Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

evilgold · 2009-05-28 11:52:00

Hey guys,

Well today was kind of the last straw for me with firefox.

Memory usage in general always tends to be a bit too much on all my machines (although this is the first time its gone THIS high). and CPU usage (especially when idle) is too high on my older machines.

I'd really like a browser that supports some kind of adblocking, and would prefer something thats close to as customizable as firefox is.

What do you guys recommend and why?

also, can anyone explain what happend here with firefox? After killing and then recovering the tabs it only used about 200mb, even though it had the same stuff open.

fumbles · 2009-05-28 13:01:07

.

Last edited by fumbles (2020-09-26 11:42:01)

MazurMe · 2009-05-28 13:02:34

As fumbles already said, midori or arora.

kensai · 2009-05-28 13:13:57

I am growing fond of Arora, it is a great little browser, and found deals way better with heavy flash sites, less cpu usage I have noticed on those and less memory consumption, still I can;t make the change, arora has come a long way, but still is far to the level that I can replace firefox with.

ArchArael · 2009-05-28 14:09:39

That's probably flashplugins issue and not firefox, hence, changing browser does not solve anything. IMHO.

evilgold · 2009-05-28 14:36:58

ArchArael wrote:

That's probably flashplugins issue and not firefox, hence, changing browser does not solve anything. IMHO.

Well in the issue with it using ~2gb ram, it was a flash issue. Apparently leaving youtube open in a tab causes a HUGE memory leak. However this is not my only gripe with firefox. And the memory usage of FF compared to just about any other browser seems like its a bit high in general. Currently i'm trying Konqueror out, and its not using nearly as much memory as firefox does under the same usage. Firefox is regularly listed at the top of my CPU and memory usage, and sometimes it idles at around 30%CPU usage or more (this is a big issue on my laptop which will throttle the CPU up even if the computer is just sitting there).

I could really go on with a huge list of the issues i'm having with firefox, but its really a moot point, i just want an alternative. Konqueror has some other serious issues making it a bad alternative (like crashing when i compose a message in gmail...NO WONDER its not a supported browser).

I'm going to try opera next, but i'd really like to use an open source alternative if possible. I used it a few years ago, and i dont recall hating it or having any real issues with it, so maybe its time to go back..

Does anyone know if this bug affects 32bit flash/nspluginwrapper? I've been using the 64bit flash since it was released, and this is the first time I've seen such a HUGE problem pop-up.

snowpine · 2009-05-28 14:43:52

Nothing personal, but I've never understood why people complain about Opera not being open source when they are using Adobe Flash.

I've had pretty good luck with Epiphany. It is kind of conservative and uninspiring, but a solid performer. Currently using Firefox though.

wonder · 2009-05-28 14:46:05

just for my curiosity, why do you run firefox 3.0.8?. i know that version had a problem with memory consumption.

Last edited by wonder (2009-05-28 14:46:15)

Nezmer · 2009-05-28 14:56:37

An interesting fact :
Epiphany-git is lighter than Midori
http://omploader.org/vMXF0Yw
I use Epiphany+privoxy(for filtering) full-time now .

TODO list for Epiphany/WebKit 2.28

Inxsible · 2009-05-28 16:01:59

uzbl

evilgold · 2009-05-28 16:08:05

Epiphany and Opera both lack ad blocking, so they are pretty much a no go for me. Opera is pretty good, but it has the same flash problem as firefox...

I'm really starting to wonder whats going on here with flash, because it seems like a VERY SERIOUS issue. Opera seems to run nspluginwrapper on its own, which eats up ram just the same as in firefox. Except i noticed with opera that i wasnt on any flash heavy sites at the time. there might have been a banner add or 2 that where using flash, if anything at all.

konqeror seems to run okay in regards to flash, but i might not have been using it long enough in one sitting, it crashed A LOT.

On the other side of things, does anyone use privoxy or something similar for adblocking? this looks like its my only option if i dont want to use either FF or Konqueror.

Army · 2009-05-28 16:19:22

You could give firefox 3.5b4 a try, been my default browser for the last weeks, it uses less ram here than the one in [extra], it's faster, xulrunner isn't as buggy and give privoxy a shot all you guys missing adblock in opera, midori etc.

ammon · 2009-05-28 17:18:59

+1

mcmillan · 2009-05-28 17:50:08

Opera both lack ad blocking, so they are pretty much a no go for me

Actually opera does have adblocking, it's just not as intuitive as ad-block in firefox. The quickest way to get it going would be to install the opera-adblock package in the AUR.

But like you said after that, flash seems to have started eating up a lot of memory lately, personally it's seeming worse in opera than firefox.

soupcan · 2009-05-28 18:38:58

Inxsible wrote:

uzbl

+1 for uzbl

Ronin-Sage · 2009-05-28 20:53:53

The memory usage issues are more of a Gecko rendering engine issue moreso than a Firefox issue, at least when it comes to memory being reported as "stolen"/missing after extended periods of surfing-time. Some suggestions(organized by "weight" as in features)

Heavyweight:
- Opera(Presto)
- Konqueror(KHTML)

Middleweight:
- Epiphany(Gecko; webkit)
- Kazehakase(Gecko; webkit)

Lightweight:
- Midori(webkit)
- Arora(webkit)

I believe only Opera and possibly another browser or two on this list would have built-in ad-blocking support, however, if ad-blocking is that important to you, consider setting up something like privoxy(consult the wiki for this), which makes for browser-agnostic filtering.

electricshoes · 2009-05-28 20:58:47

uzbl is great once you get the commands down.

DevoidOfWindows · 2009-05-28 21:07:30

For ad-blocking in Opera, use Fanboy's Adblock List. To use a media player plug-in (Totem, VLC, MPlayer) to play videos on YouTube and Google Video instead of Flash, use Free YouTube! (Firefox, Epiphany, Midori, and Opera [with slight modification]). Using a media player plug-in will give you full video acceleration, and rid you of the Flash-related woes.

Last edited by DevoidOfWindows (2009-05-28 21:10:33)

snowpine · 2009-05-28 22:22:14

Epiphany has an ad blocker.

electricshoes · 2009-05-28 22:29:47

DevoidOfWindows wrote:

Free YouTube! (Firefox, Epiphany, Midori, and Opera [with slight modification]). Using a media player plug-in will give you full video acceleration, and rid you of the Flash-related woes.

Thanks for the Free Youtube info!

ctarwater · 2009-05-28 22:37:48

I've been using Arora for a bit and I really like it (granted I use almost no plugins for firefox, so I don't miss them)

Also, the "alpha" version of Chromium was released today and I've been playing with it a bit with great results. There is no flash support, so there is your ad blocking! (you can get it in the AUR)

ArchArael · 2009-05-29 08:46:17

snowpine wrote:

Nothing personal, but I've never understood why people complain about Opera not being open source when they are using Adobe Flash.
I've had pretty good luck with Epiphany. It is kind of conservative and uninspiring, but a solid performer. Currently using Firefox though.

Good question. In my humble opinion is because Opera has good open alternatives but flash has not. I would like to remove Flash 8 IDE, flashplugin and all other proprietary software I have installed on my machine but it is very hard because I need them for work. Although flash is not the best thing I have worked with it provides a sort of common ground for the multimedia.

I am a web developer but most people need it to access multimedia content.

I really hope that html5 will solve this "issue".

bernarcher · 2009-05-29 20:28:40

soupcan wrote:

Inxsible wrote:
uzbl
+1 for uzbl

Yet another +1.

Although you need some time to get used to its minimal concept. This turned out to be not too hard, however, once the script and config examples were understood.

alienman · 2009-05-29 20:55:45

There is a plugin for epiphany that allows you install some useful plugins. One of the is an AdBlocker which you can configure. Btw doe anyone knows if there is a way in which I could tell epiphany to play flv (flash player video files) with mplayer or totem???

Thanks in advanced.

The package for the extensions is epiphany-extensions

ammon · 2009-05-29 22:36:17

Why there is dependency on epiphany for network-manager?
I doesent make sense. I would use it i there could be clean install without half of gnome libs.

Arch Linux

#1 2009-05-28 11:52:00

Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#2 2009-05-28 13:01:07

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#3 2009-05-28 13:02:34

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#4 2009-05-28 13:13:57

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#5 2009-05-28 14:09:39

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#6 2009-05-28 14:36:58

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#7 2009-05-28 14:43:52

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#8 2009-05-28 14:46:05

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#9 2009-05-28 14:56:37

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#10 2009-05-28 16:01:59

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#11 2009-05-28 16:08:05

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#12 2009-05-28 16:19:22

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#13 2009-05-28 17:18:59

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#14 2009-05-28 17:50:08

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#15 2009-05-28 18:38:58

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#16 2009-05-28 20:53:53

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#17 2009-05-28 20:58:47

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#18 2009-05-28 21:07:30

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#19 2009-05-28 22:22:14

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#20 2009-05-28 22:29:47

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#21 2009-05-28 22:37:48

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#22 2009-05-29 08:46:17

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#23 2009-05-29 20:28:40

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#24 2009-05-29 20:55:45

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

#25 2009-05-29 22:36:17

Re: Firefox issues, looking for an alternative

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