What browsers load pages fastest with a slow internet connection? [closed]

Question

I have a really bad internet connection sometimes; what browser with load pages fastest? At first I thought, well of course Chrome, but then I did a little looking and it seemed like there were some other contenders, like Opera. I am only looking for browsers for Ubuntu or Vista that have full Java, JavaScript, and Flash support.

Answer 1

If you have a slow Internet connection, the best bet is to reduce content transfer.
This means you try things from text based browsers (links on ubuntu),
or use javascript and image blocks to get reduced functionality (firefox with noscript, adblock-plus, etc.).

The bottomline is, no browser can load faster than the download rate.
And, with a slow connection, the download rate is likely to be the bottle-neck.

You could even consider a local cache (increased within browsers or something like squid running locally). It would not be much use with dynamic content (like superuser.com for example).

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The Opera Turbo Mode described by Josh is interesting.
But, it has its limitations.

Turbo uses a technology called “Opera Web Optimization Proxy”, which is different from the Opera Binary Markup Language used in Opera Mini. Web sites layout and text will look exactly the same, but image resolution may appear considerably lower as a result of the compression. Dynamic Web technologies such as Ajax (XmlHttpRequests) and Flash are supported, but some plugin content will load only after clicking on the empty element.

From what I understand, it is focused at image compression using a proxy run by their servers.
Look at the Opera User Preferences, Turbo Mode description,
It says, Draw images instantly.

From the ZDNet article on this,

More elaborate Web sites that use advanced JavaScript techniques and Adobe's Flash technology, however, might require manual intervention to work via Opera Turbo. "Dynamic Web technologies such as Ajax and Flash are supported, but some plug-in content will load only after clicking on the empty element," he said. Encrypted sites aren't accelerated or sent through the Opera servers.

More generally, the ability to send compressed data is a function of the Web Browser.
I think, that should not be confused with the Opera Turbo Mode compression.

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The references in my earlier answer.

1. links is a unix based text browser (no images at all!)
   These days we have ELinks
2. noscript and addblock-plus are firefox addons that will reduce the web fetches
   (hopefully those that you do not want to see -- however, they are highly configurable).
3. Squid is not exactly a browser solution -- but like the Opera Turbo Mode a proxy.
   Its advantage is -- it will cache static data and avoid repeated fetches.
   But, remember, all browsers have cache -- you can just increase allowed caching space.
   Solutions like Squid are useful when multiple machines in an enterprise are likely to access the same data; the cache from one fetch is useful for all.

My bottomline:

• Focus on fetching less data (block what you don't want to get, cache what is static).
• Stay away from any form of prefetching (firefox had such a feature at some time).
• Check that your browser does not have any default RSS-Feeds setup (firefox, i think sets up a latest-news feed).

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Update: I referred to the Firefox Live Bookmarks feature in the last point above.
Check this answer on adjusting refresh rates to control that.

Answer 2

Opera 10's new "TurboMode" will run websites through a proxy to compress them for you, just like Opera Mobile. From Opera.com:

The real world does not have broadband connections on every corner. When you enable Opera Turbo in Opera 10, it will use our powerful servers to compress Web pages, boosting and accelerating connections to a crowded Wi-Fi in a cafe or a tethered mobile phone.

To enable it, just go to the Tools menu > Quick Preferences > Enable Opera Turbo.

Answer 3

I would really recommend using Opera, for slow connection. as described by joshhunt, it provides now the "Opera Turbo", which compresses the page, since version 10. It also provided already other things in previous versions, which are useful for a slow connection:

1. It doesn't reload the page when you come back to previous.

When you navigate through links, and want to go back to previous page, Opera will be the fastest on a slow connection, because it loads the previous page from its cache only, without making a new request to the website (you can always refresh it, but initially, it won't use the connection to come back).

2. It provides easy way to choose how you want the images displayed.

You can choose easily to show images (default mode), use images from cache, or don't display any image. It goes faster on a slow connection, when you want to access only the text content, without loading images. (Suits especially the "internet by mobile phone" use, when you pay the quantity exchanged). You can find more information about it on this page, search for the View Bar. You can also activate it from menu : View > Images > Cached Images