new firefox user here. loads really slow. any tips?

As titled...

when i first open FF, it takes quite a long time to load, and it seems like the pages take longer to load than IE also. as for the startup, i'm thinking MAYBE it's because of the 'latest headlines' bookmark that came pre-installed? it seems like it first goes to bbc.co.uk to get all the new headlines first before it actually opens FF properly, but am not too sure about this?

otherwise, i'm quite happy with it. seems pretty cool, it does take less resources, but it's just slower...

TIA!

 

FF actually takes longer than IE to open. That's just because of the technologies that it is using (the way it was written). This is particularly noticable if you have an older system and/or a slower hard drive. I've been using FF since it was known as Phoenix (version 0.6) and it's always been slower than IE to load the first time and there were no RSS feeds and stuff back then.

But you can definitely try playing around with RSS feeds etc and see if it makes any difference.

 

download firetune and the faster fox extension. makes surfing WAY faster!

 

I'll second Firetune.

Link: http://www.totalidea.com/content/firetune/firetune-index.html

 

Firefox is slower to load than IE mostly because IE is integrated into Windows' Explorer OS interface. You can make the same true for Firefox by downloading and installing Firefox Preloader. This will create a startup item for firefox and make loading FF just as fast as IE. At present, I believe this is the only way to speed up the startup. The downside, as you guessed, is that it adds another startup item to Windows and it takes more resources.

 

There is an extension called FasterFox that really helps. Also you could remove the headlines bookmark if you wanted to. Loading ads also cause slowdowns so download Adblock extension and block the culprits.

 

I'm curious, how much longer to start up? I have 2 desktops here, and on the ancient one with only 256mb ram, it only takes about 10 seconds longer than IE

However, FF is faster than IE in loading pages, as well as Opera and Maxthon to be faster than IE, so that aspect of your post puzzles me

 

type about:config in the address bar.
type "pipe" (less the quotes). There will be three entries. Change the booleans to true, and the Integer to something high, like 50.
Loads pages faster, not sure if it helps initial startup of firefox. I haven't used firetune or fasterfox, they probably incorporate this.

 

@ above, good stuff...I do notice an improvement

Can't wait if I get into the uni I want and have free high speed broadband

 

the fasterfox extension doesnt work with the new version does it?

 

If you have enough ram to spare, you can try the firefox preloader to improve startup time (it basically just loads FF during startup and keeps it in the tray).

 

thanks to all who gave suggestions. i will try this when i get home and let's see how it goes.

thanks again! very much appreciated