Mozilla Firefox

Tao81

spud17 wrote: »

Tao81

The other thing to check is, I'm guessing here, and no offence intended, the PC is a bit old and could have several unnecessary and forgotten about programs running in the background using valuable resources.

So, a spring clean of no longer needed programs could speed up things.

Definitely no offence taken spud17:rotfl:(a new computer is on the cards, I intend to buy a high spec laptop but simply can't decide which is best out of those I like at the moment, Toshiba or HP? But that's a whole different thread?!!)
I think the 128 RAM is probably majorly at fault as I notice Mozilla recommend Min. 256 RAM!
It takes a wee while to load, which doesn't bug me too much, but then it's slower than IE going from page to page.
I've had so many problems with IE I'm desperate not to 'chicken out' and take a backwards step simply due to familiarity with IE and a tad more speed! Dislike MS! Always have!! Really grateful for having been directed towards such a great alternative. Don't know a great deal about it as yet, but feels much nicer to use already!

Have done a clear out using ccleaner do you think that's enough? or should I trawl through add/remove programs?
Thanks for taking the time to reply - really appreciate it:D TTFN

madnlooney

always have used it great browser. not had problems with it, the add ons are great and its very secure

oldagetraveller

I currently use IE7 and Outlook Express on a XP Home (SP2) version PC. If I download Firefox and Thunderbird will I have the option, during installation, to set them as default, then if necessary keep and use IE and Outlook Express as alternatives? Are "favourites" and e-mail address book transferred automatically or is there an option during installation?
Thanks in advance.

sra

oldagetraveller wrote: »

I currently use IE7 and Outlook Express on a XP Home (SP2) version PC. If I download Firefox and Thunderbird will I have the option, during installation, to set them as default, then if necessary keep and use IE and Outlook Express as alternatives? Are "favourites" and e-mail address book transferred automatically or is there an option during installation?
Thanks in advance.

I can't remember during installation what options you have to set defaults. I haven't been asked the last few times I've installed Firefox what I want as default but that's probably because I've had Firefox previously on this system.

It's very easy to decide on defaults later though.

To make Firefox default browser:-
From the Firefox Tools menu, select Options.
Under the Main tab there is a section - Always check to see if Firefos is the default browser on startup - Check Now

To make IE default:-
From the IE Tools menu, select Internet Options
under the Programs tab there is a section:-
Default web browser
Internet Explorer is/ is not currently the default web browser - Make default.

Just above that in the IE Programs tab is the section where you can choose your E-mail program - Thunderbird will be an option there if you've installed it.

MercilessKiller

Just a note:

For low spec machines, firefox is NOT a good idea.

Why? Currently it has serious memory leak problems. It takes up a LOT of cpu usage, and while open your memory pagefile will keep increasing and increasing rapidly...

These are known bugs which are being fixed in the new version, Firefox 3.0 (codename Minefield). I'm currently using Minefield and it uses similar memory to IE which is great news.

Firefox will slow down very slow spec machines (which is kind of obvious too sometimes). so just watch out

moaninmick

What's the difference between Frefox and Opera?

Thanks

MercilessKiller

http://nedwolf.com/Firefox-Opera-Comparison.htm

Firefox is open source thus also making it more secure. A good reason.

Conor_3

MercilessKiller wrote: »

Just a note:

For low spec machines, firefox is NOT a good idea.

Why? Currently it has serious memory leak problems.

You can go into about:config and set a maximum memory for it to use. I've happily run Firefox on a P100 with 32MB RAM running Win98Se.

Firefox DOES NOT have a memory leak. It' merely stores viewed pages in RAM to speed up browsing.

All the following tweaks can be achieved by typing in about:config in the Firefox address bar and entering (part of) the bold parameter into the filter field…


Browser.cache.memory.capacity: Controls the maximum amount of memory to use for caching decoded images and chrome (application user interface elements). This determines if and how much system ram Firefox will use to cache itself. The element does not exist and has to be created. The default value is set to automatic which means that Firefox uses a certain amount of RAM by default. (values for Firefox 2.x)

32 MB of RAM -> 2 MB
64 MB of RAM -> 4 MB
128 MB of RAM -> 6 MB
256 MB of RAM -> 10 MB
512 MB of RAM -> 14 MB
1024 MB of RAM -> 18 MB
2048 MB of RAM -> 24 MB
4096+ MB of RAM > 32+MB

You can tell Firefox to use another value by creating the element in about:config and assigning a different value (in KB) to it. It is also possible to turn this feature of by assigning the value 0 to it. This can greatly decrease the performance of Firefox and is not advised at all. To reduce memory consumption reduce the amount of RAM that is assigned to Firefox.


Browser.sessionhistory.max_entries: Firefox 2.x saves the last 50 visited websites of a single session in memory which means that it could add up quickly if you visit lots of content filled websites. Reduce the amount of websites that are stored this way to reduce the memory consumption. It does not make a huge difference for most surfing habits to reduce the figure to 5 or 10.


Browser.sessionhistory.max_total_viewers: Automatically determine the maximum amount of pages to store in memory based on the total amount of RAM. If you have 64 MB or Ram 1 page is stored in memory, 2 for 128 MB, 3 for 256 MB, 5 for 512 and 8 for everything higher than that figure. If you never navigate using the Back and Forward buttons in Firefox, you can set this value to 0 to disable the feature. Otherwise, reduce the amount of pages stored in memory to make this feature use less memory.


Config.trim_on_minimize: This preference determines whether to allow Windows to reclaim memory from a minimized Mozilla application. Set to True if you want to free up memory when minimizing Firefox. The value does not exist by default, simply create it and set it to true for better memory management.

MercilessKiller

Conor wrote: »

Firefox DOES NOT have a memory leak. It' merely stores viewed pages in RAM to speed up browsing.

Yes your advice resolves the situation but for an average user who won't want to be messing around with config settings, its easier to use IE7

And Firefox does have a memory leak in its caching. Whether its a "feature" or not, it's still a memory leak

So just in case you missed that, Firefox DOES have a memory leak. But as you say its used in cached browsing which can be changed.... Just in case you were confused

Conor_3

MercilessKiller wrote: »

http://nedwolf.com/Firefox-Opera-Comparison.htm

Firefox is open source thus also making it more secure.

Open Source doesn't mean it's more secure. In fact, it means it's easier for people to examine the code and find vulnerabilities. Also because it's open source, there's no financial reason to fix stuff. There's vulnerabilities in Firefox that have been there since version 1 but nobody can be bothered to fix them.



http://www.bit-tech.net/bits/2006/08/22/internet_explorer_7_v_firefox_/4