You are here

How I solved my Firefox install running slowly...

5 posts / 0 new
Last post
MrMan
Offline
Last seen: 12 years 10 months ago
Joined: 2009-08-16 05:42
How I solved my Firefox install running slowly...

I've seen many posts about Firefox being slow. I've seen tons of tweaks and tips posted. I have a much more "simplistic" approach.

I run other programs and things off of my PortableApps flash drive, and over time I noticed micro pauses in browsing. Recently this reached a point where it was more than a second or 10 and the FireFox logo in the upper left corner would turn into the default unknown icon windows uses. (empty white box with blue bar across the top)

This more than likely was caused by my other programs adding files and them becoming fragmented across the drive. You should NOT defrag a flash drive, it messes with the wear leveling, but you can... copy the contents off, and then copy them back.

If you copy them and they are kept in order by folder this helps "defrag" the files.

The only "hiccup" I encountered was a few "compatibility" upgrades I had previously made to some Firefox addons seemed to have gotten lost, and needed to be redone.

As always YMMV, but this helped me greatly and I am back to micropauses instead of 10 second long pauses. If you run more than just portable apps from your flash drive, its worth keeping in mind.

NathanJ79
NathanJ79's picture
Offline
Last seen: 4 years 1 month ago
Joined: 2007-07-31 15:07
Also

Also, if you trust the computer you're using, you can copy the FirefoxPortable folder to the computer, somewhere out of the way. This is not recommended as it goes against a lot of what PortableApps.com stands for. Then, when you're done with it, do one of two things. One, simply delete the DATA folder. (Make sure you have permission to remove files and folders from the computer first, with a dummy file and folder.) Two, move the DATA folder back to your FirefoxPortable folder, re-syncing it (e.g. if you added bookmarks or whatever). The former also "double sandboxes" your Portable Firefox because if you did anything that messed up your profile that day, and then you just deleted that copy of your profile, your profile is back where it was at the start of the day. If that makes any sense.

Thanks for the tip though, it is worth trying.

m-p-3
m-p-3's picture
Offline
Last seen: 3 months 3 weeks ago
Joined: 2006-06-17 21:25
The 10 second pause is likely

The 10 second pause is likely linked to the default value of browser.sessionstore.interval in about:config, which is to auto-save the opened tabs every 10 seconds (10000 ms) in case the browser crash.

You could increase the value to 30000ms (30 seconds) or 60000ms (1 min) for better performance on a slow USB drive. This will have the effect of saving less frequently the opened tabs, so if you crash you will be less likely to recover a recently opened tabs between two saves.

jamvaru
Offline
Last seen: 2 years 5 months ago
Joined: 2009-08-20 15:39
Yeah

that is great

I changed to 30s... heck, i would change to 60s, but it wouldn't be any improvement over 30s... i don't know if this will help, but if you say so, it makes sense to me... hcek, whoopdie doo if i crash...

I will try the copy/copy thing, sounds right, that is basically what a defragmenter does, anyway, so you might was well go all the way and do it yourself

j

;>jamvaru

Ed_P
Offline
Last seen: 5 years 5 months ago
Joined: 2007-02-19 09:09
Doesn't fit

While what you say maybe useful and helpful it doesn't match with the OP's experience. He gained major time savings by simply defragging the app.

His experience also refutes the argument that defragging a USB stick is ineffective since all access is electronic anyways.

Ed

Log in or register to post comments