So, Firefox 95...is it any better?

Call me fickle I guess. I was on FF again tonight, I typed a song review on on a music site and it would not post in the thread. It just sat there timing itself out. I copied my post, closed the site and went back in, my post was gone, I pasted it back in, same thing happened. It would not post my reply. I opened the same site in Chrome, pasted it and it went right through to the thread. I had a similar error in Facebook on FF. Maybe it has something to do with using Ublock in FF. I have no idea, don't really feel like tinkering with it right now.

I did download and try out Vivaldi, I am posting this from Vivaldi, it is just as fast and snappy as FF, it uses less ram and has a built-in ad blocker, which seems to work pretty darn well, and I can add Chrome store extensions. I also found this article, it looks like Vivaldi may be going to do everything they can to not use or support MV3. Vivaldi seems to be ok but I don't know much else about it yet, time will tell. I don't think I will try Brave, I just don't care for how it works.

www.zdnet.com

Opera, Brave, Vivaldi to ignore Chrome's anti-ad-blocker changes, despite shared codebase - ZDNET

Other browser makers don't seem to be on board with Google's decision to neuter its extensions API, and essentially, ad blockers.
www.zdnet.com www.zdnet.com

I really don't know how much good this is doing me anyway. I have an Android phone, I use Waze, I have a Chromecast on my tv and a gmail email and am signed in on Youtube. Google probably knows what I ate for breakfast this morning and can track me no matter what browser I use. I just want to get the full benefit of extensions the way they are intended. I don't like Google monkeying around with extensions I choose for my own browser.

C.H.
 
I am updating here one more time. I tried FF again tonight, I was able to post in that music site, for some reason though there was a lag of about 30 seconds after I submitted a test post, but it will go right through if I step off the site to a new tab and then go back again. That site is the only one with this problem. I tried turning off Ublock and MWB Browser Guard, it made no difference.

Facebook is working ok in FF now as well, I don't post anything in FB much but I am able now to read the posts from a few bands I follow there. I have no idea why it did not work before but it works now. I doubt any of this is a FF problem, it probably has more to do with those sites. Vivaldi works very well too, both seem to be good alternatives to Chrome/Edge.

C.H.
 
I might try that, to be honest FF is working ok, I don't post on either of those two sites often enough to worry about it much now anyway.

I spent some more time with Vivaldi last night too and I have to say I like Vivaldi better than FF. I have never seen a more customizable browser. Vivaldi is really fast and does not seem to need any extra adblocker extension, whichever one they have built in works great so far. The only security type extension I added is the MWB Browser guard. I think the less extensions I use, the better.

C.H.
 
Captain Holly said:
I have never seen a more customizable browser.
Click to expand...
I agree that it's much more customizable than othe chromium variants but the whole UI seems overblown or bloated because of all thse options. I tried it again this week and it just turned me off. I had to uninstall it after a short swing through all those settings. I can see its attraction for some users - maybe power users.
 
Kees1958 said:
I will give Brave a try in the near future. It loaded so slow in the past and I don't remember whether I could get the start/nee page a clean empty new tab.

Just tried, find the home tab very annoying, Brave is not for me.
Click to expand...
I tried Brave about 2 years ago. It was very slow and the ad blocker didn't work well at all. I haven't really wanted to try it again.
 
oldschool said:
I agree that it's much more customizable than othe chromium variants but the whole UI seems overblown or bloated because of all thse options. I tried it again this week and it just turned me off. I had to uninstall it after a short swing through all those settings. I can see its attraction for some users - maybe power users.
Click to expand...

This is very true. There are a lot of settings in Vivaldi, it is almost intimidating, and I am one of those guys that really likes to tinker with things, take them apart and find out how they work. I think I pretty much have Vivaldi to a useable state but I am still working on it for now. I wish FF had a built in ad blocker, one thing I am trying to do with this little experiment is keep extensions to a bare minimum.

C.H.

Edit: I spoke too soon. The more I monkeyed around with Vivaldi the less Iliked it. @oldschool you are right, there are too many settings and some of them will not stay put the way I set them either. Vivaldi looks good but in the end is just too much trouble. I removed it and will continue testing out this new Firefox.

C.H.
 
Last edited:
Captain Holly said:
Vivaldi looks good but in the end is just too much trouble. I removed it and will continue testing out this new Firefox.
Click to expand...

I'm sorry to hear that. Also reinstalled Viv as I'd used it a few years ago but it had stability issues then. The settings can be truly overwhelming and it's a rare individual who can tick all the right boxes without resorting to searching for this or that online (like how to get the Start page the way you like it and not some cluttered mess).

Firefox is lots more user-friendly. Still, I'm learning some new things about Firefox all the time, like the native push notifications setting in there. I'm keeping Vivald but watching the progression of manifest v.3 next year.. You can't beat chromium for performance at least. I'm done with Microsoft for now.

Edit: Yes, Vivaldi can look really good but it's not intuitive. It also has a screenshot/capture function which you can access on the bottom Status bar via the little Camera icon. Here's a snip--there are lots more themes now than there were then.

2021-12-18 12.12.35 vivaldi-webui a1be20357360.png
 
Last edited:
One last time, I have to say Firefox gets the nod. It is faster than Edge and Chrome and is easy to use, very intuitive. I added the Ublock Origin, Facebook ad blocker, Country Flags and Dark Reader extensions and that is all. FF still has the best graphics, it just looks sharper and much more clear to me. I will use it a while and see how things go, and I really hope MV3 does not cause problems with it. FF is turning out to be the least problematic browser I have tried.

Thanks to everyone here for your help on this.

C.H.
 
Kees1958 said:
I will give Brave a try in the near future. It loaded so slow in the past and I don't remember whether I could get the start/nee page a clean empty new tab.

Just tried, find the home tab very annoying, Brave is not for me.
Click to expand...
You can set home page at any URL you choose, new tab cab be blank page, for me start-up is a touch faster then Edge.
 
I used FF all this week and have to say it still works the best for me. It has sharp graphics, very fast browsing/page loading, memory use is pretty low, it looks good at night on dark mode when my eyes are tired and the privacy and security aspects are plenty good enough for me. I signed out of Chrome and made FF my default and hope to stay with it a while, as long as they don't make any radical changes to it, MV3 or otherwise. FF still has the least problems out of all the browsers I have tried, but I have learned to not be too complacent with the interwebz, some things online don't always stay the same for long.

C.H..
 
Last edited:

Recently browsing

Members who viewed this thread in the last 5 minutes

You may also like...

Back
Top