XPost: alt.windows7.general   
   From: mayayana@invalid.nospam   
      
   "Mr Pounder Esquire"  wrote   
      
   | Well, I followed Paul's advice and turned off hardware acceleration in   
   | Firebox (it's in "Advanced" and is easy to ignore)  and all has been fine   
   | all day long. I tried youtube, no problems.   
      
      XP here. Hardware accel enabled. No problems   
   once it loads, but it does take maybe 4-6 seconds   
   for first load, which is ridiculous on a modern   
   computer.   
      
      I also can't remember last time I saw a crash.   
   Years ago. But I do what I can to run lean   
   and safe. Script disabled by default. No local   
   cache allowed. ("Supercookies".) NoScript to   
   allow script when absolutely necessary. Cache set   
   to 0. (Most sites don't benefit anymore, anyway.   
   With sites building pages dynamically a 304 response   
   ("you already have this file") is very rare.   
      I also disable prefetching and most other recent   
   nonsense they've added.   
       I disable updates and delete the update files.   
   I also don't enable any kind of calling out, like   
   "health" reports or the "warn you about dangerous   
   websites" ninny service.   
      
     I maintain a decent HOSTS file, which blocks most   
   3rd-party crap. That saves on load times. I see most   
   pages load almost instantly.   
      
     The only extensions I have are for fixing broken   
   things like status bar, etc. I have no plugins. I   
   don't use tabs and try not to let browser windows   
   gather without cleaning them up.   
      
     One last note: If you have more problems specifically   
   with startup, try Process Monitor (procmon) from   
   sysinternals. With that you can see what FF is doing   
   before it opens. It could be something you didn't   
   suspect, like a corrupt file or too many fonts.   
      
     There's no excuse for slow browsers, but these days   
   they have a big job. If you don't limit script and maintain   
   a HOSTS file then on the average commercial webpage   
   you're loading dozens of images, a dozen giant scripts,   
   and maybe 200 KB of webpage. It's really a midsize   
   software program. (To get an idea, try downloading   
   "webpage complete" from some of the sites you visit.   
   Only a few years ago, 100 KB was too big. Now 2-3   
   MB of downloads is not unusual. It's a wonder that   
   browsers can work at all with such bloat.)   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)