Opera has a really cool feature called mouse gestures. Closing or reloading a window is as simple as moving the mouse! Built in RSS and email clients mean that i can check the news and my mail without leaving Opera. Although I understand that FF has many of these features via extensions, its nice to have them out of the box. http://www.opera.com/features/ Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Rocky 1,224 Posted January 16, 2006 Author Share Posted January 16, 2006 Opera has a really cool feature called mouse gestures. Closing or reloading a window is as simple as moving the mouse! ← I remember a long time ago, even before Opera I think, there was a browser plug in that did exactly that for IE. I tried it but couldn't see any gain over just moving the mouse up and clicking an icon to achieve the same thing. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
NurFACE 0 Posted January 16, 2006 Share Posted January 16, 2006 The preferred browsers are clearly firefox, opera, and flock. These 3 browsers are 2 steps ahead of IE. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
CR6 0 Posted January 16, 2006 Share Posted January 16, 2006 The preferred browsers are clearly firefox, opera, and flock. These 3 browsers are 2 steps ahead of IE. ← To say the least. IE is so behind that it's not even funny. No one knows why MS wants to wait for Vista to release IE7 except either: a) it ain't broke so don't fix it; b) sit back and wait for others to innovate and later copy them (sound familiar?) It doesn't hurt they still have ~80-90% browser market share with their browser dinosaur. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
magnumkp 0 Posted January 16, 2006 Share Posted January 16, 2006 Mouse Gestures is possible with a plugin. Browser stats: 2006 IE6 IE5 Ffox Moz N7 O8 O7 January 61.3% 5.1% 24.8% 3.3% 0.4% 1.4% 0.2% so ff is making big inroads on IE. IE7 better have something far better than just tabbed browsing. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Avey 0 Posted January 16, 2006 Share Posted January 16, 2006 Mouse Gestures is possible with a plugin. Browser stats: 2006 IE6 IE5 Ffox Moz N7 O8 O7 January 61.3% 5.1% 24.8% 3.3% 0.4% 1.4% 0.2% so ff is making big inroads on IE. IE7 better have something far better than just tabbed browsing. ← It has an RSS reader! Quote Link to post Share on other sites
the.ronin 5 Posted January 16, 2006 Share Posted January 16, 2006 Thanks for the links to FF extensions ... any more links that have to do with performance (as opposed to nifty add-ons and toolbars) would be appreciated. As a (wannabe) web designer, I have IE, FF, Opera, and Netscape installed to make sure things look properly on the popular browsers. What I like about Opera is that it has a IE and NS emulator. FF extension will only open up an IE browser for you. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
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