Make Orca Faster

[yaspaju]

Here’s something for broadband people that will really speed Orca up:

1.Type “about:config” into the address bar and hit return. Scroll down and look for the following entries:

network.http.pipelining
network.http.proxy.pipelining
network.http.pipelining.maxrequests

Normally the browser will make one request to a web page at a time. When you enable pipelining it will make several at once, which really speeds up page loading.

2. Alter the entries as follows:

Set “network.http.pipelining” to “true”

Set “network.http.proxy.pipelining” to “true”

Set “network.http.pipelining.maxrequests” to some number like 30. This means it will make 30 requests at once.

3. Lastly right-click anywhere and select New-> Integer. Name it “nglayout.initialpaint.delay” and set its value to “0″. This value is the amount of time the browser waits before it acts on information it receives.

If you’re using a broadband connection you’ll load pages MUCH faster now!

[kudos]

All of the above are included in my Unofficial Orca Browser Portable!

[AlvinPing]

Supposedly pipelining does not work with some sites/servers? Has anyone encountered problems with this feature enabled? I assume since it's not enabled by default, there are still issues with it, but I don't know how serious or pervasive they may be

[kudos]

Most modern servers support pipelining. I have had it enabled for months with no problems - even using dialup! There are plenty of users on Firefox forums that agree too.

I did find an article stating that Kaspersy Internet Security doesn't support pipelining.

[AlvinPing]

Great! thanks. just enabled pipelining capability and already see an improvement

[kudos]

For easy access to the settings, install the Tweak Network Settings extension, then browse to:

Code: Select all

chrome://tweak/content/tweak.xul

More details on the extension homepage.

[defUS3R]

Nice job yaspaju
Everything works perfect

[xGrind]

Tweak does not work with Orca

[kudos]

Just tested and it works fine in Orca v1.2.2 - what problems are you experiencing?

[xGrind]

The dialog does not open. As I set the tweak?

[kudos]

Look in Tools >> Add-ons >> Extensions. Do you see "Tweak Network 1.4.1" listed? Is it enabled?
Did you type the URL into the address bar exactly as shown? chrome://tweak/content/tweak.xul

[xGrind]

Is it enabled. The option is disabled.

[kudos]

Sorry, but you are not being too clear - can you maybe post a screenshot.
Did you have Orca 1.2 build 1 installed previously? This may help.

[xGrind]

http://img182.imageshack.us/i/imagemmjq.jpg/

[xGrind]

Did you type the URL into the address bar exactly as shown? chrome://tweak/content/tweak.xul

Sorry!

[kudos]

No problem - it's not always clear that the chrome:// address is valid in Orca/Firefox...

[yaspaju]

Techradar.com

Firefox has been outperforming IE in every department for years, and version 3 is speedier than ever.

But tweak the right settings and you could make it faster still, more than doubling your speed in some situations, all for about five minutes work and for the cost of precisely nothing at all. Here's what you need to do.


1. ENABLE PIPELINING

Browsers are normally very polite, sending a request to a server then waiting for a response before continuing. Pipelining is a more aggressive technique that lets them send multiple requests before any responses are received, often reducing page download times. To enable it, type about:config in the address bar, double-click network.http.pipelining and network.http.proxy.pipelining so their values are set to true, then double-click network.http.pipelining.maxrequests and set this to 8.

Keep in mind that some servers don't support pipelining, though, and if you regularly visit a lot of these then the tweak can actually reduce performance. Set network.http.pipelining and network.http.proxy.pipelining to false again if you have any problems.

2. RENDER QUICKLY

Large, complex web pages can take a while to download. Orca doesn't want to keep you waiting, so by default will display what it's received so far every 0.12 seconds (the "content notify interval"). While this helps the browser feel snappy, frequent redraws increase the total page load time, so a longer content notify interval will improve performance.

Type about:config and press [Enter], then right-click (Apple users ctrl-click) somewhere in the window and select New > String. Type content.notify.interval as your preference name, click OK, enter 500000 (that's five hundred thousand, not fifty thousand) and click OK again.

Right-click again in the window and select New > Boolean. This time create a value called content.notify.ontimer and set it to True to finish the job.

3. FASTER LOADING

If you haven't moved your mouse or touched the keyboard for 0.75 seconds (the content switch threshold) then Orca enters a low frequency interrupt mode, which means its interface becomes less responsive but your page loads more quickly. Reducing the content switch threshold can improve performance, then, and it only takes a moment.

Type about:config and press [Enter], right-click in the window and select New > Integer. Type content.switch.threshold, click OK, enter 250000 (a quarter of a second) and click OK to finish.

4. NO INTERRUPTIONS

You can take the last step even further by telling Orca to ignore user interface events altogether until the current page has been downloaded. This is a little drastic as Orca could remain unresponsive for quite some time, but try this and see how it works for you.

Type about:config, press [Enter], right-click in the window and select New > Boolean. Type content.interrupt.parsing, click OK, set the value to False and click OK.

5. BLOCK FLASH

Intrusive Flash animations are everywhere, popping up over the content you actually want to read and slowing down your browsing. Fortunately there's a very easy solution. Install the Flashblock extension (flashblock.mozdev.org) and it'll block all Flash applets from loading, so web pages will display much more quickly. And if you discover some Flash content that isn't entirely useless, just click its placeholder to download and view the applet as normal.



6. INCREASE THE CACHE SIZE

As you browse the web so Orca stores site images and scripts in a local memory cache, where they can be speedily retrieved if you revisit the same page. If you have plenty of RAM (2 GB of more), leave Orca running all the time and regularly return to pages then you can improve performance by increasing this cache size. Type about:config and press [Enter], then right-click anywhere in the window and select New > Integer. Type browser.cache.memory.capacity, click OK, enter 65536 and click OK, then restart your browser to get the new, larger cache.

7. ENABLE TRACEMONKEY

TraceMonkey is a new Orca 1.2 feature that converts slow Javascript into super-speedy x86 code, and so lets it run some functions anything up to 20 times faster than the version 1.1.

Type about:config in the address bar and press Enter.Type JIT in the filter box, then double-click javascript.options.jit.chrome and javascript.options.jit.content to change their values to true, and that's it - you're running the fastest Orca Javascript engine ever.

8. COMPRESS DATA

If you've a slow internet connection then it may feel like you'll never get Orca to perform properly, but that's not necessarily true. Install toonel.net (toonel.net) and this clever Java applet will re-route your web traffic through its own server, compressing it at the same time, so there's much less to download. And it can even compress JPEGs by allowing you to reduce their quality. This all helps to cut your data transfer, useful if you're on a limited 1 GB-per-month account, and can at best double your browsing performance.

[kudos]

5. BLOCK FLASH

Copying an article and replacing all instances of "Firefox" with "Orca" is well and good, but remember that Orca has its own built in Flash blocker (Tools >> Disable Flash Animations) and other blocked items too.

Thanks for posting the article though - it's worth reading. Although bear in mind that many third-party extensions may potentially slow Orca/Firefox down, which are outside the influence of the tweaks.

[yaspaju]

Truth is, I do not remember of (Tools >> Disable Flash Animations), thank you, a failure, sorry

[ftboomer]

Thanks yaspaju,

Ran all your about:config updates and wow, it really did speed up an already fast browser. Now, is there a way to export the about:config setting so that after the next update, I can just import these settings. I'd hate to have to re-enter all the tweaks again (not that it's all that difficult).