Opera has been fucking terrible every time I've tried using it. You should just stick to Firefox 2 if your computer can't handle Firefox 3.

Terrible how? Like i said, 2 days in and not even a hint of a single problem.

Slowass performance (with the page just simply not loading at all quite often) and frequent and erratic crashes. Personally, I'm not a huge fan of the interface either and think Firefox is more user-friendly and convenient in that regard.

But, as I implied in the first place, this is based on personal experience. I'm aware that Opera has a relatively good reputation, so I'm not surprised you're much better off with it than I was.

Indeed. Well, aside from the horrible inefficiency, i can't really complain about FF. It certainly has all the functionality and modular capabilities i'd ever need, so if i ever upgrade my rig, i'll probably be checking back to see if it's any better in the performance department this time around.

I'm a little worried though, because i read somewhere that Mozilla plans to have tabs work as separate processes in 4, similar to how plugins are handled right now in 3. Looks like they don't really care about speed.

Tabbed browsing in conjunction with all their plug-in containers and extensions has likely led them to conclude that doing so is in their best interest for keeping the browser stable since it's gotten noticeably less stable since version 1. But I'd consider that decision to be the repercussions of a large-scale pitfall that started ever since they started adopting more and more high-profile features.

Yes nevermind the security flaws that comes with old browsers.

Yes, nevermind that if he's using FF2 on a computer too old to handle Firefox 3, he probably wouldn't give a fuck about some random security exploits that are unlikely to fuck him over in the long run.

Fuck security, aquire malware

Spybot S&D: free
Lavasoft Ad-Aware: free
Grisoft AVG: free
Computer literacy: takes effort to acquire, but free
Common sense: also takes effort to acquire, but again, also free

and you think running those things takes less performance than using an up to date browser?

They're necessary either way and the only app that needs to run constantly is AVG, which takes up less resources than either Norton or McAfee anyways -- or, at the very least, it most certainly didn't take up as many resources back when I first used AVG. Why nerdnitpick about such trivial shit like this anyways? Do you really need to be right about this (despite the holes in your logic) or else you'll throw a hissy fit or something?

No, they're not necessary. If you still get spyware, you're doing it wrong. In the small event of a virus, you'll have to do better than that.

i worked at an IT company until recently, everybody had pretty much the same PC configuration. most of the programmers would complain about Firefox being slow and taking up huge amounts of RAM (in the order of gigs). i never really understood why it worked so bad for them.. i mean, they're supposed to be tech savy and all that (although i've learned with the years that being a programmer doesn't absolve you from being an idiot)

i'm pretty sure i was using my browser more than any of them with lots of Flash video, java games and all that (since i wasn't really doing any work :D). i suspect the main problem is an unfortunate mix of extensions or the default tab manager being shit (which i never use).

i don't want to imply this may be so in your case, maybe your PC configuration is old or something else is wrong.

Yeah, i figure on top of FF being bulky and resource heavy (well, relatively speaking) it's just my PC being an old, grumpy bastard. Probably most at fault is my cpu, which is an antiquated Celeron D. From what i can tell, Opera isn't really using much less ram (7 tabs open, 200mb used) however, the insane difference in operating speed must be coming from somewhere.

IMO, it's simply that the devs have added so many new things to Firefox since the first version (which I remember being blistering fast when I first installed it years back), and this is mostly consisting of a lot of customizability features and an interface that tries so hard to look good to the mainstream user that it ends up demanding a lot behind the scenes. Firefox suffers memory leaks quite a bit for me and crashes as well despite its overall reliability, and so I think the ideal solution is to make multiple, less feature-heavy versions of the same build of Firefox, much like Winamp has done for years with their main app. After all, not everyone cares to have extensions installed, but those same people may still prefer to use Firefox anyways.

the memory leak thing is pretty common, it went away for me during the late FF2 days (maybe because i started using Tab Mix Plus or Tab Utilities.. they flush closed tabs properly).. but crashing is really rare to me.. like once a year

mind you i've been pushing the same profile since FF2 (with updates of course) with like 40 extensions

i'm pretty sure i was using my browser more than any of them

I doubt it

lol, how do you know? i was so bored spamming refresh all day on all my usual bookmarks. plus most of my work, when i had any, was done through the browser

This cop tried chatting me up at the magazine rack over firefox.
It didn't work.

so you're past making up success stories, now you're content with making up people caring about your opinion. it's progress I guess.

Haha, keep trying.

same here, but i switched to chrome instead, new opera looks nice aswell though

crapbringer at work uhuhuhu

HIHIHIHIIH FRAGER SELF-PWN :D:D:D:D:D:D

Watch out broseph, now his retarded clown buddy The_RALPH))) must reply too

He's probably too busy being butthurt about getting banned from ql forums by id's no.1 fanboy. C:

sure, blame browser for you incompetence to take care of you computer and OS.

Sure, assume shit and then make yourself look like a moron when i tell you that it runs at the same slow, sluggish speed with fresh windows and ff installs.

durr hurr

i truly doubt it runs much slower. if taken care properly, chrome for instance has nothing on firefox. except for maybe running javascript. usually the problem is with add-ons which tend to go shit between versions. i also prefer chrome over firefox but not because firefox is that slower. wait a bit more when ffox 4 comes out in early 2011. it should at least be better than opera.

I assure you, i take good care of both my OS and PC, otherwise it wouldn't be able to run relatively error-free in the same basic configuration for eight years. You can doubt it, but when it takes 2 minutes (clock in hand) for a browser to open up, it means it's no longer suitable for my rig.

I already told Advent that i consider FF to be superior, as far as sheer capabilities go, however i really couldn't care less about any of that as long as Opera is so much more faster. :|

two minutes start time is just perverse. i really doubt clean firefox without any imported/restored shit from previous version would load this long.

Well then it can be only due to the workings of dark and mysterious powers from beyond. @_@

your obviously just computer retarded, but that can be good, means you have potential in the pro scene :p

Your face is computer retarded.

fantastic ?

Not really, no.

should be tho, its glorious

Riveting tale, chap.

what are you talking about? mine is somewhat slow, but it still takes no more than two or three seconds to start.

taking care of your system, eh?

Yes, i am taking care of my system. Maybe you missed the part where i said my PC is eight years old?

Naturally, it would start a lot faster on a brand new system with no resident programs and all it's power dedicated to FF.

Regardless, if i am, apparently, so horrible at making my PC run up to par, how come Opera starts up mere seconds after i run it?

Magic!

same problem here, firefox just got too slow (I think there is also a browser test in german computer mag c't, which supports my experience with firefox), but instead of opera I switched to chrome,
but I heard the new Firefox 4 is said to have a much better performance ...

update, opera is also a quite nice browser ;-),
though it doesn't manage to display my own website correctly, whereas firefox, ie, safari and chrome do, so I don't know ;-),
but the ui and the speed are fine :-), I like the key in opera which automatically logs you on to a website ...

TBH, even IE (yes, the evil microsoft one) works better than Firefox for me. And back when I installed FF it owned IE easy. I'm using Chrome & IE now, but I'll give Opera a try.

retarded browser. switched to chrome

I switched to opera some weeks ago and im not going back to firefox. The reasons are pretty much what you posted.

Opera ftw

opera is only good on your cellphone, firefox is best for web dev, and css, if it works in firefox it will usally work in all other browsers, never used it as a browser except for the past few days and thats only because roboform works in ff 3.6+

host lookup aint that bad, even on cellphone with the cold, and its only slow to load up the first time

Have you tried turning Militia into a browser?

Have you tried firefox? c:

:@

I've been using Opera for over a year now and I prefer over FF any day. It used to kinda sloppy and had a lot of issues displaying some pages properly but they got rid of those problems and the current build runs really fast and smooth.

Google Chrome might be a tad bit faster though.

they have no error checking, FF and opera, they took pride in being hardline browsers where all code had to be done to the book

it might be well n good and most java dont work in most browsers anyway, ff and opera all have css issues and alot of divs dont work, for floating and hidden windows etc

i'm using opera for about 10 years now and never even thought about switching to another browser :>

^ same

Firefox always bothering me with something. Look! There's a new version! OMG! One of your extenstions has an update! WTF! Your new extension is not compatible with this new Firefox version! Now instead of going to whatever website you wanted, I'll open a window that shows new super-cool features of this new Firefox version that you surely care about! BTW, OMG this website is sooo fucking dangerous, because it has unsigned certificate, I won't let you go there! Whaat, you filled out a form, but made a mistake and clicked "back" to fix it? Hahah, trololo, enter all your data again! OK, you want to save an image? Here is a clumsy unnecessary "downloads" window that I will open, so that it will annoy you. Etc, etc, etc, etc. I only used Firefox for QL, and still even with this simple use, it got me raged like av3k in his best moments.
It just can't understand that it is a mere tool and should shut up about itself and just let me browse.
For everything except QL I use Opera and even if it has tons of its own problems, the fact that it doesn't bother me about itself and doesn't pop up every 10 seconds with yet another useless reminder/dialog/notice/etc, outweighs them all.
Chrome is also good and doesn't bother much, but it has too unpredictable tab behaviour (opens new tabs in completely random places, and after you close current tab it jumps to a completely random another tab, not following any reasonable pattern), which is also kinda annoying for me.

Agree with p4r4 on the incredibly annoying Downloads window that opens everytime you download something, no matter how tiny. Really fucking tedious when torrenting.

Gotta agree with Firefox losing its edge; even sites like Salon.com don't seem to load properly. When you click the 'read more' tab it just refreshes as opposed to opening the new content - Google Chrone doesn't seem to have this problem.

Also have issues loading video content perpetually, sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't - without apparant reason. Similar issues with crashes it's getting increasingly like IE on that front.

Still stick with Firefox purely out of habit (plus too lazy to bring the bookmarks across).

Perhaps it is the amount of add-ons I've acquired over the years but FF just doesn't seem to be what it once was.

there's an option in the options to keep the download window from popping up. find it lazy muhfukka

You can also say: if you don't like something, download gcc and write your own browser, lazy muhfukka.
Browser should not require to change any options (ideally, it should not have any customizable options at all!). It should just work. If it doesn't - it's crap, sorry. Browser is too unimportant thing for user to care what damn options it has.

troll fail

If it was troll, it was not fail at all, because some idiot actually replied to it. If it was not, then your post looks even more idiotic in the context of the discussion.
In any case, please look up the definition of "trolling" in dictionary and never again use it inappropriately please.

you got pretty low standards for succesful trolling

And you're making this discussion useless by throwing out your irrelevant thoughts of what might be good trolling or not. Read your own replies. What do they add to the discussion? If you have no point, go away pls.

well either you are just trying to wind me up with your comments = trolling, or you really mean what you are writing = retard. either way, i can't take you seriously.

Right. My point is unconventional/controversial or too deep for your understanding - then I must be retard or troll, 'cos you probably don't know any other categories of people.
You see, it's YOU who garbaged this discussion with personal suspicions and accusations that no one cares about and that don't contribute anything at all. It could have been an insightful argument about browsers instead.

keep trying

Keep embarassing yourself in front of 375 users online.
Let me summarize all your generous contribution to the mankind that you've done in this thread:

troll fail
you got pretty low standards for succesful trolling
well either you are just trying to wind me up with your comments = trolling, or you really mean what you are writing = retard. either way, i can't take you seriously.
keep trying

Sure, what I write - it's nothing, just some retarded trolling, but these golden words of yours - they actually worth something, they have meaning and sense, and they communicate a very important point. All humanity should be extremely happy that instead of doing something else, you decided to share a bit of your knowledge that will be surely engraved in stone and remembered for many generations in the future. I am glad that I had a chance to get a personal glimpse of your wisdom. Thank you, you're doing really great things.

I think it's a close call between that and saying browsers shouldn't be customizable. :|

Appoint a neutral jury to settle the issue.

I didn't say they shouldn't be customizable, I said ideally they should not be customizable. But there are no ideal things, only approximations. So while real browsers cannot be totally non-customizable, they should aim towards being as uncluttered and transparent as possible and don't distract people from doing stuff. Basically, they should take care of their own business, and stop involving user in it. Does your doctor asks you what scalpel to use? No, because he knows it himself, which one to use. The browsers should know too.

Yeah, i figured, but the way you phrased it made it look like browsers shouldn't have any options to them, just cause. I think that's why Paras1te thought you're trolling.

well if you are serious, let me be serious then and comment on your comments.

You can also say: if you don't like something, download gcc and write your own browser, lazy muhfukka.
Browser should not require to change any options (ideally, it should not have any customizable options at all!). It should just work. If it doesn't - it's crap, sorry. Browser is too unimportant thing for user to care what damn options it has.

here are some questions for you. should they make 200+ different versions of firefox with different default settings where none of them are changeable? what if you don't know how you like different settings before you use them? should you download and install every different version and try them separately? and if there is no options what about the users that want the window to pop up or not to pop up, depending on what settings the program makers have chosen for you? maybe you are old enough to have lived in communist russia and prefer this lack of choices because you have gotten used to it.

settings are often called PREFERENCES because people prefer different settings.

the download window popup on/off option is even on the first page of the settings so its really easy and effortless to change it.

and if you realize that the reality differs from the ideal and the ideal can never be achieved then why even bring this up? and i don't even agree that it is ideal. ideal to not have a choice? how is that ideal? it's not ideal for me at least.

Does your doctor asks you what scalpel to use? No, because he knows it himself, which one to use. The browsers should know too.

do you need another person to surf the internet for you? i don't so comparing the browser with a doctor is inaccurate. doctors go to school for training to make a judgement in your behalf. do you need school to use firefox? i didn't. and i wouldn't pay another person to surf the internet for me.

so the equivalent for firefox would be the scalpel. scalpel is a tool as firefox is a tool to surf the web. if i needed a scalpel and one would cost the same as a set of different scalpels, i would buy the set. same with firefox. i would choose the one with more options.

what will be engraved in stone?

Whatever

Sorry but if Firefox takes 2 minutes to start-up you're doing it wrong.

Using the most recent nightly build with a new profile, FF takes less than a second to start-up and actually beats Opera (although it loses to Chrome by a small margin). And this is using a non-SSD system that can barely hold a stable 125fps on QL.

If you want to give FF another try I would recommend you download the newest beta ( http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/beta/ ) and start it with a new profile ( http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Managing%20profiles ).

Well, the two minutes was the worst, and it happened from time to time. That's right after boot. If i close it and run it again (or run it after the system gets it's socks on) it still takes around 30 seconds. Opera, even straight after boot, while NOD does it's start-up scan, takes, at most, 5 seconds.

Keep in mind rig is really fucking old. But i do assure you, it's well conserved and optimized to run efficiently (i'm even able to play semi-recent games like Dragon Age or Mass Effect in mid-quality settings without much trouble).

c h r o m e

Opera was good ages ago, had all the things FF is famous for or got from extentions(tabs, mouse gestures etc) but it got bloated and FF became my main browser but that went the same way so im using chrome, opera just had a new release maybe they fixed stuff i had issues with 3/4 versions ago but im happy with chrome for now

opera became a lot better after version 10

ff for ql.
everything else i.e. 64bit \o/

Does flash finally work on 64bit? I should check. It's been a while since I last cheked.

It does with this! :)

To all the opera users with shit configurations: have you found a way to make opera open 1000+ comments esr threads smoothly? That's one of the few issues I have with it.

instead of chrome rather try swr-iron, a chrome build without privacy spying issues

nice tip, tnx

Chrome for me. miss firefox's glory days tho

Yeah i also switched to opera about year ago and its awesome. Tried chrome and it works very fast but loads pages slower than opera. FF is a shit now, but we will see what version 4 will bring us.

I use Opera because it usually has all the good features before any other browser. Mozilla is constantly copying Opera's features and by the time they have successfully copied them, Opera already has a new version with more good stuff.

Using opera since 6, never felt any need to use other browser, simple, fast, has adblock, great skins.

FF has some serious cache issues, if you dont have proxomitron then your crapped. if you want to always refresh your page..

proxomitron lets your change the headers

"Cache-Control: no-store, no-cache, must-revalidate"
"Pragma: no-cache"

etc etc

Start up speeds for me (on 3 different PCs with XP 32, 7 32 & 7 64 and no SSD) are as follow :

Opera and Chrome basically take 1-2 second at most while Firefox takes quite a few (about 10 on the slowest pc).

I'm only talking about the first launch here though (right after your pc booted), since after you've run it once, FF is about as fast as the other 2.

Opera and Chrome are both far better than FF for absolutely EVERYTHING imo, and QL works great in both (you only need to install the plugin using FF or by using the "identify as FF" feature in Opera)
I like Opera's UI better though, and since you can make it a portable app now (portable with the bookmarks and settings, yes!) and turn off the cache it's the winner for me.

reinstalled windows, installed Opera, am writing it from opera.

Now crapbringer is the master, Happy New Year Broseidon :@/

Happy new year, broheim \@:

Powering down from 48 hour drinking marathon, i'm currently at the state where i'm dead tired but can't sleep and still somewhat half drunk, fixing it by sipping a beer and watching arsenal c: i just hope i won't pass out somewhere

o shiiiiii-

THE PREMIERSHIP DID NOT CHECK FOR 2 WEEKS HOLIDAY + ALCOHOL ABUSE DOES NOT MIX XDPLZ

FF got shit so i changed to chrome

DO THE SAME

I did the same as u, but changed to chrome.

To permanently turn off plugin-container.exe and make plugins run through the browser again, go to about:config, filter dom.ipc and turn all values beginning with dom.ipc.plugins.enabled to false. Firefox runs as smooth as any other browser for me after that.

Shit works great man thanx!

>opera

enjoy your memory leaks and vulnerabilities.

Coz FF doesn't have those, no sir.

Changed to Chrome resently due to FF hanging alot (this was after a fresh win7 install).

Only problem I have now is QL crashing every other time I connect to a server.

[edit] I would gladely change back to FF if it sorted it's problems out.

Chrome > Opera/IE > FF

Kinda wierd if you go back only two years :)

I noticed a lot of people are actually using Chrome. :o

So, what are it's advantages over Opera/FF?

if someone will tell me how to remove ads from youtube on opera i will throw firefox out of my window(s) [hehe get joke??]

sorry guys, but you're doing it wrong

like i said earlier i had basically the same profile since FF 2.0 on several computers both at home and at work. hardly any crashes and no memory leaks.

i have no idea why you have such a bad feedback, maybe it's a mix of factors. my single most solid tip would be get TabMix Plus or Tab Utilities to manage the tabs and flush the memory correctly. this should prevent crashes and memory leaks, but it certainly can't help if your OS environment is tragically fucked (especially if you're one of those guys who have to reinstall the OS every 2 weeks)

FF feels a bit slower than Chrome or Opera, but the extension/addon library is unparalleled so far. also migrating the same profile on all platforms is extremely useful.

Hey; I'll look into those later but what do those plugins do? Like the "flush memory" stuff, is it something it does automatically better after installing or would I have to be messing around with something?

(Basically optimization improvements and stuff is awesome & welcome but I'm not looking for something that changes how I (have to) interact with FF, not sure if I'm explaining this well lol)

you don't have to mess around with the options, just go with default

the options are mainly for Tab appearance, controls & behavior (like always open links from bookmarks/address bar/search field in new tab, close tabs by double click, prevent blank tabs, tab focus option etc. etc.) - a useful extension nonetheless, if you have a minor annoyance on how tabbing works in Firefox chances are you can fix it with this addon.

switched to Firefox 4 beta 11 with the same profile as before
i had some trouble with a few incompatible extensions which i solved with: http://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon...-reporter/ by overriding compatibility

wow.. the speed boost is big, both in rendering and startup time

Switched to Chrome a couple of weeks ago, i've received a huge speed increase and won't be going back.

Using Chrome now aside Firefox as well, gonna try Firefox 4 though when it's out of beta to see to which I'm sticking.