[mister ed]

There is plenty you can do to speed up Firefox. I found this tutorial on a Linux site, but the tweaks are relevant to the browser not to the OS so go ahead and use them in Windows as well.

http://www.ubuntugeek.com/speed-up-f...b-browser.html

The tutorial is written, not in video format but it is much more detailed with many more methods of optimising Firefox for speed and efficiency. I have implemented all of them and the difference is incredible.

[mister ed]

Once you are familiar with the procedures for changing these settings to optimise Firefox, go to this site for even more detailed modifications. The guy here shows how to optimise Firefox depending on your connection speed and computer speed.

The site is at
http://codebetter.com/blogs/darrell.norton/archive/2005/01/28/48720.aspx


He provides specific settings depending on whether you have:
A Fast Computer & Fast Connection;
a Fast Computer & Slower Connection;
a Fast Computer & Slow Connection;
or a Slow Computer & Fast Connection.

[Minetoo]

Mr. Ed:
FWIW, I benchmarked my Firefox and found no difference after completing all the tweaks suggested by unbuntugeek than I posted here:
http://www.traderslaboratory.com/for...ding-3524.html

[mister ed]

Hi Minetoo - thanks for that, so its that one tweak that makes the difference ... and here's me spending ages doing all the other stuff!

[BlowFish]

There is also a plugin called Fasterfox that I came across when looking at these links. Never tried it but thought I might

Be aware that by default it pre-fetches links on a web page. This is how some old accelerators worked. This can be concidered 'bad behaviour' for numerous reasons (for example its likely to increase James' bandwidth costs if several people start using it). So if you do try it out turn this option off and be bandwidth friendly

Cheers.

[mister ed]

Yes I have that pre-fetch option turned off, was probably a great benefit before faster internet speeds but now like you say its a bandwidth thief!

[Minetoo]

Originally Posted by BlowFish »

Be aware that by default it pre-fetches links on a web page.

Blowfish: Is the pre-fetch setting you are referring to "network.prefetch-next" ?

[albatross]

I have tried Fasterfox,
http://fasterfox.mozdev.org/

My perception is it is faster than standard Firefox but I have no benchmarks to back that up.