Reading blogs and other websites, participating in Social Networking Sites, doing research, dropping Entrecards can create an overloaded and disorganized Firefox browser. Here are some ways you can avoid frustration, speed up your browsing and be more organized.
- Keep one lean clean, mean speedy profile free of addin toolbars, sidebars and multiple extensions for quick browsing..
- Use a different profile for visiting other sites and social networking.
(I would not recommend using this many toolbars at any one time!)
To start Firefox in profile view, where you can choose which profile to load and add new ones: Go to Start Menu/Run and type “firefox -profilemanager”. Mac users – “/Applications/Firefox.app/Contents/MacOS/firefox-bin —profilemanager” (without the “‘s) . From the profile screen you can choose to open Firefox in the Profile Manager each time you start the program. To run more than one profile at once use the Profile Switcher extension
- Keep your most used bookmarks at hand by using folders on your bookmarks toolbar. Eg – one for social networking sites, one for sites you visit regularly…
- Bloggers who take part in carnivals or regular memes (eg wordless Wednesday) or follow particular scheduled weekly posts may be interested in the Morning Coffee Firefox extension which allows you to organise favorite sites by day and open them in tabs. Thanks to Brown Baron for putting me on to this one. You could also use this to discipline yourself and not be sidetracked while working or studying, e.g. by setting weekend and weekday bookmarks.
- If you have the Greasemonkey extension installed the following scripts can speed up your browsing and make life easier:
- Disable Text Ads – Disables inline text ads from Vibrant Media (IntelliTXT), AdBrite, Infolicious (lingoSpot), Kontera, Linkworth, EchoTopic, Targetpoint and MediaText (to date).
- RSS+Atom Feed Subscribe Button Generator – automatically finds RSS and Atom subscription links on a webpage and insertsa feed subscription button to the top left of the page.
- It’s All Text, – speed up the process of writing in text areas (comments, forum posts etc) and do not lose what you have typed due to mishaps.
- If you are game to alter your Firefox configuration take a look at the tutorial Speed Up Firefox web browser
- Use the noscript extension to disable javascript, Java, Flash and other plugins for safe browsing as well as speed. You can choose which sites you wish to be excluded from the disable functions – It does take some setting up to do this though. Some love it, some find it annoying. If you do not want to use this all the time add it to your “lean” profile or to a new one
- It is wise to do backup or copy of your Firefox profile before editing your config or adding Greasemonkey scripts.
- It is always worth doing regular backups of your profile in case other problems arise.
Please let me know if you have any tips to speed up your browsing activities (apart from setting yourself a time limit that is – something I have rarely been able to achieve).
Wonderful tweaks, I desperately needed them; BTW I’m not a wombat am I?
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Ha Ha. I have too many tool bars. I am going to come back and look at this again.
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I’m going to have to check out FF Profiles. I’ve been using different browsers (kinda fun to try out Safari and Opera) as I hate clearing my cookies since I have multiple Entrecard accounts.
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And I tried to install the Kramer Plugin (very cool) but it the options won’t save on my blog. I wonder if it’s not compatible with WP 2.5
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This is great. I’ve pretty much given up on FF for a few reasons. One being the login problem, it just refuses to remember any of my logins any more. The other being the toolbar thing. I have a few of them and had looked for something that would make them into a one bar deal or something. This is great but I the login thing is too aggravating for me to go back to FF at this point.
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there is always great trick to make the time in cyber space more officiant – thanks for sharing your knowledge Sue!
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Some good tips there.
I hadn’t considered profiles but having read your post they’re perfect for web developers like me.
I’ve always opted for a very “standard” browser setup so I can (supposedly) see the web as others see it. With profiles I can have the browser how I like and have a separate profile for testing.
Excellent!
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I never knew profiles could be set in firefox, that is a pretty major innovation and one I’m going to have to try out
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Excellent! Guess who my next post is about…
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This is fantastic Sue,
Have just switched to flock, but these probably work there. Would you like to come and organise my firefox looks very complex
Will stumble this
Thanks
Suzie
“Disable Text Ads” is Great.I don’t like inline text ads.
[...] Sueblimely offered her advice on how to speed up your Firefox browsing. I'm going to be using this particular list of tips in order to get around better when I [...]
[...] Speed Up Your Firefox Browsing By: Sueblimely Excellent article on using Firefox. Since I use Firefox, I had to read it. The suggestions are great and now I’ve got some new plugins to play with. I love plugins. They make me happy. [...]
Great Tips!!!
Please write about grease monkey stuffs.
[...] profiles which I can run at the same time using the Profile Manager extension. Please see my post Speed Up your Firefox Browsing for more [...]
Great ideas, I really liked the arranging of the different folders. Thanks you for the nice visuals also.
Never knew that you can use different profiles in firefox. I am currently formatting my pc but I have noted the blog post as I would like to learn about using this feature.
Firefox is the best and the fastest (and the sweetest) browser. But I guess that it might also become sluggish if you just add and add plugins.
…And don’t we just love the plugins?
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I have found the All-in-one sidebar to be most helpful…… and then I can get rid of the bookmarks toolbar & have more space. Also the Adblock Plus addon is great.
Wow this will help me thanks
Hi,
It’s my first time to visit your site. I am using firefox as my default browser. Great tips you have here. Thanks for sharing.
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That profile manager is one of the sweetest tip I’ve ever heard of! I do the folder organization bit and the other plugins I’ve never heard of before. I’m always leery of adding more plugins as that in itself makes it slow as well. But that profile manager I’ve got to try…
Thanks!
How did I miss out on It’s All Text? What a useful plugin. Thanks for pointing it out.
For a self confessed internet addict, your tips on using morning coffee make a lot of sense. Just wish distractions were not so distracting while working.
No wonder this is one of your most popular posts. Awesome tips! Thank you!
I would recommend downloading the Adblock add on for Firefox. This allows you to block ads and sites from displaying on the pages of your choice. I’ve noticed my browsing is much faster with this installed.
Download Speed: 15356 kbps (1919.5 KB/sec transfer rate)
Upload Speed: 1750 kbps (218.8 KB/sec transfer rate)
This is with my boost.
My boost is perfectly safe and legal.
Myboost:
Here’s something for broadband people that will really speed Firefox up:
1.Type “about:config” into the address bar and hit return. Scroll down and look for the following entries:
network.http.pipelining network.http.proxy.pipelining network.http.pipelining.maxrequests
Normally the browser will make one request to a web page at a time. When you enable pipelining it will make several at once, which really speeds up page loading.
2. Alter the entries as follows:
[enter the text in the quotes, IE network.http.proxy.pipelining in the filter tab in the about:config page]
Set “network.http.pipelining” to “true”
(by clicking/doubleclicking it)
Set “network.http.proxy.pipelining” to “true”
(same as above, click/double click)
Set “network.http.pipelining.maxrequests” to some number like 30. This means it will make 30 requests at once.
(click, double click)
3. Lastly right-click anywhere and select New-> Integer. Name it “nglayout.initialpaint.delay” and set its value to “0″(click, double click). This value is the amount of time the browser waits before it acts on information it recieves.
If you’re using a broadband connection you’ll load pages MUCH faster now!
your welcome!
FireFox on my Mac was extremely slow. Last week, I tried the steps on this page: http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=358919. The result was FireFox with speeds 3-4 times faster. I don’t know how it works, but if you have a Mac, the steps on that site may be just what you need.
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Thanks for the post. It can surely improve work efficiency a lot.
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why do you need to use noscript addon when there is already an option in FF to disable javascript, images and java?
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Firefox is always so damn slowly. The second version was eating a lot of RAM and the third one eating half of the processor time when you open a lot of tabs.
I’ve tried different methods but I must say that it’s slowly anyway.
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Thanks for the tip.
I always try not to install o many plugins in firefox but it’s still slow.
The very first version of firefox i had was very fast.
Now i have to wait a lot for it to even open when i click the icon.
Rob
nice info thanks.
Thanks. I definitely needed the Morning Coffee add-on. LOL!
Cluttering Firefox with so many toolbar is not a good idea at all.I use Greasemonkey.It is helpful.
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Firefox r0x
IE sucks
My website work faster in IE than firefox. Don’t know why, though (well, I’m not a programmer. Please, don’t ask)
Nice article about Firefox tweaks. It looks that we need these tools more and more.
Do you know if you don’t have the toolbars showing, are they still slowing you down?
Thanks.
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My website work faster in IE than firefox. Don’t know why, though (well, I’m not a programmer.
Your tip “Keep your most used bookmarks at hand by using folders on your bookmarks toolbar. Eg – one for social networking sites, one for sites you visit regularly…” is just gooood.
10x
Just a question – Why not to show the numbers beside the top commentators list to give them gratification and motivation for the others to comment more?
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thanks for the valuable information i tried and it really help me up
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Hi I use firefox…it can be slow…I like the tips on the tool bar..i have to much on the tool bar…I need to look at that side… greasemonkey…sounds good…I thank you for all your information and taking time out to share….Thanks…Guys….
The other being the toolbar thing. I have a few of them and had looked for something that would make them into a one bar deal or something. This is great but I the login thing is too aggravating for me to go back to FF at this point.
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I’ve been using different browsers (kinda fun to try out Safari and Opera) as I hate clearing my cookies since I have multiple Entrecard accounts.
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I use to be a huge Firefox but lately it just has been frustrating. It freezes a lot and sometimes I have to kill the process in my task manager before I open Firefox again. I am going to try your tips. Hopefully it will help make Firefox run smoother for me, otherwise it’s time for a new browswer.
Cheers for these. I like FF a lot but sometimes it’s a bit slow for my liking.
Till then,
Jean
One of the reason I started using Chrome though FF was my favorite browser is because it took so long to start and then the reminder to install and upgrade one or other plug-in. So thanks for this article and the tips.
God bless Firefox. I don’t understand how so many people can manage to rack up more than 5 tool-bars which they never use and basically have the same functionality. Many of these people don’t even realize their installing these tool-bars because they didn’t read all the select boxes when installing software like anti virus software. You know straight away when you see someone’s computer with all these tool-bars that they are a complete amateur and their computer probably needs formatting. This is a very handy article, too bad most people who need to know about this site probably don’t care and won’t ever land here because they’ll type things like “how to make Internet faster?”.
The other being the toolbar thing. I have a few of them and had looked for something that would make them into a one bar deal or something.
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Such a great list of tips here. It always makes me smile when I see people with a huge tool bar with about 3 different search engines and huge icons.
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I love to use firefox because of it functionality. But some plugins are not working is higher version. These should be fixed.These are the great tips. Thanks for sharing.
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