Giving Opera 7.54 a try, from a longtime firefox user

[Schadenfroh]

I got this version for free without the banner ad here.

Yes, I know I am one of the main FireFox fanboy's here , but I willing to give it a chance and use nothing but it for a week. I am posting from it now, after getting the UI the way i want it. I have found some things that rather annoy me.

1. I cant get Opera AdBlock to work or OperaAdFilter, I guess it is the version i am using that it doesn?t like. I have blocked all I could thru the hosts file but I still get tons of annoying flash ads. Can anyone tell me how to make flash only play when I click on a little box where it should be (like in the firefox extension) or a way for me to just disabled flash (I can?t find it in opera's options). All these ads are killing me

2. I won?t be trying the email client with opera; I refuse to leave my Outlook 2k3, I am addicted to its many features. So I won?t be able to comment on that in a week.

3. I don?t chat on IM anymore, so I won?t be using that feature.

4. Anyone know if Spybot or Adaware scans opera's cookies?

5. When i hit the back button after posting in a thread, it just refreshes the thread instead of taking me back to the main forum. It does this in IE also.... but not in firefox, anyone know what setting i can change to correct this?

Observations so far
[*]Very fast, it loads pages faster than firefox and as far as i can tell is just as fast as my IE 64bit edition.
[*]Uses about the same amount of ram as FF so far........
[*]UI and menu system are OK, im sure that if i got used to them, things would improve.
[*]Tabs work better in Opera than in firefox. The post new thread window opens as a tab instead of as a window (although there is probably a firefox extension to do this)
[*]No ad blocking software extensions (that work with the version I am running) makes browsing the web very painful. The ones that I have found were much harder to install than adblock thru Mozilla?s XPI installers. Cant use proxomitron or webcleaner for i am in xp 64bit

 

[us3rnotfound]

Very nice, good luck and have fun with this venture.

 

[bandana163]

4 - Yes, I use Opera and Ad-aware (and possibly Spybot as well) finds spying/tracer cookies.
5 - You can use the fast backward button (icon: blue double arrow pointing backwards) to return to the first page you visited in the currently open tab/window.

The folks at the official Opera forums might be able to help you with the adblocking issues (I don't use and adblock utility).

 

[kamper]

Originally posted by: Schadenfroh
5. When i hit the back button after posting in a thread, it just refreshes the thread instead of taking me back to the main forum. It does this in IE also.... but not in firefox, anyone know what setting i can change to correct this?

Doesn't that depend on whether or not you're using the quick reply box?

Originally posted by: Vaerilis
The folks at the official Opera forums might be able to help you with the adblocking issues (I don't use and adblock utility).

I certainly don't know, but I would expect that you wouldn't get any official help on adblocking. Adblocking is a great feature (for the end user) and wouldn't be that hard to implement, so I think that the only reason there isn't a good solution built in is that, as a commercial entity, Opera would catch hell from advertising companies.

 

[Schadenfroh]

Originally posted by: kamper

Originally posted by: Vaerilis
The folks at the official Opera forums might be able to help you with the adblocking issues (I don't use and adblock utility).

I certainly don't know, but I would expect that you wouldn't get any official help on adblocking. Adblocking is a great feature (for the end user) and wouldn't be that hard to implement, so I think that the only reason there isn't a good solution built in is that, as a commercial entity, Opera would catch hell from advertising companies.

I dont know about this. Doesnt Opera have less market share than the Mozilla based products, not to mention IE..... They already have a pop up blocker like many browsers (which would also piss advertising companies off). I think they could integrate an adblock like feature without getting any retribution from the ad companies.

 

[bandana163]

I've found this:
AdMuncher utility (simply intall and run)
And here's a search result:
I searched for "Adblock" on the Opera forums

 

[hans030390]

Opera was slow and bloated my computer, so i didn't use it.

 

[kamper]

Originally posted by: Schadenfroh

Originally posted by: kamper

Originally posted by: Vaerilis
The folks at the official Opera forums might be able to help you with the adblocking issues (I don't use and adblock utility).

I certainly don't know, but I would expect that you wouldn't get any official help on adblocking. Adblocking is a great feature (for the end user) and wouldn't be that hard to implement, so I think that the only reason there isn't a good solution built in is that, as a commercial entity, Opera would catch hell from advertising companies.

I dont know about this. Doesnt Opera have less market share than the Mozilla based products, not to mention IE..... They already have a pop up blocker like many browsers (which would also piss advertising companies off). I think they could integrate an adblock like feature without getting any retribution from the ad companies.

Well, there is a difference between pop-ups and ads that are part a page but you do have a good point. Ok, then I'm clueless as to why the opera designers think people need an integrated bittorrent client but not a decent adblocker

 

[Hadsus]

Opera is faster than Firefox. I remember checking it on a webpage that runs a browser test loading up all sorts of test pages, images, etc. Still, I'm sticking with FF. I don't need or want the extra email and Usenet functions it bundles. I like to choose my own products for those purposes. No doubt it's a nice browser but I've got no complaints with FF.

 

[konakona]

I think I wanna give it a try, but I have way too many bookmarked pages on FF. is it easy to import FF bookmarks to opera?

 

[The Green Bean]

Originally posted by: VanillaH
I think I wanna give it a try, but I have way too many bookmarked pages on FF. is it easy to import FF bookmarks to opera?

Yes very easy. Just save your firefox bookmarks someplace. The go to opera -> file -> import firefox bookmarks.. Done

 

[konakona]

just uninstalled FF and started using opera instead.
Key things I noticed :
1)doesnt leak memory like FF does. with FF, it was not unusual to have 120MB usage after few hours, not the case with Opera.
2)saving open tabs on exit is nice. heard this could be done with ff also with a proper plugin, but i just didnt bother
3)more compatible with sites not written alternative browsers in mind. still looks kinda messed up, but at least works halfway as opposed to FF which simply refuses to open those pages
4)there are more subtle options here and there... like choosing between opening in the background or newpage, lets you set your program for mms (meaning that i can start using gomplayer, yeay)
5)close button on each tab is not located in the upper right corner, that will take some time getting used to

all in all i like it so far and i am glad i made a change. staying openminded about program of choice is rewarding... now its time for you to try miranda and switch, you trillian zealots

 

[xtknight]

I got Opera 8 from the deal the other day. I've been using it ever since, loving it. This is the only browser so far that will ever take me away from IE. For some reason I just can't get used to FireFox, it needs a major makeover IMO. Anyway I tried installing Opera AdBlock/AdFilter, and both like to be a pain in the ass. So far I've gotten neither to work. AdFilter said direct it to my opera6.ini. What opera6.ini? I had a operadefs6.ini so I selected that, which was what it was talking about, thank god. AdFilter had buffer overflows/problems with DEP, so I had to make an exception. But even after that, it never worked, and it screwed up the ini file, so I'm glad I made a backup.

I've observed Opera 8 using MUCH less memory than Firefox, even in the most demanding situations. Everything is snappier, and looks better. Opera 8 makes Firefox look rather skinny. Now if the AdBlock project just released an Opera version, there'd be no reason to use FF IMO. Opera is also more user-friendly than Firefox by leaps and bounds, and the interface is fantastic. The whole browser looks elegant, and at the same time bests the speed of anything out there. Efficient browser that doesn't slow down over time like IE. I had about 60 tabs open the other day, and I was just opening more and more, whereas in Firefox, it will only let you open so many before the toolbar runs out of room. The Back/Forward buttons are extremely fast. Sessions management is easy. With Firefox I think you used the bookmark menu to save sessions, which really makes no sense. That's one example of how much more user-friendly Opera is. Everything is just in the right place...it's about time somebody make a perfect interface. Also, page compatibility seems a lot better than with FF. Also, press CTRL+TAB when you have lots of tabs open. A nice menu pops up (just like ALT-TAB) that lists your tabs, and you can scroll through them. I don't recall anything like this in FF either. Granted, FF is open source whereas Opera is shareware, but if FF wants to compete with Opera they'd best take some notes. Nothing I'd listed would require millions of R&D to complete. Opera is such a breath of fresh air compared to anything I've used before (IE6, FF, Konqueror, Lynx). Gotta love the Quick Preferences (F12) menu and awesome RSS reader. Automatic forms completion is also awesome. Opera is just as secure while at the same time it breaks less functionality.

Things I'd like to see improved:
[*]Bug where links don't show up as "visited", but instead "active", until you mouseover them, at which point they return to "visited" style.
[*]Plugins support and configuration, not to mention installers.
[*]Better ActiveX support. Sites like LAUNCH don't work whereas in Firefox, with ActiveX plugin, they do. However some sites with the WMP embedded object do work fine.

I was very surprised to see broad operating system support. I had Opera 8 running on FC4 AMD64 in no time.

P.S. Try the Stardust skin.

Originally posted by: Schadenfroh
Cant use proxomitron or webcleaner for i am in xp 64bit

Why not? As long as you let them run upon WOW32, there should be no issues. I'm near certain proxomitron should run fine.

I don't have the back button problem.

- xtknight, now an officially converted Opera fanboy.

 

[xtknight]

What is it with these plugins? I couldn't get either AdBlock/AdFilter/AdMuncher to work. I go to AdMuncher user guide, nothing comes up. This is starting to get frustrating.

 

[SonicIce]

Block pop-ups in Opera.

 

[TechHead87]

What makes one browsers page-load speed faster than the others?

 

[xtknight]

Try Redraw Instantly in Tools->Preferences->Browsing. Ahhhhhh, it feels like I just got cable again.

 

[SonicIce]

Originally posted by: xtknight
Try Redraw Instantly in Tools->Preferences->Browsing. Ahhhhhh, it feels like I just got cable again.

I don't see that in version 7.54

 

[xtknight]

How did you guys get 7.54? I thought the deal was Opera 8? Or this is different?

 

[Stretchman]

I tried Opera a few years ago, during MS Explorer's heyday. As funny as it sounds, it gave me kind of a rush knowing that I was bucking MS's standard web browser. After a while I gave it up. It was probably for lack of effort on my part, but I just couldn't get used to it.

It's good to know that Opera is still around though, and that people have a nice variety to choose from when it comes to web-browsing.

 

[imported_Phil]

I love Opera dearly; always have.

Without adblocking (built-in, no external programs thanks), I'm forced to stick with Firefox.

 

[xtknight]

Originally posted by: Phil
I love Opera dearly; always have.

Without adblocking (built-in, no external programs thanks), I'm forced to stick with Firefox.

Firefox has built-in adblocking? News to me. Both Opera and Firefox have popup blockers. Ditch Opera 7 and get the now-free Opera 8.5.

 

[xtknight]

So Schadenfroh, any updates?

 

[kamper]

Originally posted by: xtknight

Originally posted by: Phil
I love Opera dearly; always have.

Without adblocking (built-in, no external programs thanks), I'm forced to stick with Firefox.

Firefox has built-in adblocking? News to me. Both Opera and Firefox have popup blockers. Ditch Opera 7 and get the now-free Opera 8.5.

Built-in in the sense that once you've installed it, you can add a new ad filter with the fewest possible steps. No editing .ini files and restarting the browser or crap like that.

 

[Evander]

Originally posted by: xtknight
How did you guys get 7.54? I thought the deal was Opera 8? Or this is different?

it's in opera's archive section:
http://arc.opera.com/pub/opera/win/754/en/std/

edit: fatwallet code doesn't seem to work though