How to speed up a browser?

[midwestyankee]

A few weeks ago I downloaded the Opera browser. I did this for a couple of reasons, one of which was the recommendation that it would run faster than IE. And at first I was truly impressed with how quickly it loaded pages as I navigated my way around Lit and other net places.

Lately, though, Opera seems to have gained weight and gotten sluggish. Pages load more slowly and it seems to hang up almost as often as IE used to.

I am running Win XP on a 1.4 gig processor. My net access is via a LAN and a cable modem. I regularly run both Ad-Aware and Spybot Search and Destroy and defrag or run Norton Speed Disk weekly.

What kinds of factors might cause a browser to slow down? Does anyone have any good ideas for returning Opera to its original lean and speedy state?

 

[Woodmiester]

Everytime you click the mouse or at least seemingly, you get an internet file or cookie and they are junk that slows it all down. Most folks think by simply setting up the system config to auto-delete cookies will clear them and that's just not true.

One of the better ways to clear these is to open your control panel however you want, and open Internet Options, or you can if using IE go to tools and then Internet Options. Once that's open make sure the General Tab is ontop and then click Settings in the middle section. Now click View Files. Once they all appear go to Edit, click Select All and hit the delete key on the KB or rightclick and delete. If it promts asking are you sure you want to delete these click yes.

You can and should also do a weekly Disk Cleanup using your system tools and defrag weekly if you surf much. And reboot afterwards and you should see a dramatic speedup

 

[jeffshi]

maybe you can have your system copied

i'm not good at computer. but as far i'm concered, maybe you could copy your operation system with a software called ghost. then you can always renew your system anytime it's slowdown.

hope it helps, thanks!

 

[Weird Harold]

What kinds of factors might cause a browser to slow down? Does anyone have any good ideas for returning Opera to its original lean and speedy state?

One thing I recently discovered that was slowing down my browsing was my Real-time Virus Scan -- I use PC-Cillin 6 which scans every file that is accessed; just pointing the mouse at an icon on the desktop generates a scan of that shortcut file.

I put all fonts on the do not scanlist for the real time scanner and it made a noticeable difference in Browsing speeds because the real-time scanner isn't scanning the hundrds of fonts on my system every time a web page specifies a font.

Other "watch" programs, like pop-up stoppers and Ad-Aware's immunize function, read each page you access for "bad things" and sometimes several programs will look at the page befor they collectively decide to let it load.

If you have programs that duplicate watch functions, turn one of them off (for the specific function duplicatd) and try to minimize the number of "watchers" vetting your browsing.

 

[heckle]

Re: maybe you can have your system copied

Going to try and recap some of the previous post...

Ghost - Not useful for cleaning up a system. Ghost is used to make and restore hard drive images. Just like reformatting and reloading but all done in one step.

Opera - Good browser. But like with anything else, you have to either keep the cache small or "empty" it every now and then.

AntiVirus programs - Yes, realtime scans can slow down a system but most of the time it doe snot have a drastic effect.

Some things you can try for general system performance is the following:
1. Clean up your desktop. Saving files on the desktop may be easy but it can also slow down your system. Making folders on the desktop is just as bad. Everything on the desktop is constantly refreshed by Windows. The more thats there, the longer it takes. The longer it takes, the slower the system will be.

2. Wallpaper or background images - Get rid of big ones. Reasoning? See item 1.

3. Themes - See item 1.

4. Sad as it may be, rebooting your PC every now and then can help out. Microsoft programming is terrible with the way it is written. No reusing of code.

5. Back to the desktop. Yes, check your display settings. Do you really need High (32 bit) or True (64 bit) color settings? Drop it down to Medium (16 bit).

6. Do you have alot of items in your task bar or the system tray? Take a look to the far lower right. Bet there is a bunch of stuff there. If you don't need it, get rid of it.

Well, thats just some simple ways. With me always going to the extreme. I think the best way to speed up a Windows machine is to install linux on it. Gentoo Stage 1 install.

 

[enigmalone]

Re: Re: maybe you can have your system copied

Going to try and recap some of the previous post...

Ghost - Not useful for cleaning up a system. Ghost is used to make and restore hard drive images. Just like reformatting and reloading but all done in one step.

Opera - Good browser. But like with anything else, you have to either keep the cache small or "empty" it every now and then.

AntiVirus programs - Yes, realtime scans can slow down a system but most of the time it doe snot have a drastic effect.

Some things you can try for general system performance is the following:
1. Clean up your desktop. Saving files on the desktop may be easy but it can also slow down your system. Making folders on the desktop is just as bad. Everything on the desktop is constantly refreshed by Windows. The more thats there, the longer it takes. The longer it takes, the slower the system will be.

2. Wallpaper or background images - Get rid of big ones. Reasoning? See item 1.

3. Themes - See item 1.

4. Sad as it may be, rebooting your PC every now and then can help out. Microsoft programming is terrible with the way it is written. No reusing of code.

5. Back to the desktop. Yes, check your display settings. Do you really need High (32 bit) or True (64 bit) color settings? Drop it down to Medium (16 bit).

6. Do you have alot of items in your task bar or the system tray? Take a look to the far lower right. Bet there is a bunch of stuff there. If you don't need it, get rid of it.

Well, thats just some simple ways. With me always going to the extreme. I think the best way to speed up a Windows machine is to install linux on it. Gentoo Stage 1 install.

Very good info!

E