Software

Re: Latest Browser Speed Tests

ParaDOX — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 06:10:43 GMT

That is odd... Try running it without addons to see if that is what is causing the slowdown. You can also disable some the extra features like recommended sites and smartscreen filter. These cause the browser to do additional lookups behind the scenes. I leave them on, because my connection is fast. But if you want maybe tomorrow we can try a few things to see if we can get it back to normal.

Mine is lighting quick. It takes around 2 seconds to open a new window and display the MC homepage. About a second or less to open the default google page from there.

Re: Latest Browser Speed Tests

Troop — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 03:31:31 GMT

ParaDOX:

I have a couple of Quick questions:

Did IE8 NOT do everything you needed it to do?

What is Chrome doing for you that IE8 or even Firefox did not do for you?

IE8 does everything I need it to do. So does Firefox. I switched because IE was being REALLY slow. Pages (even google) take 15 seconds to load, the scrolling freezes up and lags, and even Flash lags. Rather than fixing my problem I just switched to Chrome. I do keep my computer as clean as possible. It's defragged and should be free of all forms of malware (I run scans all the time just in case, they always come up empty). I'm not really sure what the problem is. I've never liked Firefox at all so Chrome was the way to go. I only really do basic browsing and I've never been inconvenienced for using Chrome anyways.

Re: Latest Browser Speed Tests

ParaDOX — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 16:12:43 GMT

It all comes down to resources, usually memory. I use Microsoft Virtual PC, it's free and works quite well. For a machine that I use for something like this, use just a bare minimum of memory for the VPC, at most 256 MB, if you have 4GB's or more, then assign more for better performance. I use 368MB's or more depending on what I use the VPC for. Install XP as the OS, use an undo option on the virtual drive.

I recommend this method over any browser plugin based solution for real security. Preventing ads and flash won't catch a Browser exploit or java exploit. With my method you can also see the effects of the infection, which are quite amusing to watch :) Feel free to use your plugins within the VPC environment also, might improve performance to not have hundreds of windows being spawned. If your computer supports Hardware Virtualization, the performance is quite good. It also helps to have lots of RAM and storage space.

Re: Latest Browser Speed Tests

DarkAstraea — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 07:29:33 GMT

The site is shown the way the author intends it, more or less, just without the ads that are paying to run the site. It really helps lessen the amount of spyware and malware that try to come through when i'm using my tricks and sources to get games and other stuff =P After years of experience with this stuff my new laptop has never been infected with any lethal viruses. And i'm usually running 10 tabs at a time plus running games, and music in the background, hard to keep vmware running as well as those programs on at the same time with only a dual core.

Re: Latest Browser Speed Tests

ParaDOX — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 20:00:56 GMT

If I want or need to browse a site that I cannot trust I simply visit the site in a Virtual machine and undo the VM's drive when I'm done.

I prefer to see the site the way the author intended. I'm not a fan of plugins that strip things out. As for Ads, My firewall blocks most common ads at the domain level. The rest don't bother me.

95% of the sites that I visit are Techie sites. The other 5% might be whatever interests me at that moment.

Re: Latest Browser Speed Tests

DarkAstraea — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 21:11:36 GMT

Well first, i don't just "surf". What i do is an art XD

I have two that I use, Adblock and FlashBlock. Both very useful in blocking out random spam or stupid ads on websites that could potentially harm your computer. Adblock gives you the ability to filter out any unwanted materials (pictures, frames, flash, hidden scripts, etc.) from sites. FlashBlock blocks any flash content on a website the moment the site is opened unless you click on the FlashBlock icon to allow that specific flash to open and play, really helps me cause i hate it when there are flash objects that auto-play when a site is opened.

And i also use the interwebs more intensely than anyone in this community, probably, to find loopholes to get whatever i want so they are very useful plugins, and IE8 does not have that for me.

Re: Latest Browser Speed Tests

ParaDOX — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 17:02:33 GMT

DarkAstraea:

Giveth me EPIX pluginz?

Such as?

If you need a lot of plugins just to surf, then you have issues!

I would love to know what you consider "Required" plugins, ones that you can't live without. Just for the sake of completeness. Because Plugins would be the only reason to use a different browser. It's one of the reasons I use Pidgin for IM instead something else.

Re: Latest Browser Speed Tests

DarkAstraea — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 14:32:37 GMT

Giveth me EPIX pluginz?

Re: Latest Browser Speed Tests

ParaDOX — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 23:31:40 GMT

Troop:

I actually switched to Chrome a while ago. It works great for everything I need it to do.

I have a couple of Quick questions:

Did IE8 NOT do everything you needed it to do?

What is Chrome doing for you that IE8 or even Firefox did not do for you?

Re: Latest Browser Speed Tests

ParaDOX — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 23:28:55 GMT

Chrome is not mature enough as a product for me, nor does it offer anything that I require that IE8 does not do. The same goes for all of the other browsers out there. One thing they do NOT do (To the best of my knowledge) is support activex, that is something that I require for numerous things. When it comes to testing out a new site that I am building that I need to make compatible for all browsers, I'll install them and use them, but for now, I am happy with my current browser. I see no need to switch.

Unless of course you can give me good reason(s) to switch....

Re: Latest Browser Speed Tests

Troop — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 10:41:44 GMT

I actually switched to Chrome a while ago. It works great for everything I need it to do.

Re: Latest Browser Speed Tests

ParaDOX — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 04:05:12 GMT

You are correct, I didn't read the post, because your post said:

DarkAstraea:

"In a three-way cage match, LifeHacker threw Chrome 4, Firefox 3.5, and Opera 10 into the ring and let the three browsers duke it out to see which would emerge as the fastest app for surfing the web.

No mention of IE8 there, so I didn't even bother to read the link :) Sorry, I'll read it.

Re: Latest Browser Speed Tests

DarkAstraea — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 03:27:21 GMT

IE8 was tested as well as other browsers could read the post more thoroughly or click these pix.

(Pix 1) (Pix 2) (Pix 3) (Pix 4)

Re: Latest Browser Speed Tests

ParaDOX — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 22:21:16 GMT

What about IE8? You can't test all the top browsers without including it... IE8 has tons of performance improvements and new features. I still prefer it over the others.

What the world needs is more web browers, more differentiation between standards. yay!

Latest Browser Speed Tests

DarkAstraea — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 22:06:47 GMT

"In a three-way cage match, LifeHacker threw Chrome 4, Firefox 3.5, and Opera 10 into the ring and let the three browsers duke it out to see which would emerge as the fastest app for surfing the web. Quoting: 'Like all our previous speed tests, this one is unscientific, but thorough. We install the most current versions of each browser being tested — in this case, Opera 10, Chrome's development channel 4.0 version, and the final Firefox 3.5 with security fixes — in a system with a 2.0 GHz Intel Centrino Duo processor and 2GB of RAM, running Windows XP.'"

(Click Meaz!)

A very nice read, Chrome has all the power I'd expect from it, but still has memory usage issues. O well still sticking with FireFox, Chrome just isn't for me.