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Opera 9.5 Beats Firefox and IE7 As Fastest Browser
Abhinav Peddada writes "Ars Technica takes Opera 9.5, the latest from Opera's stable, for a test run and finds some interesting results, including it being a 'solid improvement to an already very strong browser.' On the performance front, Ars Technica reports 'Opera 9.5 scored slightly higher (281ms) than the previous released version, 9.23 (546ms). And Opera 9.x, let it be known, smacks silly the likes of Firefox and Internet Explorer, which tend to have results in the 900-1500ms range on this test machine (a 1.8 GHz Core 2 Duo with 2GB RAM). Opera was 50 percent faster on average than Firefox, and 100 percent faster than IE7 on Windows Vista, for instance.'"
From what I've seen the speed rankings in all tests always have Opera and Safari leading with IE and FF being behind.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
I wonder if they would have said this if Pavarotti hadnt just died?
Well... okay. That was a short article.
I'm not expecting them to try Lynx or anything, but at least test Safari on Windows? The one that also claims to be fast?
-Rob
Biblical fiscal responsibility
Those milliseconds really add up...
The article links to a Javascript benchmark only. There are many many more variables involved in determining how fast a given browser is, although certainly Javascript plays it's part. Variables like how soon does the browser start processing incoming, but yet incomplete data, etc. influence the browser's snappiness a lot aswell.
Basically, the speed of the browser depends upon the speed of the html parsing engine, available bandwidth, browser settings, speed of the cache and Javascript, just to mention the main variables.
Still, I'm interested how comes Opera's Javascript is so fast compared to the other browsers.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
So Opera is much faster than FF when running JavaScript tests, according to Ars Technica.
Numbers are meaningless without context
without units. 281ms per what? Apparently a bunch of tests listed on http://celtickane.com/projects/jsspeed.php
Now my question is, how significant is ~500 ms for these tests? All I care about is how long it takes to load a typical webpage I surf, and for me, Firefox seems almost instantaneous for most pages. "Smacks silly" my be an overstatement.
Right now, the biggest issues with both IE and Firefox is a huge memory footprint. If Opera wants to bring something valuable to the table, make sure it can run smoothly on XP with 256 megs of memory. That would be valuable for a lot of people with aging hardware.
.: Max Romantschuk
I'd have sworn that the Youtube videos ran as fast on Firefox as they do on Opera, and I haven't really noticed myself reading slashdot articles faster on Opera than Firefox.
I guess I am just getting too old for these newfangled Web 2.0 stuff.
It's the internet, of course someone cares. I've actually been in a debate about wich browser is the fastest one, I cried a little bit and a part of my soul was forever gone.
Is that overall time to get and display an average page has gone up for me atleast in the last 10 years.
This despite the fact that the computer speeds have increased and the connection speeds even more.
The bigest fault lies ofcourse with maers of those silly pages with 100 different elements that have to be loaded and displayed separately, but also both IE and Firefox have become more and more bloated with functionality making them slower and bigger memory hogs.
Opera aims at different market -- small gadgets. This is where the speed is really critical. For IE and FF good enough is enough, since performance on modern desktops is not that critical.
May Peace Prevail On Earth
I can't believe they left out Konqueror!
Last time I looked, 400ms is the better part of half a second - quite noticeable in my experience!
Opera is faster than Firefox across the board. Always has been, and probably always will be. Put that into context whatever way you want. So what's the point of your emphasis again?
At the same time, Opera is also smaller, lighter, more stable, more innovative, better integrated, and comes from a company that behaves ethically towards the rest of the software community (eg, it does not engage in patent warfare to pummel the competition).
Yet because it's not open source (it's been "free as in beer" for quite some time now, but even that's news to some people here) it's practically awarded pariah status by many Firefox zealots who typically use nothing more than ignorance and FUD to put it down.
Seriously, the amount of anti-Opera, pro-Firefox propaganda (for want of a better word) here on Slashdot is ridiculous. Opera is, and always has been, a top-notch product.
In the eyes of this humble observer, it's a far better browser than any other, but regardless of our personal preferences, isn't it time that people gave it due respect? Or is good software engineering only to be appreciated if it comes from the open source community?
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
wake me up when it supports spnego/kerberos auth. Then I can tell my users they use opera at work.
Right-click --> Block content
F12 --> Enable plug-ins
F12 --> Enable JavaScript
If you need to do any of these on a per-site basis: F12 --> Edit site preferences. Additionally you can also switch off:
You can change these settings for one site or all sites. Now is that enough for you, or do Opera need to call this functionality 'adblock plus', 'flashblock' and 'noscript' and supply it in addon form? :-)
I'm going to transform myself into a mighty hawk. Either that or I'll just go and work at Dixons, haven't decided yet.
I'd like a multi threaded browser, where something heavy in one tab doesnt drag the rest of the browser down to a crawl...
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
Opera aims at different market -- small gadgets. This is where the speed is really critical. For IE and FF good enough is enough, since performance on modern desktops is not that critical.
Opera aims at different market -- small gadgets. This is where the speed is really critical. For IE and FF good enough is enough, since performance on modern desktops is not that critical.
As a Quad G5 (4x 2500) Mac owner with lots of RAM, I really don't want a browser choking up an entire CPU and flooding my memory. I didn't pay money to cover amateur programming mistakes by other people. As same guy, I flamed Opera guys about not fixing a bug happens on Slashdot beta, first thing I checked was that after getting that awesome 9.5 alpha and yes it is fixed.I have used a Xeon Video workstation lately and poor AVID was acting like it is on 80386 because a stupid "free" antivirus was taking whole CPU cycles trying to "scan" gigabyte level raw videos while it was asked to ignore them.
It is common getting replies as "get more RAM" or "upgrade your CPU" from various browser fans but when I see a browser using 100% CPU , I get alerted about what kind of security issues it may have and why I should be wasting my CPU to it.
Opera's power comes from managing to code and sell full feature browsers which would even run on Nokia 7650 with 2 MB of RAM. Don't let the Desktop versions memory usage fool you, it is mostly RAM Cache, not memory "flood". Instead of flooding memory, they use it for a good reason and release immediately when another app needs it.
Automatically updating block lists, Opera doesn't have that. Flashblock displays an inline play button over all flash content so you can choose to play something instantly. Noscript gives you an icon right at the bottom showing what domains are allowed and what are blocked from running scripts and you can white and black list things through the same menu. Opera doesn't even come close to matching these features natively, and if there's plugins that do I'm not aware of them. And I'll kick in Down Them All plugin that I can't live without now. So that's four reasons I can't use Opera, even though I like it better than FF in a lot of ways, the UI is solid and it's very snappy with a low memory footprint.
If you build it, nerds will come. Soylentnews.org
Opera aims at different market -- small gadgets. This is where the speed is really critical. For IE and FF good enough is enough, since performance on modern desktops is not that critical.
I really wouldn't say that. Once you've used a browser that renders pages considerably faster than your old browser, there's no going back. It makes a *big* difference.
With Opera 9.5, I can browse my API docs on the web just as fast as if the data were local. It's incredibly comfortable, and for me definitely worth the switch. (I had been using Firefox for a while before going back to Opera)
Mark Kretschmann - Amarok Developer, KDE Member
Its not like I actually notice the speed of my browser on a daily basis. I have 3 browsers to choose from between my laptop and iMac. Those are Firefox, IE, and Safari. I tend to use FireFox on both machines as it provides a consistent experience regardless of platform. I also find many of the plug ins to be very useful.
Should I care? With today's machines the only performance issue I ever encounter is my connection. Frankly, if someone wants to sell me on a new browser then speed isn't the way to do it. Provide some convienence or functionality I can't live without. You are probably going to have to work hard at it and it will have to be something most of us haven't thought of. Sorry, but browsers are not rocket science and in this day they really aren't viable commercial products - you just have to have one and its expected your OS provider will have one for you.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
I've written both simple demos and fairly sophisticated JavaScript apps (which can do Sim City / Civilization 2.5 isometric views like this - and render them extremely quickly so you that you can pan around the environment as if it was a native title)).
When it comes to looping through a large array of arrays (e.g. the terrain tile detail in one of the above examples), applying style or class attributes to DOM elements, creating or moving DOM elements on a page and dealing with event handlers Safari wins hands down, followed by FireFox, Opera and IE (in all respects). The "Opera is the fastest" claim holds very little weight with me having compared them. What Opera has is a very fast UI that's extremely responsive, which is all a bit smoke and mirrors really. It's not particularly fast at script execution or object manipulation as soon as things get interesting (it lags behind Safari and FireFox certainly, but it's still far ahead of IE), and of course it renders perfectly valid pages very differently from Safari and FireFox (for which is sometimes possible to blame ambiguities in the standards, but that it doesn't follow the lead of Gecko/KHTML/Webkit or IE is a bit annoying - though do I appreciate the complexity involved).
My block list in Opera is a many years old - most of the stuff was done when Firefox wasn't even on the horizon. I maybe see one ad per month. Why are auto-updating block lists so important? It looks just like paranoia to me - "zomgz, I *need* to update, or there will be ads!". No, there won't really be.
There is a UserJS somewhere (userjs.org?) to introduce Flashblock-like functionality.
Opera 9.x natively supports per-site JS and plugins blocking, and CSS as well. But OK, there is no status bar icon.
You don't need the "Down Them All" plugin. Press Ctrl+Alt+L and you have a new tab with links on the current page. You can even filter them. Then just select whatever you want and download.
http://nontroppo.org/timer/kestrel_tests/
And remember, this is an *alpha* release.
Yes, it does makes difference, but on desktop feature set is much more important and there is no way I'm trading NoScript + CookieSafe + Firebug + Foxmarks + Slashdotter for a slight increase in speed.
May Peace Prevail On Earth
The only reason I use Firefox over Opera and IE 7 is because of Firefox's find feature. Having a separate window pop up for finding a word or phrase is incredibly disruptive, especially when you're looking for multiple instances. As soon as you click outside the find window, it looses your place, and you have to start all the way at the beginning again. I know it sounds silly to most people, but Find is one of the feature I use most often, and if it isn't like Firefox, I'm not switching.
Luciano Pavarotti September 6, 2007 R.I.P. yesterday.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luciano_Pavarotti
What matters Opera without Pavarotti about?
Another handy but little know plug-in for FF, which is not available in any other browser, is CookieButton. It allows you to quickly set per-site cookie permissions from the toolbar.
This is fantastic for privacy. I have FF to accept all cookies, but delete all except the ones I specify to keep when the browser is closed. This way all web sites work (some don't if you disable cookies) but all tracking cookies and other crap gets deleted at the end of every session.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
That is not possible. Opera cannot know when another app needs memory.
Right click | Edit site preferences... | Cookies tab
Maintain away, including setting site specific cookies to delete upon exit.
Go permanent? In your dreams and my worst nightmares.
+ Adblock + a few other things, and that 'slight increase in speed' might start to look like a supersonic jet outrunning a kid with a wheelbarrow. A wheelbarrow with a lot of nifty stuff on it, sure, but still
APK
P.S.=> Some added "FYI" for those of you comparing FireFox/IE/Opera:
Opera security advisories @ SECUNIA (0% unpatched):
http://secunia.com/product/10615/?task=advisories
FireFox security advisories @ SECUNIA (43% unpatched):
http://secunia.com/product/12434/
IE 7 security advisories @ SECUNIA (56% unpatched):
http://secunia.com/product/12366/
(As far as security related vulnerabilities remaining unpatched, Opera leads here (super-important in today's online world where security IS a concern))
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Also, as far as speed comparisons? This is one that also extolls Opera's benefits over FF &/or IE here, & ON MULTIPLE OS PLATFORMS:
BROWSER SPEED COMPARISONS ON MANY TASKS & MULTIPLE OPERATING SYSTEM PLATFORMS:
http://www.howtocreate.co.uk/browserSpeed.html
And, especially on Win32 OS', the most used PC platform/OS there is...
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(& the best part is, Opera has ALL of the features a body can need, WITHOUT using addons (though it has that via Opera widgets), & YET, Opera is LIGHTER ON MEMORY than FireFox &/or IE typically!)
You can check memory residency yourselves by loading FF, & Opera (& IE for Windows users) & test memory size occupancy via taskmgr.exe (or similar tools like Process Explorer) yourselves & see what I mean... I did so with FF 2.0.0.6, IE 7.x, & Opera 9.23.
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Opera also passed the "ACID2" test, for standards compliance (it is not alone here, but is over IE & FF, & it was the 6th browser to do so):
http://it.slashdot.org/it/06/03/12/1416222.shtml
A descending chronological order in which browsers (and authoring tools) passed Acid2, per a tip I got from by rh0 (member 1110203) here on
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acid2
Safari, Prince, Shiira, Konqueror, Opera, & iCab
(Firefox's Acid2 compliant branch has been merged into the trunk, thus, Firefox 3 will likely be Acid2 compliant, but currently FF & IE are not passers of this test.)
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And, Opera had features (like tabbed browsing) that other browsers (major 2 others in IE/FF) copied from it:
FIREFOX MYTHS:
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/SupportCD/FirefoxMy
(Yes, Opera had tabbed browsing before IE &/or FF, & other features as well. Opera comes FULLY LOADED features-wise, with a built in email client, IRC client, RSS client, & more + yet eats less RAM than others, & addons only bloat IE &/or FF even more memory-occupancy-wise. (AND YES, Opera has addons as well in "opera widgets" (like
I just switched from FF to Opera because of its low market share numbers - which was the same reason I switched from IE to FF when the FF market was about 2%.
Pffft. I'm must more emo than you, I use Lynx which has practucally no market share!
"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge"
- Charles Darwin
Just tried the alpha and it almost instantly became my primary browser. IE and FF are hideously slow on my system and no amount of tweaking can fix them, they seem to 'hang' when downloading pages, like they disconnect and have to re-establish. Safari is faster but takes a bit longer to load, but Opera loads in under a second (excusing the prompt that just popped up to tell me it wasn't my primary browser at the moment) and draws complete pages noticably faster (easily 3-4 seconds faster for the Slashdot main page). I'm keeping all these browsers on my system for testing my own sites, but Opera has easily become my browser of choice.
Lose: misplace or fail || Loose: not bound together
The Rule of Economy is fine when applied sensibly (for example, GNOME do the right thing writing many end user applications in python). However, Firefox is currently at the level where it's computational burden is increasing almost as fast as Moore's Law.
I was a long time Opera user until Firefox 1.0, but FF won me over with plugins and better default behaviors.
Like when you are looking at a page and you see something to search for, highlight and right click search for....
In Firefox you automatically get a new tab with the search, which is what I want. Opera overwrites the page you were reading with the search. Other features work similarly. You can hold down alt or something and get what you want.
Similarly with bookmarks. Firefox I middle click a bookmark in my bookmark bar and I get a new tab. Opera, nothing happens, if I left click it over-writes my current page. Seeing a pattern
Search in page. Firefox much better implementation with obvious highlighting.
Speed isn't enough to win me back.
So why use Opera at work. It is stable. Firefox crashes all the time on my Redhat corporate install. Perhaps something wrong with the Redhat because I have tried out IT supplied Firefox and my own DL copy with the same results.
A lot was stolen from Opera, it is time for Opera to steal back with some of the better interface elements of firefox.
- Security: According to Secunia, Opera has 0 unpatched holes, compared to IE which has the most and Safari, second worst; unfortunately, Firefox has quite a few left as well.
- Features: Integrated email, feed reader, widgets, notes, IRC & bittorrent client; back in the day, Netscape tried to do that with email, then gave up when the code became too heavy and impossible to manage, opting instead for "modularization"; IE followed by introducing menu items for OE and FP Express. Opera is the only one left standing and still the fastest with the smalled footprint.
- The only browser that can read pages back to you (Windows->select text, right click, V)
- Portability - opera-usb.com, comes with flashblocker button in case you don't know how to set it yourself
- Mobile devices, where it's at - Opera rules that market
- Someone complained about the find function - the window doesn't actually disappear if you click behind it, it stays on top but loses focus
Wishlist: better integration with Google modules and especially Google Reader, but part of that seems to be addressed with Synchronization I used Opera since version 5. I would not use an OS unless there's an Opera made for it."One of the symptoms of an approaching nervous breakdown is the belief that ones work is terribly important." -BRussell
I don't know of any OS that provides such a facility. The app could monitor free physical RAM, or could (as you mention about the Mac version) choose to dump cache when hidden/minimized, but I don't believe there is any way to allocate memory such that the OS will simply take it back when needed. All non-locked memory allocations on modern OSes are subject to being paged out to free up memory when other apps need it, but that is very different from saying the OS "takes the memory when needed", because it involves the (slow) process of writing the memory contents out to the disk.
It's an interesting idea, though. Perhaps operating systems should provide such a feature, a way to allocate memory "weakly", such that the OS can reallocate it as-needed. There would have to be some mechanism by which the OS could notify the app that the memory was being taken away (I suppose it could just be a SIGSEGV).
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
Opera does have equivalents of many must-have extensions. Some are missing (IETab), some are better integrated (gestures), some are almost-but-not-quite (web dev tools unfortunately).
p opular-firefox-extensions-and-opera
That sums it up: http://my.opera.com/Rijk/blog/2006/07/04/top-150-
Out of 113 most popular Fx extensions: 38 are built-in, 38 are not possible, rest can be added by tweaking/hacking/configuring something.
They have deals with search engines, like Google and Yahoo, to get placement as the default engines in the toolbar, in Speed Dial, and in Opera Mini. (I think these days it's Yahoo in all 3.) Same kind of deal that Firefox has with Google, really.
Plus there are the versions for devices (Nintendo DS, etc.), which they still charge for, either directly or through licensing deals with device manufacturers and mobile carriers. So they pull in revenue from that.
This article is a year out of date, but still informative: Opera making big profits from free software.