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Has Firefox jumped the shark?

kirkbross

kirkbross

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Mar 6, 2007
666
22
Los Angeles
There may be similar threads already, but I have found over the past year that Firefox (for Mac OS at least) has gotten consistently slower and more glitchy. It's a drag to get all my cookies and passwords and bookmarks transfered, but I'm considering going to Safari full time.

Anyone else share this view?
 
I've been on OS X for a little over a year. I've never been tempted to go the Firefox route at all.. Safari works that well for me. And the latest incarnation is lightning-fast. Give Safari a shot, I think you'll be pleased.
 
I used to love Firefox but it's completely unuseable to me anymore. Now I admit, I'm on an old, weak ibook (512 mb :eek:) but Safari handles it just fine. I opened up and updated Firefox yesterday because I wasn't able to view a website on Safari and it took me 20 minutes to do anything because FF kept freezing and I was getting the spinning mouse symbol, etc. Crazy! I'm very glad I switched to Safari last year.
 
UngratefulNinja said:
I used to love Firefox but it's completely unuseable to me anymore. Now I admit, I'm on an old, weak ibook (512 mb :eek:) but Safari handles it just fine. I opened up and updated Firefox yesterday because I wasn't able to view a website on Safari and it took me 20 minutes to do anything because FF kept freezing and I was getting the spinning mouse symbol, etc. Crazy! I'm very glad I switched to Safari last year.
Click to expand...

I prefer Safari on PPC as well, but the behavior you saw from Firefox is not normal. Make sure Firefox is not running.(Quit from Firefox menu) In your Home (Finder: Go menu, Home), open Library. Open Caches. Trash Firefox.

From Library again, open Application Support. Trash Firefox.

This will delete all your cookies, bookmarks, etc.
 
Amdahl said:
I prefer Safari on PPC as well, but the behavior you saw from Firefox is not normal. Make sure Firefox is not running.(Quit from Firefox menu) In your Home (Finder: Go menu, Home), open Library. Open Caches. Trash Firefox.

From Library again, open Application Support. Trash Firefox.

This will delete all your cookies, bookmarks, etc.
Click to expand...

Thanks! I didn't think it seemed normal either. I'll give it a shot :)
 
I much prefer Firefox to Safari on my 8 core Mac Pro. Firefox 3.5 is very fast and I utilize many of the extensions available. Safari is fine, but Firefox is more feature rich and extensible.

S-
 
Firefox 3.5 works great for me with extensions installed while Safari 4 takes a good 5 seconds to get out of a BBoD cycle that happens every time it starts up. Thus, Firefox it is for me.
 
I'm not too found of Firefox anymore. Got tired of it near the end of v3.0's life, after using it religiously since v0.8. No particular reason, really--it's just as great as it always was, but I feel like other browsers have surpassed it. I loved the Safari 4 beta, but the release redacted one of my favorite features (tabs on top), plus it runs slower. And using it for any length of time makes it run like molasses. So I moved to Stainless, which...doesn't do that. I just wish it had topsites.

On Windows, I use Chrome.
 
I've been using FF since I got my Mac and it works without problems. 3.5 is very fast too, the only thing I think works better in Safari is the scrolling, it seems somehow smoother for some reason. Other than that, Safari is the IE of OS X - a default browser whose average user has low IT knowledge and/or low demands. Adoption numbers seem to support that claim too.

What you're experiencing definitely isn't Firefox simply getting slower, it's some kind of a problem you should resolve.
 
FF 3.0 was a bit slow, but FF 3.5 is much faster. I use it on all my machines. Safari 4 is also very nice.

FF default title bar annoys me, I always add an extension to change it back to the old behaviour of the 2.x series.
 
When I used Windows I world swear by Firefox.
But now, I've tried using Firefox on my MBP and just don't like Firefox. Prefer Safari by a mile. To me and I could be wrong, Firefox feels scrappy / rushed maybe even rough. Please don't see my post as a 'fan' post etc. I just fell out of love with Firefox when I switched to :apple:
 
To me every release after beta4 went downhill. I updated to very beta of 3.5 and I found that the last beta, 4 was the best. They were quick to release the .1 update, which imo made things slower. Regardless there are things that FF can naturally do that Safari can't in which I am lost with out. Safari is still in my dock for the times FF doesn't want to work though. =/
 
I can't get into Safari at all. It doesn't do anything the way I like it.

Firefox on the other hand has been good to me since version 3. I didn't care for it in v2 because it was noticeably slower than Opera, but especially now in 3.5 it's fast enough and the extension support is great. It's still not the fastest browser around, but it's the best all-around choice IMO.
 
Another argument concerns how deeply you are into the apple ecosystem.

The extension support for Firefox is clearly superior to Safari, but I have been sucked in by the convenience of something as simple as simultaneous synchronization of my browser bookmarks, addresses, and calendars on MBP, MacPro, and iPhone via MobileMe.

Sure, it can be done with Google+Dropbox+Firefox etc, but synchronization to me is still something that requires tweaking time that I'd rather spend thinking about other issues.
 
sommls said:
Another argument concerns how deeply you are into the apple ecosystem.

The extension support for Firefox is clearly superior to Safari, but I have been sucked in by the convenience of something as simple as simultaneous synchronization of my browser bookmarks, addresses, and calendars on MBP, MacPro, and iPhone via MobileMe.

Sure, it can be done with Google+Dropbox+Firefox etc, but synchronization to me is still something that requires tweaking time that I'd rather spend thinking about other issues.
Click to expand...

Same here. That's the main reason I use safari over FF, but I think both have become great browsers at this point.
 
I used firefox for years. But when Safari 4 was released I switched tot hat and haven't looked back since. It's faster, appears to run more natively, and it's more stable.
 
sommls said:
Another argument concerns how deeply you are into the apple ecosystem.

The extension support for Firefox is clearly superior to Safari, but I have been sucked in by the convenience of something as simple as simultaneous synchronization of my browser bookmarks, addresses, and calendars on MBP, MacPro, and iPhone via MobileMe.

Sure, it can be done with Google+Dropbox+Firefox etc, but synchronization to me is still something that requires tweaking time that I'd rather spend thinking about other issues.
Click to expand...

You can use the Xmarks addon in FF to sync your bookmarks and passwords to any machine. There's even a version for Safari and you don't have to pay for something like MobileMe. Obviously it doesn't sync the addresses and calendars tho.
 
Yeah I use Xmarks with firefox, that's my biggest reason for using it on PC, but I use Safari+xmarks on my mac and think it's a lot smoother than FF
 
u just need a new profile.

transfer password is quite easy. manual, or addon. cookie should not be transferred.
 
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