why does my firefox now suck

[taxico]

i've been using firefox the past few years... it seems at least since 2014 it's been getting really awful.

sites don't load - i have been quick to blame my ISP when i now realize (almost) everything works when i fire up IE. examples include singapore government websites (ACRA, bizfile, etc).

i'm on the cusp of moving to chrome. am i the only one? my wife doesn't seem to think there's a problem...

[zzm9980]

It can be a lot of reasons. Firefox historically tends to stick to the "standards" more than other browsers. Unfortunately there is a lot of buggy HTML on the web, so that means Firefox may not render it as well where as other browsers make concessions for poorly written sites.

Other things include Firefox not always bundling support for protocol or standards that weren't completely open-sourced and unencumbered by patents. For a while that meant Firefox couldn't natively play h.264 video without a third-party plugin. (h.264 is an open standard, free to use, but some people have patents that may or may not cover some parts of it) They finally gave on on the video thing though.

I'd say go with Chrome. I'm a pretty heavy web using (having spent years as a web app sec tester) and have a browser up 10+ hours a day. I've been using Chrome now for a while and find it is mostly the most stable, fast, and secure. There are still the occasional sites which don't work (Funny enough I think Singtel's bill pay site and a couple of Singpass sites). I use Safari on those.

[sundaymorningstaple]

I generally use Chrome for general surfing and firefox for large downloads as I find it's usually faster and more stable on downloads (although recently I'm finding it's starting to suck as well, but I'm not sure its the browser or the ISP.

[taxico]

thanks! chrome it is! my wife is not keen on moving to chrome as she thinks it will collect, store and data mine everything (a la gmail/google).

personally, i don't care as long as it works...

sunday: have you tried a download manager add-on for chrome or does it not work?

[sundaymorningstaple]

Never tried one there. I used to use one on FF but found it really didn't matter that much. Aside from allowing multiple downloads but in those days I didn't have the bandwidth to make it worth while. Should maybe try it now as well. If you find a free d/l manager that is worth a darn in Chrome, let me know and I'll give it a try as well.

[Brah]

thanks! chrome it is! my wife is not keen on moving to chrome as she thinks it will collect, store and data mine everything (a la gmail/google).

same here, so I use it only for certain things

I use FF for others,

I find Chrome starts to hog, but you can kill PIDs that are for specific pages it seems, unlike FF where it kills the who browser.

If you kill and restart the browser it usually alleviates the hog problem for a while. Not sure but I may have reverted (see that, 'revert", correct use of the word in Singapore, imagine that) back to an older version.

[Strong Eagle]

thanks! chrome it is! my wife is not keen on moving to chrome as she thinks it will collect, store and data mine everything (a la gmail/google).

same here, so I use it only for certain things

I use FF for others,

I find Chrome starts to hog, but you can kill PIDs that are for specific pages it seems, unlike FF where it kills the who browser.

If you kill and restart the browser it usually alleviates the hog problem for a while. Not sure but I may have reverted (see that, 'revert", correct use of the word in Singapore, imagine that) back to an older version.

Use DoNotTrackMe. Google search will track you regardless. Chrome and FF both will track you.

[zzm9980]

thanks! chrome it is! my wife is not keen on moving to chrome as she thinks it will collect, store and data mine everything (a la gmail/google).

personally, i don't care as long as it works...

sunday: have you tried a download manager add-on for chrome or does it not work?

Don't "Sign in" to Chrome, and you'll negate Google's ability to collect metrics on you with it. You also lose the advantage of Synchronizing bookmarks, settings, and open Tabs though... One of the nice things about Chrome is the ability to put it on your Laptop/Phone/iPad/tablet and access all of your other active tabs from anywhere.

[Brah]

I never sign into Chrome, and I rarely sign into Gmail or G+.

I keep one Chrome browser with tabs of things that require my identity - email, FB and other accounts

I keep FF and Chrome incognito/private browsers open for a lot of other things, and other accounts in different names for similar services.

I have NoScript and Ghostery on FF and block most of the Google services (and probably should block more). I haven't tried DoNotTrackMe.

And I often run a VPN homed outside of the country.

But even with all that I don't think you can stay so safe.

Oh and I also try not to use Google Search so much, been using Yahoo, DogPile, ixquick, DuckDuckGo, and one other I can't remember.

[zzm9980]

thanks! chrome it is! my wife is not keen on moving to chrome as she thinks it will collect, store and data mine everything (a la gmail/google).

same here, so I use it only for certain things

I use FF for others,

I find Chrome starts to hog, but you can kill PIDs that are for specific pages it seems, unlike FF where it kills the who browser.

If you kill and restart the browser it usually alleviates the hog problem for a while. Not sure but I may have reverted (see that, 'revert", correct use of the word in Singapore, imagine that) back to an older version.

Use DoNotTrackMe. Google search will track you regardless. Chrome and FF both will track you.

Google tracks via ads no matter which browser you use. How does FF (the browser) track the user, and who do they report it to (as they're a non-profit and how they make their money is transparent for the public to see)?

Also, this extension/add-on for both firefox and Chrome is great: https://disconnect.me/

NoScript for Firefox is also good, but that's the Nuclear option. Most sites just won't work at all, and you'll have to enable so many things on each site to make them work the script becomes pointless.

[Brah]

Google tracks via ads no matter which browser you use. How does FF (the browser) track the user, and who do they report it to (as they're a non-profit and how they make their money is transparent for the public to see)?

Also, this extension/add-on for both firefox and Chrome is great: https://disconnect.me/

NoScript for Firefox is also good, but that's the Nuclear option. Most sites just won't work at all, and you'll have to enable so many things on each site to make them work the script becomes pointless.

You are right, there are some sites that won't work unless I un-disable scripts for those sites - sometimes I can get them to work, sometime not, then if I still want to visit the site I do it in an incognito Chrome browser.

The nice thing about NoScript is you can temporarily allow trackers one by one just for that visit.

Pretty shocking how many scripts run on some sites, Ghostery and NoScript show you these. They are great add-ins. And they often address performance issues per the OP.

I'm still looking for something to disable automatic updates to HuffPo without losing the article pics. I have tried many ways so before anyone offers suggestions make sure you try it yourself and be sure it works.

[mironet]

Have you tried Flashblock or any extension to block flash ads?

It helped a lot improving speed and temporary hangups, you decide what do you want to see and what to hide...

[Brah]

How are those different from NoScript or Ghostery?

[rajagainstthemachine]

Ghostery is very good at blocking websites which track you, its a definite must have on whatever browser one has.
I use opera and IE, I use IE for my intranet as several of my work apps support just IE.
for the internet I use Opera but NOT the latest version! The old version gives you opera link which allows you to sync your favorites, notes etc between multiple devices.
HOWEVER! Opera decided that it would take a u turn and stop development on a parallel competing browser to Chrome, but it took chrome open source version and developed its own skin and that's the new/latest Opera.
I tried the new version on another computer, it is a major disappointment right now, a lot of features the older versions of opera have not been ported over.
I therefore use the old version until they fully migrate everything.

[Brah]

Mine was a rhetorical question as I doubt the prior poster bothered to either read the earlier posts or know that NoScript does exactly what he/she was suggesting.

Interesting to hear from another Opera user, I only stopped using it recently, because of performance and other (newsfeed) issues. At one point I ran 4 different browsers, all with different purposes and accounts.