Firefox 4 - Whats it like - should I upgrade now? Updated: Firefox 5.0 Already?

RussJK

mlmleadsmentor wrote: »

I upgraded to FF 4 a couple of weeks ago and it was terrible. Lots of crashing and freezing. Like some others I thought it was something to do with my computer until I went to the Mozilla forum and found lots of people there with the same problems.

In the end I uninstalled FF 4 and went back to FF 3.6. Aahh! What a sweet relief

I waited awhile, and joined the bandwagon at 4.0.1 - glad I did. Early adopters always do the bug finding for developers these days...

Try it yourself with the portable version, it might be better for you now:
http://portableapps.com/apps/internet/firefox_portable

Can copy your profile into the portable version. I've been able to configure it to my liking with all things (except for the switch-to-tab feature that they arrogantly introduced, without offering a way to disable it.)

Antispam

Firefox 4.01 works fine for me on win7 64

free4440273

mlmleadsmentor wrote: »

I upgraded to FF 4 a couple of weeks ago and it was terrible. Lots of crashing and freezing. Like some others I thought it was something to do with my computer until I went to the Mozilla forum and found lots of people there with the same problems.

In the end I uninstalled FF 4 and went back to FF 3.6. Aahh! What a sweet relief

and welcome to the mse :wave:

spg_SCOTT

RussJK wrote: »

Try it yourself with the portable version, it might be better for you now:
http://portableapps.com/apps/internet/firefox_portable

That is the only one I use, running from the hard drive instead of installing completely.:)
(as well as others)

...(except for the switch-to-tab feature that they arrogantly introduced, without offering a way to disable it.)

Hmm...I hadn't actually even realised the problems that this could cause. Googling about seems someone made an addon to get rid of it.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/switch-to-tab-no-more/

RussJK

spg_SCOTT wrote: »

That is the only one I use, running from the hard drive instead of installing completely.:)
(as well as others)

Hmm...I hadn't actually even realised the problems that this could cause. Googling about seems someone made an addon to get rid of it.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/switch-to-tab-no-more/

Perfect! No errors using it. Memory usage is higher in FF4 than 3.6 but then again I've plenty of it, hard to get a baseline since it changes. I didn't find this as I'd only searched for proper releases.

Not a bad idea using portable apps where possible, I'd once considered going that way. Did you need to do anything in particular to set the portable version as your default browser? What other programs do you find convenient running this way?

spg_SCOTT

RussJK wrote: »

Perfect! No errors using it. Memory usage is higher in FF4 than 3.6 but then again I've plenty of it, hard to get a baseline since it changes. I didn't find this as I'd only searched for proper releases.

Haha, I googled "Firefox 4 disable switch to tab". There are a few mozilla forum topics :rotfl:

Not a bad idea using portable apps where possible, I'd once considered going that way. Did you need to do anything in particular to set the portable version as your default browser? What other programs do you find convenient running this way?

I don't have it set as the default browser, because if you do it messes things up (starts the wrong one - not portable) But I just have a shortcut to the portable launcher and since it is always open I just copy and paste.

I use quite a few...and with them it is a little easier...just use the open with option and point it to the portable launcher.

The main ones I use in portable form on the hard drive are:

7-Zip
Foxit
Notepad++
Thunderbird
VLC

I don't use the open with trick with 7-Zip but have a shortcut to the portable launcher in the shell:sendto folder so I can send files to it.
(I prefer to extract zip files with explorer since it is quicker/easier, but it is good to have there to send files to to zip or unpack other archives)

Generally, If I use it a lot, or it is rather slow when used on a usb drive, I run it from the hard drive.

Mrs_Arcanum

OnAndUp wrote: »

Thanks everyone for your many replies!

I upgraded to firefox 4 earlier today - it does seem faster so far? I have a 19" screen so no need for extra space so I have added the menus bar back in as on the previous version because I like to see them!

I currently have adblock plus add on enabled (as suggested to me by russJK!) should I use no script thingy too?

They do work together. If you play on line mini games flashblock can be a pain.

Thing I am only just getting used to is the reload button being at the end of the address bar.

spg_SCOTT

Mrs_Arcanum wrote: »

Thing I am only just getting used to is the reload button being at the end of the address bar.

I couldn't have it there...changed it within two minutes of installing 4

If you right click the toolbar and choose customise, you can move the reload button

The order of the reload/stop buttons determines whether they are combined or not.

Reload/stop - they are combined
Stop/Reload - they are separate buttons

I have mine combined between the back/forward buttons and the address bar

ahmjt

Edinburghlass wrote: »

I like it but I do miss my refresh button

Use F5 for refresh.

RussJK

spg_SCOTT wrote: »

Haha, I googled "Firefox 4 disable switch to tab". There are a few mozilla forum topics :rotfl:

I don't have it set as the default browser, because if you do it messes things up (starts the wrong one - not portable) But I just have a shortcut to the portable launcher and since it is always open I just copy and paste.

Yeah yeah ;p Believe it or not I had read through a few forum topics a while back, particularly the long one on mozillazine, but the only two extensions I saw mentioned hadn't been checked for security at the time IIRC and I don't use random addons. The author of one was even telling people not to use the one he made which didn't give me confidence!

Back in XP there was a simple program to enable/disable the portable version as default, just a matter of having the registry entries point in the right direction.