FIREFOX uses way more CPU than IE8

G

gmcjetpilot

New Member
My computer is only P4, 1.8 Ghz 512 Mb ram XP. When streaming video IE8 uses about 50-60% CPU. Memory is holding it's own at about 50-70%.

Firefox max's out CPU... just at 100%, video is fine, but forget doing anything else. Looking at the system diagnostics it's not just Firefox but the "plugin-container.exe" that opens with streaming video, using up to 50% CPU. On basic forum sites Firefox is at 2% of CPU. Streaming Firefox is about +40%. With the two, Firefox and "container" it's about 100%. Again IE8 is much less streaming.

What about Chrome? I am happy with EI8... but I think with the little use I had with Firefox I might like the features better. Is there a way to set the preferences in Firefox to save CPU?
 
You can try to cut out all of the extra stuff that you have enabled (like addons and extensions) in Fire Fox and see if it helps. Chrome seems snappier to me. It is worth a try to see if it works better on your system.
 
salvage-this said:
You can try to cut out all of the extra stuff that you have enabled (like addons and extensions) in Fire Fox and see if it helps. Chrome seems snappier to me. It is worth a try to see if it works better on your system.
Click to expand...
What are addons and extensions? I just loaded Firefox and it's pretty much default settings. I imported EI8 bookmarks... that was it.
 
salvage-this said:
You can try to cut out all of the extra stuff that you have enabled (like addons and extensions) in Fire Fox and see if it helps. Chrome seems snappier to me. It is worth a try to see if it works better on your system.
Click to expand...

Chrome all the way mate i aint going back to firefox lol.
 
FlashBlock

linkin said:
AdBlock Plus to disable those CPU-Hogging flash ads.
Click to expand...

Good suggestion :good: but I have noticed that some websites are getting around AdBlock+ (yes it's that popular) by changing the address of the ad so if I block it today then some time in the future an ad will appear again.
While I still use AdBlock+ because it also reorganizes the page I recommend the use of the FireFox extension FlashBlock.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/flashblock/
FlashBlock will block all flash but then you simply click on the FlashBlock icon to view what is blocked that one time or you can permanently allow a whole website so FlashBlock won't block anything.

The following FireFox tweak can also help with RAM usage.
- Open a new Tab in FireFox
- In the address bar type about:config then press the Enter key
- Accept the silly warning
- Right click anywhere on the page and select New then click Boolean
- Name the new Boolean config.trim_on_minimize and set it's Value to true
- Close the Tab

When you Minimize the window FireFox will 'trim' (release) unneeded RAM, this means FireFox will take a split second longer to Maximize the window (I don't notice the difference) but you get that extra RAM without closing FireFox :)
 
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