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Ask Slashdot: Best Small-Footprint Modern Browser?
Annirak writes "I've recently started a paid internship at a company which is expanding faster than their IT department can supply new hardware. As a consequence, I've been issued a P4 2.4GHz with 512MB of RAM. Currently, I am using Firefox 4, but I find that it eats up far too much of my limited RAM. I'd rather not give up some of the more modern UI features that are offered by the current versions of Firefox and Chrome, but I need a smaller footprint. What other browsers are out there which could help me conserve resources?"
It's not expensive and if you get worth out of the investment it's a good thing all the way around.
opera
Quit that job, and become a hobo.
K-meleon.
I use Opera 11 with Windows 2000 on my P3 with 256 MB of RAM and it works quite well.
is of course Lynx.
Aside from that Opera should require at lot less resources.
Try disabling flash, other plugins, and javascript. It makes 99% of sites faster, and only breaks about 30% of sites. Of the sites that aren't worthless, only about 5% are broken (mostly shopping sites).
If you install NoScript in Firefox, you can selectively enable/disable scripts and flash and other plugins for specific domains, only enabling what you want.
This also prevents most advertisements from loading.
Call your local admin and request an extra bit of memory because you need [obscure app] to run properly. It's a nice chance to get befriended with him too.
To answer you q.. IE <cough>
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
I saw the "expanding faster than their IT department can supply new hardware" note, but - come on. That hardware is close to a decade old! Is their IT department run by an 80-year-old man?
#DeleteChrome
If I had to work all day on this PC I would simply buy one for work. There is no way a P4 with 512mb is going to get the job done in 2011.
The RAM usage in FireFox isn't a bug, and there are things you can do to make it use less RAM:
'For we walk by faith, not by sight.' II Corinthians 5:7
Since you don't mention your OS, I'm forced to assume it's Windows of some kind. If so, check out some of the various remasterings of the XP install CD put out by various release groups. There is one in particular called TinyXP which is about 400MB installed and idles with around 24MB of RAM used. A very good friend of mine put it on his brother's old machine and it runs Chrome + youtube stuffs + games just fine.
Otherwise install linux and lynx :)
Bring back grail.. it was small, fast and mulitplatform out of the box, being based on Python.
( and one of the first broswers.. )
---- Booth was a patriot ----
"...expanding faster than their IT department can supply new hardware" is corporate terms for "..because we are almost broke"
My recommendation, just stay away.
don't cut it off www.mgmbill.org
What are (as far as you're concerned) "the more modern UI features?" If you can nail down what you really mean by that, we can probably come up pretty easily with one of these two answers: 1) Browser X, of course 2) Nothing; you're screwed.
Is the Firefox awesome bar a bug or a feature? Is fast javascript a "UI feature" or nearly irrelevant? And so on. You mention FF4. Is FF2 just as good a UI, or worse, or better (and if so, how)?
Midori is really lightweight and fast. It tends to outperform Chrome on older computers in my experience. Plus it runs in XFCE, so you're set for a lightweight environment.
Run the browser on the Corei7 guy's computer, use his RAM, and see it on yours. ;-)
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
try xxxterm http://opensource.conformal.com/wiki/XXXTerm
If you're on Windows - Kmeleon http://kmeleon.sourceforge.net/ Otherwise (all joking aside on this!) - (E)Links. I use it on both Linux and Windows regularly - with the right setup you can even get a graphical UI... http://elinks.or.cz/
I think therefore I am... a Linux geek.
I assume you have Windows XP or Linux.
Try to disable as many services or daemons as you can to free up RAM. In the Microsoft world, MSCONFIG is your friend. If you manage to keep your "working set" below your actual RAM you should be okay. About all you really need is the bare-bones OS, networking and security software, a web browser and whatever extensions you need, plus whatever you need for your business. Those "business" applications can eat you alive, especially if they have the word "Office" in them. Consider closing all heavy-RAM applications first then surfing, then closing your web browser and resuming your "Office" work.
Firefox 3.latest is not bad, but I haven't done a RAM-usage comparison w/ Firefox 4.
If RAM is the issue and it's not something exotic like RAMBUS, I'd upgrade with "just enough" to get you up to what you need. Half a gig of DDR PC2700 is under $30 from a major hundreds-of-stores retailer's web site, with free ship-to-store shipping.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
How about using Emacs as a web browser? Specifically, XEmacs and this one random one I've heard in passing called "w3m" or something should be able to do it pretty much out of the box.
*rimshot*
flashblock is the single most important piece of software to install for browsing on older (or current) machines, it's a firefox extension that replaces flash ads and videos with a "click to play" icon. avoids total CPU overload as well as ram use.
Then, some websites are obviously more heavy than others, you can load a lot of "web 1.0" pages with simple layouts and few features but you will get groped by the bloated sites - no marvel, fat browser memory use comes from fat content. you can try Adblock and/or Noscript if you really feel the need to.
Firefox 4 is nice enough, better than previous versions though helps more with CPU load than memory load. you can try Opera or some other browser but you will run in the same, content-based memory limitation (ultimately).
I hope your system is not on the dells with bad caps.
but any ways that hardware is so old and the IT department saying that it can't supply new is a bad sign for the company. What do they want you to do on your job anyways and I hope they don't force windows vista / 7 on that hardware or any kind of bloated AV or other stuff.
Most distro's will run fine on 512MB of ram. Your OS is the problem not your browser.
However just go to the dump crack a couple of cases open and viola free ram. I do it all the time for older computer parts. Last time I found a broken (dead cmos battery) IBM Lenovo ThinkCentre 3.2 GHZ, 1 GB ram, 80 GB hdd. Upgraded the ram (4 GB) hdd (500GB) Hooked it up to my 37" LCD TV running openSuse with Gnome 3. I fix dozens of older computers for friends and family with dump parts. Simple things like power supplies can save a lot of money.
But even if you have the spare ram get the tech guy to install it even though you know how so you don't step on any toes.
To answer you q.. IE <cough>
Internet Explorer 9 requires 1 GB of RAM because it requires an operating system that won't run well with less. Or are you recommending using Internet Explorer 8?
I interned at a company that issued me similar hardware (p4, think it was 1,6ghz, and I know for sure 384 megs'o'ram). Even at the time that sucked balls (2007), especially because I had to do coding on it (eclipse). Asked for an upgrade, they didn't have the budget.
I told them: I'm sorry, but a paid internship costs like 1/6th of a FTE. You can drop 50 bucks on RAM and add a gigabyte. Of course they didn't, so whenever I was held back by that box I made a point of it to lean back in my chair and assume the most relaxing pose possible (even closing my eyes). Any time they asked what I was doing I'd tell them (truthfully) that I was waiting for my compile/whatever. Eventually it worked and I got a whopping 512 megs more. Big whoop.
Theres no reason any company needs to shove 10 year old hardware on an intern. You call up Dell or whoever, say you need a thousand PCs and they will bring it out.
You need Linux and luakit. They are awesome on old machines.
... what more do you need?
openbsd and links
I think you would want to give Opera a try. I compared some of the major browsers several months ago, and what I found was that Chrome was fast but uses RAM excessively, and Firefox was slow but used less RAM. Opera seemed to be strong in both speed and memory conservation, the main drawback being that it is not open source. Firefox is faster now that version 4 is out, putting it in competitive range of Opera, although I'd wager that Opera is still more efficient.
Now if you're able and willing to try non-mainstream browsers, there are a lot of fun things you can play with. Epiphany is a popular underdog choice, and other alternative browsers run a full gamut of niches. In the past I've tried Konqueror, Midori, Aurora, Dillo, and yes, even elinks (I've actually used it productively, so I'm not joking). There is even that funny K-Meleon browser for windows. I don't know how many of these are still in active development, but many alternative browsers do excel in being lightweight, so on systems with limited resources you will see noticeable speed gains. The downside is that you will get compatibility problems, and the Javascript engine may be slow.
If you really want to have fun try browsers designed for embedded/mobile systems, such as Android.
Back during the Firefox 4 betas I sometimes used a 300Mhz P3 laptop (380ish megabytes of RAM). Firefox pegged the processor just by being open, but Chromium didn't.
This happened to me (an apparently many other interns) at one of the National Laboratories. The lab wasn't strapped for cash nor going away anytime soon. The real problem was that the guy that hired me didn't plan ahead and order a computer (which can take weeks to get thanks to procurement overhead), so he panicked and snagged one on the way to reapplication. I scrounged up some more RAM from reapp, and it worked fine for the three months I was there.
2.4 Ghz P4 with 512mb of ram is not that bad, I used one with these specs up until last summer, and my sister is still using it.
I do not recall the browser slowing down the system (I used chrome).
I run firefox 3 on my old 512Mb p4 laptop (it doubles as a hotplate for frying eggs). With noscript installed it runs reasonably quickly, plus a lot of annoying crap on websites doesn't work with javascript off which is a bonus.
The job you're been hired to do probably does not include browsing the web on company time anyway. Just don't do it. Problem solved.
Firefozilla 4 compiled with -Os, sorted. Thank me later.
I know you already mentioned it (and specifically asked for "other") but my computer is much, much older than yours and Chromium runs fine on it. If it doesn't on your computer, chances are that the browser isn't the problem. Open up Task Manager (or better yet, Process Explorer) and see what crap you've got running in the background. You don't really need it.
Don't know if this is still true, but as recently as v9 some websites would have problems with Opera's Javascript implementation.
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
OpenBSD, CWM and surf.
Are you getting paid to browse the Internet? No?
Then quit the browser and go back to work :)
Enjoy! :)
This is my sig. There are many like it but this one is mine.
I used to use Konqueror 3.x on a 200 MHz Pentium with 96 MB RAM. It was the only graphical browser that both had good support for the Web at the time (HTML4, JavaScript (including AJAX), Flash and other plug-ins, tabbed browsing) and that would allow me to have multiple tabs open and still have the browser respond immediately to mouse clicks.
On top of that, those versions of Konqueror have some nice features that weren't common at the time, such as access keys (press control, then a letter to follow a link) and web shortcuts (type a short keyword and some search terms in your address bar, and you could search the web using your favorite search engine, Wikipedia, or whatever else you would add). Konqueror is a very nice browser even if your machine isn't resource-constrained.
I haven't used the post-3.x versions of Konqueror, but I've always enjoyed 3.x. About the only annoyance is that a number of "Web 2.0" sites don't work with Konqueror, or require tweaks. Support has improved with the increasing popularity of WebKit (which originated with Konqueror as KHTML, but is now used with Safari, Chromium, Chrome, and several other browsers), and most sites will actually work if you set the browser identification to some more popular browser (e.g. Opera, Safari, or Firefox).
If you are willing to use closed-source software, Opera is a very good browser. I don't know about the resource usage of their newer releases, but they are known for packing an amazingly good feature set in a small package. Same as with Konqueror, though, you may need to set the browser identification to some other browser to get certain websites to work with it. Opera makes this very easy to do.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
Firefox 4, built in bartab. When you set browser.sessionstore.max_concurrent_tabs=0 , only tabs you click on get loaded.
If that's not good enough for you, get the same setup on lubuntu or similar lightweight Linux, or just go buy some more RAM and install it yourself. Should be $30-60 for 2 1-gig sticks depending on the type needed. If that's too much to expense or pay out of pocket, can't you help much.
Blessed are the pessimists, for they have made backups.
You were given an ancient machine to discourage browsing. After all, you're getting paid to do a job, right? Does that job really require you to have much of a browser or computer? Apparently not, given what they stuck you with.
If browsing is supposed to be a big part of your job, then you're hosed anyway.
If you're really need bare-bones performance, use lynx. Who needs all those silly graphics, anyway?
Hi, here at Contact ( http://www.contactmorpeth.org.uk/ ) the standard PC is
512MB RAM
Windows (some XP, one Vista) or Ubuntu Linux
web browser (sometimes IE, sometimes Firefox, sometimes Safari)
And they work fine!
Which web sites are you accessing that cause you grief?
pfft, way too much. by a used laptop (1G ram, 30+G hard drive) with 30 or 60 day warranty from highly rated mom&pop shop on eBay, less than $100.
There are only a few major browsers. IE (7 and 8), Firefox (3, since you've tried 4), Safari, Chrome, and Opera. Each have their pros and cons with regard to speed, features, etc. How these get weighted depend on what your preferences are and which sites you visit.
There are two browser hogs of resources: flash and javascript. If you can, get rid of flash altogether. If you can't, at least use a browser/plugin/etc that allows you to "click to play" flash. That'll do more than any browser switch.
Use each one for a day. See what kind of memory usage it has (512 MB is plenty for all of them, but if you use non-browser apps you may need to be pickier). The bottom line is that relatively few people will have tried each of the browsers and have similar taste to yours. The benchmarking sites may give you some speed tests, but not necessarily ones relevant for the sites you actually visit.
"The universe seems neither benign nor hostile, merely indifferent." --Carl Sagan
Netfront. Its massively underrated.
http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.slashdot.org Errors found while checking this document as HTML5!
No such thing as a 300MHZ P3.
i don't know what os you are running but.... i am currently running firefox 3.6.16 via untarring the linux installer into my home folder... i am running debian squeeze on a p4 3.0, 1g ram, it seems my 2gig swap partition isn't loaded/mounted, onboard video, and creative live sound card and have...80 tabs open(most of which being 4chan's /w/ Threads so there is lots of images)....plus BetterPrivacy, DownThemAll, FlashBlock, FlashGot, gTranslate, HTTPS-Everywhere, NoScript, Personas, Text to Voice Extensions running.
Surely with Firefox 3.6.X series of browsers you should be able to do what you want to do on your current computer. Although it may be hard to find anymore.
... or install Windows 98 and use IE6 SP1
I'll see your Boundaries and raise you Initiative.
First of all this is a suspicious (not post, but circumstances why they handed him that comp, when a yard sale could come up with better) setup. So either they hired 20 new peoplein one shot, of course hardware will lag. So since they apparently can't afford more, buy it yourself and let them do the authorized install.
"Interns" are not "temps". Now there's 100 different corp cultures, but "only 100", not 20,000. If they get upset that he spent $100 of his own money on RAM, *that's* the sign they don't care about initative. That's a sign that the job is thin, and he has to decide what it does for him in raw personal cash paycheck flow.
If they say "sure, we were down to our last IT dollar, so since you bought it, sure, we'll do the install next week." That says it was a money problem, and that the job has promise.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
You can try K-Meleon. It is a lightweight browser based on gecko.
Is your computer 10 years old because the CEO is a tightwad or is it because your company has to wait 6 years for FDA approval that your computer won't adversely affect food preparation? I can guarantee it doesn't take your IT dept 10 years to buy you a new computer.
Seriously. Chrome is too resource intensive for you? I'm not sure you're gonna find a better option. Maybe (*maybe*) Lynx will work for you.
and then take it back and ask for another.
If they give you another like it, then wrap it tightly in plastic and drop it out of a 2nd floor window several times so it lands flat, then return it.
If they give you another like it, power it up and dip it in a bucket of salt water overnight, rinse it off the next day and dry it for 5 hours with a hair dryer. Take it back and ask for another. &c.I think you get the point.
BTW this is an algorithm I learned from cops for dealing with undesirable official stuff.
Talk to your IT department, say "my computer runs slowly", and see what they say. I'm serious, keep it simple and to the point. Say what the problem is, not the solution.
They may well have more RAM around lying spare, 1GB is about the minimum for Windows XP SP3 for a comfortable experience without too many heavyweight apps running, 2GB for Vista. I haven't tried Windows 7 with less than 2GB, but it's touted as running faster than Vista in the interest of netbooks etc.
Use Window's performance mode instead of "let windows choose" (right click on my computer > properties > advanced settings). You may want to tick a few extra options if you notice fonts are too jagged or you want to view pictures as thumbnails in windows explorer, etc, etc. Use Smooth Screen Fonts and Turn On Drop Shadows are the only two I normally bother with
Setting your swap space to a constant size, about 1.5x your RAM, tends to make the system run slightly faster. ie. set the minimum the same number as the maximum instead of "let windows choose".
If your hard drive needs defragging, do it.
Without knowing what kind of company you're in, you may find your IT department don't support browsers other than their standard IE6 / IE7 / whatever. So the internal web applications and intranet might not behave quite as you expect.
(I've worked in various IT support roles for the last 5 years including a lot of desktop support)
You can run it locally rather than on a stick. Go to configuration and kill anything unnecessary. I get better memory usage with FF3 over FF4 despite bugs. Also, kill all services/daemons/auto-run background programs (Quicktime comes to mind) nut being used to free up more RAM.
P4 with 512 is fair good computer power,
any way if you can install another browser, why not install another OS with small footprint, thats well suited for you.
When you're finishing your internship, sell the RAM for the same price or a little more to one of the people staying behind.
Just buy another 512M. How much could it cost?
If they get upset that he spent $100 of his own money on RAM, *that's* the sign they don't care about initative.
Or, it's a sign that they don't want some intern fucking around and modifying company property just because he wants to open ten browser tabs at once.
I would use their shitty terminal for network file shares and e-mail only, and bring my own modern laptop to work. Many places have wireless access points for guests, and you can usually browse the web through that. I rather spend my own money than wait for Glasnost to happen. Most large company IT desktop support staff couldn't give a shit if you get a new computer or not. Many are so beaten down and craven that they won't go to bat for you ever.
How would you propose adding RAM to a maxed-out system?
The laptop I'm typing this from has 1GB of RAM. This is the maximum it supports; it cannot take more. Incidentally, the laptop is over 8 years old and runs fine, even the battery is still OK. It's a Celeron system currently running Lubuntu 10.04, since the LXDE desktop is leaner than Gnome or KDE (some unnecessary services are disabled also). I rely on Opera as the primary browser, and usually don't need a swap file even with a good number of tabs open in Opera, and some other applications running (right now: Inkscape, Gimp, Thunderbird, Pidgin, and a few lxterminal/bash/pcmanfm windows).
[warning: rant] This laptop has not been replaced partly because modern laptops with equivalent displays (1920x1200) are priced outrageously. I see no reason to downgrade to a 1920x1080 shortscreen, but object to the notion of paying double the money to keep the extra 120 rows of pixels. [apologies for rant]
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
There are several free X servers that can run on WIndows - Xming, Cygwin, etc. Run one of them and log in to a nearby Linux server that has enough RAM to actually run Firefox on. Or boot Linux from a memory stick.
Or if you only have Windows servers, use Windows Remote Desktop to run the browser on one of them, though that's a bit more awkward.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
You can buy faster machine with more RAM than that for less than $300.
As the island of our knowledge grows, so does the shore of our ignorance.
You will likely find it more probable that your hands will get smacked by installing "unauthorized" (yes, sarcasm) software versus sticking another memory module in there which they will likely never detect. That's assuming you can find one cheap enough. It seems as an intern you probably got the lowest end machine they had lying around that actually still "works". Unfortunately you might even find that all the memory slots have been filled.
Chrome is significantly faster on my Linux Mint/XP dual boot system with a P4 2.4 GHz (non hyperthreading) with 512MB RAM.
I don't know how Opera could be an improvement over Chrome. Chrome launches almost instantly, and browsing is extremely fast with FlashBlock and AdBlock.
First, a P4 2.4aGHz computer is not that dated or slow for business application.
Second, 512 Mb is a respectable amount of ram for business application.
Third, to employers internships are 'shakedown cruises' of prospective employees.
For the first and second, any browser should work well enough to do a job and look for data on the web while programs are working, compiling, etc.
For the third anyone who is an intern should know to ask, and get an OK before doing anything.
For the third also, an intern should be careful about b*tching or seeming b*tchy about assigned equipment.
For the third also an intern should, if it is in the area he or she is supposed to be up in, check the assigned computer for health and performance, infections, bloatware, etc.
For general interest an intern should check the IT department's workhorse hardware, servers and such, to see what processors they run.
The results of a working hardware 'cpu review', even in a cutting-edge company, may surprise you.
Ultimately, safety and security, not size or speed, are the first priority in IT
Next comes hauling the freight.
An old buss that carries the load reliably within parameters has priority over a latest and greatest that may not.
Finally, for light and quick GUI browsing, Dillo works well, Opera works as well as the best, though some sites don't like it, and Seamonkey runs lighter than Firefox, which has more bells and whistles to slow it.
Having just launched a few browsers I have set up, I can say that K-Meleon appears to be the slimmest of the browsers I use ("Modern" browser). Followed closely by QT-Web, and then Opera.
Unfortunately, K-Meleon development (being smaller than Firefox's) is slow(er than firefox). It uses Gecko, though, so its as good as Firefox (as long as the Gecko versions are good, and up to date).
QT-Web uses chromium. It doesn't add in all that the official Google-branded Chrome does, but it adds more than basic Chromium. I am sure there are other Chromium builds that offer in other decent things that would probably be smaller in footprint than Google's, too.
The newest Google Chrome adds in sandboxes, Flash, a PDF reader, tons of stuff, so I can kind of see where it would take up more memory right off the bat (though it *shouldn't* load them all up right away, only when needed).
If you want to include Lynx, then why not also include OffByOne? Its got a GUI, but doesn't do flash, javascript, or plugins. It's very small, and VERY fast.
Lynx has some problems though: no client side scripting and no images. I've found it completely useless for work related functions because most logins (often for http settings) are run with java script. You can't see captchas. You can read google caches, but beyond that, most sites these days have their pages set up in 20 css divisions that they peice together with javascript. Also you encounter the old if (client==firefox compatible) send webpage; else send errors; problem.
As far as interns go: how can you browse the cheeseburger network without being able to view images?
512MB? What kind of a joke is that? My two older boxes (2-3.5 years old) both have 8GB, and this one has 12GB and is about to get upgraded to 24GB.
The last computer I had with 512MB was a p3-1ghz back in 2001. At the same time I built a dual p3-1ghz with 1GB ram, so 512MB was the lower end of what was acceptable even back then.
I have trouble believing a modern browser (chrome or FF) could even run on a system with 512MB ram. That system must swap a lot.
Seamonkey uses much of the same Mozilla code that Firefox uses but has lower RAM requirements (128MB versus 256MB for Opera 11 and 512MB for Firefox 4, according to the respective system requirements pages).
It is the RAM that's slowing you down. RAM is cheap. Do you think you could persuade IT to provide an upgrade? K-Melon is another obvious suggestion. --Sam
Really, if it is such an issue, then buy some more or rip it out of some other unused machine. It's cheap as dirt anyway.
We've not been told what you're there to do and how much of it needs a browser. If your work is being hindered by the equipment it's one thing, but if your day time surfing is getting interrupted it's something quite different.
RAM is relatively cheap. Spend the money and get more RAM if the company doesn't explicitly say you can't.
You're the intern, you get the leftovers. Show some initiative.
I do contract work. I'm expected to provide my own office and equipment. Some clients are nice enough to give me free stuff when I ask. I recently got a nice P4 2.0Ghz IBM ThinkPad with 2GB of RAM. Eventually I'll buy a new laptop to replace it with using my winnings.
When you're a real employee, then you can complain about what they give you. In the meantime, expect to spend your own money to make your job easier.
Work Safe Porn
It was a sad day when they gave up their goal of keeping the browser so small and tightly coded enough that it could fit on a single floppy disk.
Nevertheless, I suspect that it's your best bet for a resource unintensive browser.
But the real question is, if you're doing an internship, why are you web browsing instead of working?
Done deal.
2 gigs of PC133 is stupidly cheap (like $30-50 cheap) depending on where u look... or even free off of cl
why depend on someone else? take the initiative and add the ram to your computer.
K-Meleon's an unstable joke that isn't even slim. The only thing 'slim' about it is its button bars being 16x16 primarily.
Offbyone on the other hand, is freaking fast on Pentium 100s with 32mb ram. it makes me wonder what the hell kind of bloat is in all these 'fast browsers' that are hyped like cake
Since summer interns generally start at the same time, they probably did hire "20 new peoplein one shot." We are hiring about 100. I will let you guess if I have a budget for 100 new computers...
I have trouble believing a modern browser (chrome or FF) could even run on a system with 512MB ram. That system must swap a lot.
You have troubles...
They (e.g., Dell, HP) were selling P4s in 2006. Five years might seem like ten or even a hundred to some people, particularly those with fat wallets. However, there is not a big difference between a hyperthreading 2.4GHz P4 with 400MHz DDR memory and a new quad-core Core7 running 2.4GHz with 8GB of 1600 DDR3 if you are just running XP and a browser. Almost all the latency will be in the network. Adding a gigabyte of DRAM would solve the problem for $30 -- http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820178282. I know that cracking cases can be expensive, time wise, but so can tweaking software that doesn't quite fit.
The biggest things that cause Firefox to chew up memory are dynamic content. There are a lot of developers out there putting out dynamic web shiny gewgaws who are not thinking about memory management. Installing FlashBlock and NoScript, and only turning on dynamic content temporarily, when you need it, will keep the footprint down dramatically.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
My windows xp uses 96mb of ram on boot, and FF uses around the same. 512 should be WAY more than you need for browsing.
Someone should be able to *give* you another stick of 512mb DDR or even a 1GB, you can drop it in and you have instant speed boost.
I have a box of these kind of parts that I almost have to pay people to take. Shouldn't be too hard to beg or borrow a stick of ram to bring that old P4 back to life.
After logging in slashdot still does not take you back to the page you were on. It's been that way for 20 years.
There are always options. One, scrounge available RAM from another unit. Two, spend the 20 or thirty dollars and add your own ram module. It's worth it in time, just make sure to have some sort of inventory control documentation. Three, take option two and turn in the reciept.
See for example: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/firefox-chrome-opera,2558-4.html, or http://digitizor.com/2010/12/18/opera-11-benchmarked/ Opera places last in the memory usage stakes in all the tests. It is also slower than Chrome in most benchmarks. Firefox is probably the best overall for memory use, but I think for performance/memory tradeoff you cannot beat Chrome.
Opera@USB version 10.01 or even 9.64
see http://www.opera-usb.com/downloadold.htm
Pull up your pants, realize that you have a vested interest in the job, and buy more memory. Taking a couple of guesses as to the hardware, you'll probably spend something like $80 to get 2GB new, or $20-$30 used. Just be certain you spec out which memory your box takes and buy exactly the right one.
If you can get reimbursed for the memory purchase, great, otherwise deduct it on your taxes as an unreimbursed employee expense. If you buy used memory, that's about as much as beer on a cheap night out, so don't whine about the expense if it's going to make your job easier.
Put my fist through my alarm clock with its ding-dong death inside my ear. - The Blackjacks.
However, there is not a big difference between a hyperthreading 2.4GHz P4 with 400MHz DDR memory and a new quad-core Core7 running 2.4GHz with 8GB of 1600 DDR3 if you are just running XP and a browser.
Errm... to put this in perspective, I seem to recall that I looked it up and a 2.4GHz P4 actually benchmarks as significantly slower than the 1.6GHz Atom processor in the netbook I'm currently typing this on. Also, while you can get some speedup from using less bloated software, you'll still be browsing 2011-era websites with all their own nasty bloat...
You only need a computer on your desk, it doesnt have to be yours. Convert your machine to a file server. Rotate through the company swapping machines out each day. Pending on size of company, you could schedule out several months in advance. I assume you "own" the crash cart? Leave the monitor and rearrange your office furniture so that it becomes an extension of your desk. Bootable linux on a thumb drive would be nice.
You will also have the chance to rearrange your schedule pick up time for some poor saps computers, if they need it. They will thank you and owe you one. WIN-WIN-WIN (rinse. repeat)
This will also help you make friends. Anyone who figures out what you are doing, would make an interesting friend.
Shelbot
Just do the simple thing: install VNC or an X client and run the browser where it can run fine. (I was doing this in the 90s, with a skinny 386 laptop of 4MB RAM over parallel port with PLIP, which stood no chance to run X with Netscape).
Windows 2000 is fine if you are on an isolated network guaranteed to be malware-free but it's NO LONGER SUPPORTED by Microsoft which means it's toxic for general Internet surfing or being on a LAN that isn't guaranteed to be malware-free.
If you must use Microsoft Windows, use XP SP3 but strip it down as much as practical without compromising security.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Buy more RAM. RAM is much much cheaper than buying new computers.
"Write programs that do one thing and do it well. Write programs to work together. Write programs to handle text streams, because that is a universal interface."
http://www.uzbl.org/
Oh, man. I've just... Always wanted to say that.
Joking aside, just what IS it that you guys do when you browse? I have a 2.6, 1 gig, 256 meg v card, 100 gig hard drive and run Debian. Old stuff. But I never bitch about streaming video or anything (flash games, etc). I'd be looking at network throughput first.
Well, I am currently typing this in Firefox 3.6.3 in a WinXP laptop with 512 MB RAM and an AMD Athlon 3000+ that is however downclocked to 398 MHz (it overheats if I let it run faster. I had to tweak it after some years of abuse...). Then again, I am a really patient person.
You have 512Megs RAM? Phfft! I'm still running a laptop with 128Megs memory and with any modern browser it's hard to tell it's even working! It spends all its time updating the OS and Adobe reader and the virus scanner and Flash and... and... Wait, it just opened my mail. Got to run.
Sorry, but gray text on gray background is making my eyes bleed.
I have never tried it nor have I seen any benchmarks, but the "uzbl" browser claims to be a "minimalist web browser designed for simplicity and adherence to the Unix philosophy."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uzbl
That old computer should be just fine with Firefox 4. In fact I run FF4 on an older Dell Dimension 8200 - P4 @1.7Ghz, 512MB RAM. (Secondary comp). And I run FF 3.6 on another Dell Dimension 8200 - P4 @2.2Ghz, 512MB RAM. (Primary computer).
Company IT sucks in many cases... if you have a few $$$ to spare, RAM is cheap enough that you could do the upgrade yourself. It's worth it to reduce the aggravation of such a POS computer.
I use Smart Clean to recover ram when FF4 uses too much. It resides under Smart Ram under Tools in Advance System Care v2. I install it and then close AVS. SC sits in the system tray. Right click to open its menu and right click one or another of the options offered.
Am I the only one that's starting to get creeped out by the persistent quote at the bottom of /.?
Oh come on, even if it's near-minimum wage, that's still enough to blow a few hours pay and go buy 2GB RAM. And when you leave, you can take it with you ;)
They (e.g., Dell, HP) were selling P4s in 2006. Five years might seem like ten or even a hundred to some people, ...
Pentium 4's started being shipped in fall 2000. Looks like they were discontinued in 2008.
I bought a cheap Dell desktop with a 2.4GHz P4 and 512MB RAM in 2002, which matches the specs of the Slashdot posting we're all talking about - so darn close to 10 years. It seems unlikely a computer with 512MB of RAM was sold in 2006 or later.
#DeleteChrome
I'd rather not give up some of the more modern UI features that are offered by the current versions of Firefox and Chrome
And you propose a text-based browser?
(nothing against lynx, per-se, but it's really a "browser" of last resort)
These two plugins are must haves, IMO. Bar Tab needs a little massage to get to work in FF4 (there are details in the reviews) but that's detailed in the reviews on the plugin page (or use FF3). With them FF3 used under 300MB with tons of tabs, while Opera uses over 1GB for the same number of tabs. (I'm currently using Opera, switched because FF4 wasn't compatible with the plugins I wanted, but that's on a 8GB system. And I hate the memory footprint.)
1 GB of RAM costs about $10 now, probably less on eBay. It's easy to fit.
I've been using chrome for more than a year now and im quite impressed by its speed and responsiveness, but when you're consuming 1.4 Gigs of ram for just a few open tabs it made me think again. Is it worth the speed? I switched to firefox and IE now, using chrome only for emergency cases. BTW would you believe that IE 9 is the most energy efficient browser in benchmarks? So if you're on laptop mode it'll give you a much longer battery life by about 30 mins more. Chrome is the most energy hungry btw.
http://www.engadget.com/2011/03/29/ie9-is-the-most-energy-efficient-modern-browser-according-to-mi/
but I worked for a company such as this, once. They were eager to have me as soon as possible, and when I got there, they had no computer for me. A few days later, they managed to dredge up a pitiful antique that didn't have a network card, so I had to beg other employees to copy the files I needed to floppies. No one blinked an eye. It turned out to be standard behavior for the company. That sort of grotesque mismanagement should send red flags shooting up in all directions. Polish your resume and prepare to abandon ship.
Actually solving the prob, I recommend Dillo. Does 99% of whatever I need when I'm in a pinch. Fits inside of something like 10 megs, and you can learn it instantly if you're used to FireFox.
C|N>K
Yep, google chrome. Cheers ^^ or Lynx if you want true light weight.
Chances are instead of a "control freak" there was instead some inexperienced person/idiot that tied things down too tightly when procedures were written for quality assurance or similar. Small items should be treated like stationary supplies but instead get lumped in with major assets and you get a stupid process nobody likes.
Bullshit. If you have billable hours of some kind and you do something to stuff up an important server the IT guy gets sacrificed for not keeping you out. If they are a source of cost and you are a source of profit that is how it goes unless you do something criminal.
Use Opera and set the memory cache to use 4 mb. It's about a million times faster than firefox.
The Official Site of 1337 Pwnage
Qtweb is a good lightweight choice for older computers.
http://www.qtweb.net/
See also other browser choices at:
http://alternativeto.net/software/qtweb/
There will still some low end machines being sold with 512 in 2008, mostly during the XP/Vista transition debacle. 256 was the standard for many machines in 2003.
Freakin it techs think they are the only people to know anything about computers. Some of us design computers, some of us decided custmer service was a dead end job, dosn't mean we can't put in a stick of ram.
Arora (QT) or Midori (GTk). Both are light weight, Webkit and open source (if those things matters to you), Linux and Windows (wasn't clear from your situation) and both have binaries ready to go and are actively developed. I am much happier about these than the 'big three' (or big two on Linux).
My preference is Arora but the binaries are a bit dated so I am compiling. That probably is not an option for you. Midori is updated more often.
Dillo is another option but that's pretty minimalist.
"I just can't sit while people are saying nonsense in a meeting without saying it's nonsense" J Watson, Sci Am 288:(4)51
I have a P3 1 GHz laptop with 700ish megs of RAM - I've got an optimized XP on it, and IE 7 runs fine. In fact IE7 runs much faster than Firefox. So I'd streamline the OS as much as you can, then run IE 7.
Why should it take 512 megabytes of RAM to display a page of HTML? Really.
Not a new browser.
Why is this even in the news here... this just seems ridiculous. Does he drive a 1972 Nova too?
Why use Windows? I've got a T22 Thinkpad, with 512megs memory and a 900 mhz processor. I'm currently using it, with FireFox 4.01, w/add-ons. It's a bit pokey, but it works fine. How? Very simple.
I use Debian 6/LXDE - Pure and simple. With just a tiny bit of work, D6 is as easy to use and install as Ubuntu, but it doesn't have the bloat of Ubuntu. If your not forced to use propitiatory software, (IE, Outlook express) or even games, why continue on Windows?
How does my laptop run? Nearly as fast as a netbook of 1.6ghz, w/2g memory on Ubuntu 9.04 and /better/ than XP could run on it.
Ask if your allowed to try that. Dual boot it too to try them both. You may be surpised.
- Kc
Have a look at SeaMonkey. It's the direct descendant of Netscape Communicator (for those for whom that's a positive thing - it is for me) and works quite nicely.
http://www.seamonkey-project.org/
none of you has yet mentioned the possibility that this user is located in a poorer part of the world where a P4 is not yet as stigmatized or ancient as wealthier folk make it out to be.
Errm... to put this in perspective, I seem to recall that I looked it up and a 2.4GHz P4 actually benchmarks as significantly slower than the 1.6GHz Atom processor in the netbook I'm currently typing this on. Also, while you can get some speedup from using less bloated software, you'll still be browsing 2011-era websites with all their own nasty bloat...
According to the processor comparison tool at hwbot.org, the 2.4GHz P4 seems to be twice as fast as an Atom N270. But I dunno...
I'm posting this using K-Meleon on an old notebook with minimal memory (256 MB...with a bunch of that allocated for the video). K-Meleon is built on the Mozilla Gecko engine.
It's fast, stable, and lightweight. You won't see a lot of CSS3 effects, but otherwise, it's a fine small footprint browser, even for a tab-heavy user like myself. You can use a number of older Firefox extensions with a little work, and it responds to the usual Firefox performance tweaks as well.
> Am I the only one that's starting to get creeped out by the persistent quote at the bottom of /.?
At least it's not a comment. Considering that the quote is (currently)
> Are Linux users lemmings collectively jumping off of the cliff of reliable, well-engineered commercial software? -- Matt Welsh
you know that if it was a post there'd be a slew of "I am" and "Me too" replies, all moderated to +5 Funny...
(ducks)
Try midori, it's webkit based and aims to be small and compatible.
Can you slim down what your OS is running? I know with all the anti-virus and management software that IT forces on everyone it usually slows the system down quite a bit. If you can remove some of it that would help. I'd suggest installing Ubuntu on it. Any machine you need to manage you can RDP(Windows Remote Desktop) or SSH into.
you are on windows? why not just use IE ?
Another path to travel is the OS tweaking path. Assuming you have the admin rights needed... If not, hey, its may-day. tell the admin stuff that the proletarian movement demand more control over the means of production. Assuming its a Redmond spawned code were talking about, start by turning off some resource-hogging features like error reporting and fast user switching. Check out http://www.blackviper.com/category/guides/ for a list of services you can safely disable. Consider creating a trimmed hardware profile where some of the services and the drivers will be disabled. Last but not least, even though you seem fond of glitzy UI elements, try to disable some of the fade-in-while-i-yawn features. Most times you will not even see the difference, and the benefit in reduced mem. footprint is not trivial.
Another thing to consider is Flash. Minimize the number of flash\video\shockwave (etc.) instances to the required min. (i.e. - block ads and don't open more than 951 Youtube flicks @ once).
Using mem. management software may help or may even hinder. Its a trial-n-error process. No one solution (that I'm aware of) fits all configurations and usage patterns.
I've had some luck setting up some pretty neat 512MB and even 256MB systems. I even ran a proof-of-patience system for a while using XPsp2(or 3) Office 2003 and IE7(or 8 - I guess I suppressed these memories) with a mere 64MB of ram, I think Win2K would not even install under such conditions.
I repent!
Now... You can secretly bring along a Linux-on-a-stick and simply do most of your browsing from there. If you won't tell I won't.
Spend 20$ of your own (or less?) and get another 512 MB of RAM -> continue running firefox
Sounds like you should give Opera a try...
add a user on the office server and use mstsc
I am sure the server has more then 512ram
I better try Opera again, every modern browser I have is an absolute whore for memory.
Ola, did you try Surf? I use it most of the time. Made my index/bookmark page and I am most happy!
Kind regards, Goran
Whatever you do.. don't get fired or marked for installing something against company policies. Or doing something that might violate security policies. Things have vastly changed since I was a co-op at Xerox back in the 80's. Companies have been burned and fined by security violations and IT doesn't want to support N browsers. It's tough that they didn't give you a laptop that would allow you to fly free, I understand that, but ask around first..
Have you fscked your local propeller head today?
or risk failing the it partnership.
ask money for it, deduce in taxes - ANYTHING. if you're having trouble just running a web browser, what chance have you with modern ide's and other programs.
and of course lynx etc. but make sure everyone sees you using the lynx, so you guys get the computers you need to work.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
why you are being paid for this internship? dude, if you can't google browsers, what can you do?
You are being paid for an internship and not for surfing on internet, you insensitive clod!
Do you call your USB memory drive a lipstick?
http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5264/5676211571_b3660843f1_b.jpg K-meleon and Opera == 19 Mb FireFox 4 , PaleMoon, Chrome ,etc much bigger=
I have trouble believing a modern browser needs 512MB of RAM.
Surprisingly enough, Seamonkey is actually lighter and faster than Firefox. Give it a try.
Who would have thought people surfing the net with a computer twice as fast as a CRAY1 and with hundreds of millions of bytes of memory would be ridiculed for using a computer that was not up to the task.
Rekon, Arora, Midori, Dillo, elinks, links, lynx, w3m, Kazehakase, NetSurf
just because he wants to open ten browser tabs at once.
you say that like 10 tabs is lots