3 replies to this topic

[rob86]

I've been a loyal Opera supporter for a long time but lately I've been torn between Firefox's extensions and Opera's speed. I was both excited and disappointed that it was released. I was getting used to Firefox, and had almost completely forgot about how great Opera was.

It has a new Turbo Boost, which honestly is more than just an advertising scheme. I tested it out for a few minutes and let me tell you all, there isn't a tiny difference in speed. No, not at all, because there is a HUGE increase in speed.

I ran a few tests on different webpages and despite the results, they are not altered or exaggerated. I ran both on Ubuntu 9.04 using Swiftfox 3.5.2, and Opera 10. I'm using n Dial-Up.
Here are my results. Swiftfox was started in SAFE mode, disabling all extensions and eliminating any possibility of excess lag. Opera was of course, a fresh install. Images were enabled. Turbo Boost was enabled on Opera. Cache was erased in Swiftfox. Time measured is from typing in the URL and pushing enter, to complete loading of the page (When it says DONE)

http://www.trap17.com/forums/
Swiftfox - 1min 46 seconds
Opera - 24 seconds.

http://www.yahoo.com
Swiftfox - 3 min 18 seconds
Opera - 1min 3 seconds

http://www.xisto.com
Swiftfox - 2 min 52 seconds
Opera - 1 min 20 seconds.



Now, Opera's Turbo Boost works by server side compression of things like images. This means that when Turbo Boost is enabled, images are noticeably compressed, with not so crisp image quality. This service used to be offered by companies who wanted people to pay a good amount of money monthly so I think that Opera is really trying hard to compete with Firefox. Personally, I almost always disable imaged on FF or Opera, so the turbo charge wouldn't be so useful for me.

Either way, there's no question that Opera is blazingly fast with or without Turbo boost. Tests aside, it just works faster. The tab switching is instant, the webpages load readable content faster. It seems to cache images better than Firefox.

Darn you Opera, you're making it hard to stick with Firefox. I need my extensions!

[truefusion]

I would update to this new release (build 4585) (i'm using build 4583), but that would mean i wouldn't be using Opera with Qt4. Looking at their blog shows that it's not really a necessary upgrade from build 4583. You might find it weird to stick to a previous build just because of Qt4, but Opera with Qt3 looks ugly on my system.

[rob86]

I was wondering about something after trying out Opera a bit. It bothers me a little that all of my web browsing appears to go through Opera's servers for them to compress. Opera is a pretty reputable browser so it's not that I don't really trust that they're taking care of a users privacy, but it still seems like it has the potential to be a real breach of privacy. Whenever I type in a password or check my email and see my browser connecting to Opera's servers, it makes me feel a bit uncomfortable with the whole thing. I haven't done much reading to see what they're saying about this, but I'm sure the privacy issue will be a hot topic in reviews of the new release.

Edited by rob86, 03 September 2009 - 01:38 AM.

[truefusion]

rob86, on Sep 2 2009, 09:37 PM, said:

I was wondering about something after trying out Opera a bit. It bothers me a little that all of my web browsing appears to go through Opera's servers for them to compress. Opera is a pretty reputable browser so it's not that I don't really trust that they're taking care of a users privacy, but it still seems like it has the potential to be a real breach of privacy. Whenever I type in a password or check my email and see my browser connecting to Opera's servers, it makes me feel a bit uncomfortable with the whole thing. I haven't done much reading to see what they're saying about this, but I'm sure the privacy issue will be a hot topic in reviews of the new release.

Isn't that due to the new Opera Turbo feature? If you have it turned on on your side and are worried about security, you can turn it off. I browse with it off; but even if i were on dial up, i would have it off. Even if the data is compressed, i would still be downloading the data from somewhere. If it were stored on my computer where it could be loaded instantly, then i would consider it.

I'm not sure how the Opera Turbo feature works, but it probably registers something that is specific to your own browser that no other person using Opera would have, and matches against that. But i wouldn't know—that's just how i would go about it.