For Productive Web Browsing, Gearfire Recommends How to Improve and Speed Up Firefox Start-up Time
One of the only disadvantages of using Firefox is the start-up time. It often takes 5-10 seconds to start-up your first browser window, depending on how many extensions you have. Internet Explorer on the other hand, is integrated into Windows, and thus takes 1-2 seconds to start. So how do you combat this? There are a couple different techniques, such as compressing and decompressing your installation, but the simplest is using a preloader.
If you are growing tired of the long Firefox start up time (personally I just leave it on.) Firefox Preloader is an open source application that will load parts FF into your RAM at system start-up, so it will load quickly when you call on it. As long as you start your browser at least once per reboot, this little software will prove useful to you. I decided to try it out myself, and it seems to have a noticeable difference. Even more of a difference if you are running an older machine. You may want to install a copy on your parent’s computers as well. Assuming they’re already using Firefox.
Richard McGraw said
am June 19 2008 @ 12:53 pm
Wow, this small program really works! Thanks
David Earle said
am November 20 2009 @ 8:42 pm
Definitely an excellent program that continues to work very well when it comes to boosting startup times. Unfortunately it hasn’t been updated in ages, and while it still works with the latest versions of Firefox, the browser becomes much more likely to crash while you’re using it.