Having been a solid Internet Explorer user for years, I was quite reluctant to try out the numerous alternative browser. However, when IE started getting hit hard by spyware I figured enough was enough. Switching to Firefox has been one of the best things I’ve ever done. Since using Firefox, I’ve never gotten hit by spyware (knock on wood). And the tabbed browsing was a godsend as an alternative to having a million Internet Explorer Windows open.
This year though, Microsoft came out with Internet Explorer 7 (IE7) which was a huge improvement over IE6 in terms of speed and security. And what’s this, it actually has tabbed browsing now too.
On top of this, the speed of IE7 is certainly faster than a stock Firefox setup. So as my browsing taste started to lean towards IE7 over Firefox, I had to stop myself and see what I could do to speed up my beloved Firefox. So let’s share what I’ve learned.
SPEED UP TIP:
1) Type “about:config” into the Firefox address bar and hit enter.
This will bring up your super advanced configuration settings for Firefox. Now scroll down and look for these:
network.http.pipelining
network.http.proxy.pipelining
network.http.pipelining.maxrequests
2. So our first change will make your browser access several components of a webpage at a time. You’ll need to change these settings to:
Set “network.http.pipelining” to “true”
Set “network.http.proxy.pipelining” to “true”
Set “network.http.pipelining.maxrequests” to 25-30.
3. Now RIGHT CLICK anywhere in the white box
Select New-> Integer.
Name it “nglayout.initialpaint.delay” and set its value to “0″.
That’s It! Now you should experience much faster Firefox browsing because we’ve removed Firefox’s built in delays. Like Firefox doesn’t start painting your page until it receives all the relevant information, now it’ll paint the page as it receives the info.
Enjoy your newer, faster and foxier FireFox!
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