It's your addons. On my Core Duo laptop without hardware acceleration, vanilla Firefox is snappy enough. However, I need my 23 addons, and most of the perceived lag comes from Adblock and Ghostery, things I can easily live with.
In short, point the arrow in the right direction. Firefox is already snappy, will get snappier, and when it is not snappy, it's either addons or very unlikely graphics drivers not playing well.
I actually found my experience to be the same. I'm currently running 27 addons, that do slow down my Firefox considerably. But when running a Vanilla installation, it does feel as snappy as Chrome.
However, I must add that the SSD is a rather lot like Morphine. With it's presence, you just don't care about the snappiness, as they both seem snappy enough. :)
I tested them without add-ons as well. Even with a completely clean FF installation (with nuked old profiles) on a modern system, my browsing habits always make it stutter, by which I mean opening multiple background tabs and leaving sessions open for long periods, sometimes days (with computer asleep overnight). Chrome and Opera tick along smoothly no matter what I throw at them, Firefox chugs with either situation. I tested a bit and it seems to be because Firefox will only use one process/core no matter what you are doing, leaving the rest of your cores untouched, so that when you're doing more than one thing at once in it it freezes up when the core hits 100% usage. Opera and Chrome on the other hand use multiple cores so they don't slow down when I do that.
If Firefox works well for you great, nothing against it, just sharing why I ditched it.
I used to think Firefox was snappy, fast, "good enough", usable, etc. It handled all the websites I threw at it, it displayed all the content I needed to see, etc. Then we implemented Zimbra, which is very JS-heavy, and I found myself waiting around a lot.
Switched to Chrome, and then I understood what "snappy" and "fast" really meant. :) And Firefox just seems pokey in comparison.
Firefox 8 was better. 9 better still. 10 a good improvement. And 11 was finally usable with Zimbra again.
But it's just not as fast as Chrome on JS-heavy sites. And these days, everything is JS-heavy. :(
[q]Now if they can just stop a Flash crash locking the entire browser.... [/q] And...Done! It is called Firefox 3.6 which loads flash in a separate process. But this was 2010 so you might not have read about it yet.
typical smart ass answer, unfortunately despite all the "current" versions somehow, Flash still manages to kill Firefox, often, so no it hasn't been fixed.
I started using 12 beta when it came out and surprisingly the memory problem I used to have with previous version finally got fixed!
In 11 if I let it running for more than 4 hours eventually the memory would increase upto 1.2GB and i could see firefox lagging and had to restart it. Yes this with 5-7 addons and a lot of tabs.
But with version 12 it never goes over 600k under the same load and I can keep it on as long as i want without it lagging!
This for me is a great improvement. I have tried others but none is as good as firefox imo.
Firefox uses upwards of 150k of memory at start up, without any addon. Chrome and Opera use a lot less. While it is true that memory is cheap these days, still it would be nice if Firefox could accomplish the same thing with less memory. It is always good form to write smaller programs with less pressure on hardware resources.
I have been the Mozilla browser since version 1.0 and have found it to be quite friendly and productive. However, I have heard more than I can remember that as far as web standards; and to some degree speed, go Opera is the browser to beat.
That's an unheard of low-amount of RAM, if we assume that is 150,000 bits, 18.75 kiB!
I think Mozilla should be commended. They were serious when they said they wanted to reduce bloat, but I didn't know they'd be getting it down this far.
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25 Comments
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tipoo - Tuesday, April 24, 2012 - link
Maybe its the threading architecture, maybe its something else, but as much as Firefox improves it just never has that snappy feel of Opera or Chrome.Also, I hope the silent updates mean no more articles for every few week release :P
Andrew.a.cunningham - Tuesday, April 24, 2012 - link
Gotta be thorough. :-) We do updates for Chrome, too, and those are already silent.jibberegg - Tuesday, April 24, 2012 - link
Just my 2c worth, but I like the updates. Pipeline is great place to put these mini-stories. Keep up the good work!sld - Wednesday, April 25, 2012 - link
It's your addons. On my Core Duo laptop without hardware acceleration, vanilla Firefox is snappy enough. However, I need my 23 addons, and most of the perceived lag comes from Adblock and Ghostery, things I can easily live with.In short, point the arrow in the right direction. Firefox is already snappy, will get snappier, and when it is not snappy, it's either addons or very unlikely graphics drivers not playing well.
Ronakbhai - Wednesday, April 25, 2012 - link
I actually found my experience to be the same. I'm currently running 27 addons, that do slow down my Firefox considerably. But when running a Vanilla installation, it does feel as snappy as Chrome.However, I must add that the SSD is a rather lot like Morphine. With it's presence, you just don't care about the snappiness, as they both seem snappy enough. :)
Ronakbhai - Wednesday, April 25, 2012 - link
Can't find edit button, but I must add that my first paragraph was made in reference to a regular 7200RPM HDD.tipoo - Wednesday, April 25, 2012 - link
I tested them without add-ons as well. Even with a completely clean FF installation (with nuked old profiles) on a modern system, my browsing habits always make it stutter, by which I mean opening multiple background tabs and leaving sessions open for long periods, sometimes days (with computer asleep overnight). Chrome and Opera tick along smoothly no matter what I throw at them, Firefox chugs with either situation. I tested a bit and it seems to be because Firefox will only use one process/core no matter what you are doing, leaving the rest of your cores untouched, so that when you're doing more than one thing at once in it it freezes up when the core hits 100% usage. Opera and Chrome on the other hand use multiple cores so they don't slow down when I do that.If Firefox works well for you great, nothing against it, just sharing why I ditched it.
phoenix_rizzen - Friday, April 27, 2012 - link
Define "snappy enough". :)I used to think Firefox was snappy, fast, "good enough", usable, etc. It handled all the websites I threw at it, it displayed all the content I needed to see, etc. Then we implemented Zimbra, which is very JS-heavy, and I found myself waiting around a lot.
Switched to Chrome, and then I understood what "snappy" and "fast" really meant. :) And Firefox just seems pokey in comparison.
Firefox 8 was better. 9 better still. 10 a good improvement. And 11 was finally usable with Zimbra again.
But it's just not as fast as Chrome on JS-heavy sites. And these days, everything is JS-heavy. :(
Kent_Diego - Tuesday, April 24, 2012 - link
Now if they can just stop a Flash crash locking the entire browser....Fergy - Wednesday, April 25, 2012 - link
[q]Now if they can just stop a Flash crash locking the entire browser.... [/q]And...Done! It is called Firefox 3.6 which loads flash in a separate process. But this was 2010 so you might not have read about it yet.
aguilpa1 - Friday, April 27, 2012 - link
typical smart ass answer, unfortunately despite all the "current" versions somehow, Flash still manages to kill Firefox, often, so no it hasn't been fixed.phoenix_rizzen - Friday, April 27, 2012 - link
That's the theory. Unfortunately, it's not always true in practise. Especially on non-Windows systems.Musafir_86 - Wednesday, April 25, 2012 - link
...should be "Firefox Updated to Version 12 with an Updated Updater". :)thegr8anand - Wednesday, April 25, 2012 - link
I started using 12 beta when it came out and surprisingly the memory problem I used to have with previous version finally got fixed!In 11 if I let it running for more than 4 hours eventually the memory would increase upto 1.2GB and i could see firefox lagging and had to restart it. Yes this with 5-7 addons and a lot of tabs.
But with version 12 it never goes over 600k under the same load and I can keep it on as long as i want without it lagging!
This for me is a great improvement. I have tried others but none is as good as firefox imo.
Fergy - Wednesday, April 25, 2012 - link
Do you use McAfee?thegr8anand - Thursday, April 26, 2012 - link
No, MS:SE and MBAMversesuvius - Wednesday, April 25, 2012 - link
Firefox uses upwards of 150k of memory at start up, without any addon. Chrome and Opera use a lot less. While it is true that memory is cheap these days, still it would be nice if Firefox could accomplish the same thing with less memory. It is always good form to write smaller programs with less pressure on hardware resources.I have been the Mozilla browser since version 1.0 and have found it to be quite friendly and productive. However, I have heard more than I can remember that as far as web standards; and to some degree speed, go Opera is the browser to beat.
Spoelie - Wednesday, April 25, 2012 - link
Something else is wrong, or that's just spreading FUD.http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/chrome-17-fire...
piroroadkill - Wednesday, April 25, 2012 - link
Something's wrong?He said it only uses 150k of RAM at startup!
That's an unheard of low-amount of RAM, if we assume that is 150,000 bits, 18.75 kiB!
I think Mozilla should be commended. They were serious when they said they wanted to reduce bloat, but I didn't know they'd be getting it down this far.
Jedi2155 - Wednesday, April 25, 2012 - link
Not necessarily. Afterall 640K ought to be enough for anybody ;).He probably meant 150 K * KB (i.e. he 150k = 150 MB).
versesuvius - Wednesday, April 25, 2012 - link
That is correct. It is not 150 K. It is 150,000 k. Right now as I am writing this it is 194,344 k.Sorry.
Fergy - Wednesday, April 25, 2012 - link
Type about:memory in your location bar. Post the results here. I am very interested where that extra 90MB goes to.versesuvius - Thursday, April 26, 2012 - link
It gives 130 Mb. After clicking minimize memory usage it is 116 mb. The windows task manager gives about 30 mb more around 190 mb and 160 mb.tipoo - Wednesday, April 25, 2012 - link
The original post does seem off, must be a leaky addon. But look at the memory recovery test on that page, doesn't look good.DukeN - Wednesday, April 25, 2012 - link
Update: Updated Firefox updated with updated updater.