Firefox 7 released, promises improved memory management

The latest version of Mozilla's Firefox browser, released yesterday, promises to cut down on the amount of memory it uses.

Poor memory management is perhaps the biggest complaint among Firefox users. With the emergence of Google's Chrome browser, which is notably light on memory usage, has made the issue more pressing for Mozilla developers to address.

The announcement on the Mozilla blog promises:

Firefox manages memory more efficiently to deliver a nimble Web browsing experience. Users will notice Firefox is faster at opening new tabs, clicking on menu items and buttons on websites. Heavy Internet users will enjoy enhanced performance when lots of tabs are open and during long Web browsing sessions that last hours or even days.

They have also added an option to send performance data to Mozilla to help with future improvements, which you will be asked about the first time you run Firefox 7.

Other changes include modifications to Firefox Sync intended to make passwords and bookmarks update almost immediately and a new rendering engine which should speed up HTML5 2D animation rendering for most Windows 7 and Vista users.

Written by: Rich Fiscus @ 28 Sep 2011 9:28

ROMaster2

This is still a freakin' joke...

28.9.2011 10:01 #1

xminusone

Wow! ". . . Google's Chrome browser, which is notably light on memory usage--"

Have you actually USED Google Chrome or Chromium--or even SRWare Iron? All of them routinely swallow up all the RAM and swap space on every machine I've used or repaired.

True, they're exemplary if you normally browse with less than five tabs open, but who does that anymore? I can browse with Firefox with over 100 tabs open and it still doesn't swallow as much memory as Chrome does with 20 to 30 open.

It's especially a problem since the all-knowing, all-seeing Goog chooses not to allow end users any control over the browser (such as setting cache limits) and the command switches seem to do little anymore.

Chrome is increasing market share because people would rather let the Goog think for them; Firefox takes a little bit of thought and common sense every now and then.

28.9.2011 10:27 #2

DXR88

Good God Man, 100 tabs. You need to visit tabbers anonymous and get some professional help.

28.9.2011 15:09 #3

aldan

never had ff use any more than 35% of my ram and it doesnt increase with time.

28.9.2011 23:01 #4

xtago

Originally posted by xminusone: Wow! ". . . Google's Chrome browser, which is notably light on memory usage--"

Have you actually USED Google Chrome or Chromium--or even SRWare Iron? All of them routinely swallow up all the RAM and swap space on every machine I've used or repaired.

True, they're exemplary if you normally browse with less than five tabs open, but who does that anymore? I can browse with Firefox with over 100 tabs open and it still doesn't swallow as much memory as Chrome does with 20 to 30 open.

It's especially a problem since the all-knowing, all-seeing Goog chooses not to allow end users any control over the browser (such as setting cache limits) and the command switches seem to do little anymore.

Chrome is increasing market share because people would rather let the Goog think for them; Firefox takes a little bit of thought and common sense every now and then. I don't know about that I usually have firfox chewing up over 150megs of ram with less than 5 tabs open if I'm on a youtube binge then I might have up to 50 or more tabs open and with all the flash firefox just falls a part, it's a bad problem it has.

Then flash starts to stuff up and other things in pages will screw up.

I have 4 gig of ram and it'll be chewing up memory the highest I've seen has been about 400+ meg and I don't actively look at it.

29.9.2011 08:48 #5

juventini

Originally posted by DXR88: Good God Man, 100 tabs. You need to visit tabbers anonymous and get some professional help. Originally posted by DXR88: Good God Man, 100 tabs. You need to visit tabbers anonymous and get some professional help. NICE

Forza Juve!!

29.9.2011 12:06 #6

juventini

The update from FF was MUCH needed. FF running much better. Thx Mozilla.

Forza Juve!!

29.9.2011 12:09 #7

oneguy

It is running better now but it's still slow.... I could have about five or six ff windows open with about 8 or 9 tabs now and it work alright, still kinda slow but I dont have to reconsider the use of each tab... until i open up something with flash then it just kills it. I've got 4gb of ram with about 1.95 gigs of ram being used, some of that is my ps3 media server running but still. I dont use googles because ff does give us more say with settings. So it's improved but I'm hoping they figure out a way to make it easier for ff users that stay busy multitasking windows and tabs on any given day with flash included. I dont do 100 tabs but if I did ever have to research something that required me to I'd hate to think my shit will crash.

29.9.2011 12:50 #8

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