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FireFox offers half the download speed of my other browsers
Mozilla firefox operates at half the speed or less than any other browser that I install on my computer. I removed my hard drive from my computer and formatted it. Reinstalled the hard drive and put a fresh copy of windows up (not some crappy recovery disc recovery i did a full format with fresh install of windows). At this point nothing existed on my computer besides what comes on the windows 7 disc. I downloaded firefox and get the same speed test results from multiple speed test sites. Always getting less than half what I pay for on mozilla on my download speed but my upload is generally ok but maybe a few ticks off what it others browser pull with a speed test. Keep in mind there is no virus protection installed yet and windows firewall is disabled. HELP! I cannot stand any other web browser. I hate them all except firefox but have been forced to use IE for the last 2 months because of this. GAG
All Replies (10)
hello jetbluez06, maybe it's an issue with the protected mode that adobe has introduced in its flash plugin for firefox - you could try if downgrading to flash 10.3 (which is still supported) or disabling protected mode makes a difference.
Make sure that you install a Anti-virus and firewall provider, the simplest firewall provider is windows firewall, but the best in my opinion is AVG!
Once you have A proper Firewall service, try and download AVG for anti-virus which is free, but the payed one is better.
deleted email address - moderator
also, have you tried the best internet speed tester out there? Speedtest, I hope that I helped!
P.S. It could be your Adobe Flash player, if you want to downgrade you can here: Adobe Flash download
Gewysig op
I disabled protected mode as described and it worked perfectly. Now Firefox gave the same speedtest results as Chrome and IE. After reactivating the protected mode I was back where I started. Is it harmful to have the protected mode disabled? If so what will Mozilla do to correct this very unattractive issue? I will use Chrome until it is solved.
this happens when something like security software is sandboxing/interfering with the process used for flash protected mode. unfortunately those are both external factors, so mozilla can't do anything about it.
for more information about flash protected mode please see the following blog entry & in case you're having further issues please contact adobe's support...
http://blogs.adobe.com/asset/2012/06/inside-flash-player-protected-mode-for-firefox.html
Thanks madperson. But why does it only affect Firefox if it is an external factor?
because adobe has only developed/enabled this protected mode for its flash plugin for firefox. ie uses a different version of the plugin altogether (activeX) & google has an agreement with adobe that the plugin is deployed directly in the chrome browser.
what kind of security related programs are running on your pc? personally i could only replicate those slowdowns with old versions of f-secure or trusteer rapport - but the issues seem to be coming up time & time again...
AVG Internet Security 2012 is as far as I know my only protection.
Which are the risks I take if I use Firefox with disabled protected mode?
Is it only the measured speed that is low or does it also affect the speed of loading pages aso.?
Gewysig op
flash protected mode doesn't make any difference to the security of firefox itself, but only for content run by the flash plugin. it adds an additional layer of security for flash & adobe only recommends disabling it as a last resort. the slowdowns you were observing should only occur in flash content too - so for example general page load times or downloading a big file with firefox should be unaffected & will run with the full speed that is available on your connection.
for testing purposes i've tried to install avg 2013 on my machine & played around with a few of its settings but i couldn't reproduce any slowdowns with flash myself - so the cause of the slowdowns might also lie somewhere else...
as stated before, if you'd like to troubleshoot the issue further it would be better to contact adobe's support, since they will have a better understanding of the internals of flash protected mode & therefore may know what else might be at the root of the problem you were seeing.
Gewysig op
Thank you again madperson. The slowdown must then be a combination of the flash protected mode and that other possible cause as it disappears when the protected mode is disabled. I also have a laptop that shows exactly the same behavior as my desktop. I will, however, take your advice and contact Adobe Support. Thanks again!
Gewysig op