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What can I do to improve browsing performance?
In particular I have a browser-session with around 1000 tabs (they only load when they're clicked). And I also open up many new tabs at the same time quickly and would like to have them load very fast.
I'm using Chrome and Firefox (I'll probably switch to Firefox-only later).
I'm looking for any recommendations towards that goal - from hardware-upgrades to software and configuration-changes.
I'm not sure what parts of my hardware setup are the weakest here. I'll probably upgrade my mainboard and CPU soon. As of right now I got the Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 2.4ghz, 8GB of 800MHz RAM (would 1600MHz and maybe DDR4 be much better for browsing?) and 64Bit Windows 10.
What would you recommend?
mYnDstrEAm
Posted 2017-01-12T13:20:55.817
Reputation: 297
1Use less tabs. No, really this is the best solution available. From my own experience you're just running into software issues and not so much hardware issues with that amount of tabs. You should be using the 64-Bit version of Firefox. Other than that you would have to look at the actual memory consumption to decide whenever more RAM would help. Faster could help as well as it would reduce the time to load a block of memory into the CPU but as I said it's probably software issues you're running into with that amount of tabs. – Seth – 2017-01-12T13:31:29.437
@Seth I knew that this would get brought up ;) It's my current "solution" - it's not really a solution though as it's still pretty slow with fewer tabs. When opening up many new tabs at once it takes quite a long time to load (from what I can see that's not a loadtime issue but an issue of handling/properly caching the data) even if I don't have many open already. Also even when I use fewer tabs I reach ~30 sooner or later. I guess for RAM it's mainly the freq and less the amount that needs to be upgraded. If it's software issues why aren't those suited for multi-tab browsing? I mean it's 2017 – mYnDstrEAm – 2017-01-12T14:15:20.143
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They are just not to the extend you're doing it. Depending on what you actually experience you might also have to look into the number of concurrent connections your Browser of choice is using. As it might not be so much a display but rather a request issue. In addition this might also be impacted by your connection speed and the kind of page you're loading. Naturally the loading process of simple HTML pages is pretty fast in comparison to media rich sites.
– Seth – 2017-01-13T06:31:12.220@Seth But we got quantum computers, video games with graphics that are indistinguishable from reality, Moore's law for decades etc etc and we still can't figure out a way to get a browser to properly handle someone actively surfing the net as it's needed for proper research etc? Seriously? :/ I'm really disappointed - I'm not the only one browsing this way. I don't think it's a display or connection-speed issue. I mostly need it for media-poor Wikipedia (meta) pages. But thanks for the settings-tip - that's useful! – mYnDstrEAm – 2017-01-13T08:55:42.720
1I have a few machines with lower specifications in that in use. Your machine is essentially at least as good as the lowest end modern machine. Switching to 64 bit firefox seems to run better for me anecdotally. Throw in an SSD - you're stuck with SATA 2 so you don't need a high end one, but once again, a low end one will perform better than your current storage as a boot drive. That said... 1000 tabs is ridiculous, and I wonder if you're limited by something other than the usual. – Journeyman Geek – 2017-02-19T11:06:50.043
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Heh. Ok, as a fellow high-tabs user: more RAM. I'd say 16 GB as a minimum. If you like to keep tabs unloaded, that's even better - get an extension that does so, or reopen the browser often-ish. 64-bit browser is an absolute must. Your CPU is long overdue for an upgrade, but whether that'll have much effect depends on your browser and the sites you visit. Also, some tabs kept open for a long time can leak memory, and this can be rather nasty. If you feel like discussing this more, we can do so in chat - Q&A might not be great for this.
– Bob – 2017-02-19T11:13:57.730