Firefox Myths Debunked

[Big Booger]

http://mywebpages.comcast.net/SupportCD/FirefoxMyths.html

Myth (Definition) - A fiction or half-truth, especially one that forms part of an ideology. While Firefox is a decent Web Browser, there are numerous Myths floating around the Internet regarding it. Hopefully this site will debunk some of these.

Firefox Faster, Safer, Better
We have all seen these banners before or heard people say "Firefox is Faster, Firefox has Lower Requirements, Firefox is Secure, Firefox defends me from all Spyware, etc." How misleading is it? Read on.

Notes - This page is in no way affiliated with Microsoft or Comcast. This page is NOT an endorsement for any web browser and it is NOT a Comparison Guide. It is designed to debunk the most common Myths heard on the Internet about Firefox - Period. All Myths relate to running Firefox in Windows. Please read carefully.

http://mywebpages.comcast.net/SupportCD/FirefoxMyths.html

What do you think?

[rohitk89]

Well, myths are just that- myths. Firefox doesn't claim half the things on that site to be their browser's features.

Internet Explorer 6.x is clearly faster than Firefox 1.x overall and is significantly faster from a cold start.Are there any statistics to prove that or are we just supposed to believe his gut feeling?


Since Firefox was released users have been exposed to 26 security vulnerabilities and counting. 6 of which were market as Highly Critical.All of which have almost been patched. (Right?)

[phishhead]

I knew I should of stayed with opera damn you fastgame for converting me. ;). I personally think its a preference. I was using opera for years until these guys converted me and I just find that theres more support for FF and have alot more ext. and themes. But maybe I'll install operas newest release and see how it is.

[FastGame]

Remember that myth debunker's can also start "myths"

FF safety ? hmm all got patched, where have you seen reports that FF users were affected by these exploits ? and what about all the infections that aren't encountered simply because they don't affect FF.

Windows had the WMF exploit for how many years ? :p Because something has holes doesn't mean people are out there exploiting it.

Speed ? yeah FF launches slow, don't know why. I know its slow even on a powerful system, try it on a 700 Duron with 256mb ram :eek: dam can make a pot of coffee before launch. Surfing speed, I don't know how anyone with high speed net could see the difference between any of the browsers.

I use Opera along with FF, IMO FF is best for me, what ever Mythical short comings it may have :D

[petard]

Bow to the Fox!

http://img172.exs.cx/img172/1236/bowtothefox7mw.gif

[rik]

http://img363.imageshack.us/img363/1199/firefox8wa4fo.gif (http://imageshack.us)

[hotmale]

Are there any statistics to prove that or are we just supposed to believe his gut feeling?Yes, he linked to this source. (http://www.howtocreate.co.uk/browserSpeed.html#winspeed)

All of which have almost been patched. (Right?)True, the author's point I believe is that Firefox, like IE, has holes.

[Aloone_Jonez]

Explorer 6.x is clearly faster than Firefox 1.x overall and is significantly faster from a cold start.
It's true Internet Explorer does load more quickly than Firefox but that's because it's already loaded when Windows starts.

Minimum requirements, I wonder. . .

Microsoft always have BS minimum requirements for their software, they say Windows XP will run on 64MB of RAM and they recommend 128MB fo aceptable performance, when you and I both know you need at least 256MB to get decent performance. and exactly the same applies to IE.

I prefer Opera, it's got the most features and it also smaller than FireFox and it uses less memory, but it isn't as well supported as Firefox so I use both.

I know it's a myth that Firefox is 100% secure, accessing the Internet with a restricted user account with a good fire wall and anti-virus will protect you more than using it over IE alone, but it cannot by denied it has less security holes than IE, hell even US CERT (http://www.kb.cert.org/vuls/id/713878) even recommend you should consider using and alternative.

[Reverend]

hell even US CERT (http://www.kb.cert.org/vuls/id/713878) even recommend you should consider using and alternative.Wow, if US CERT recommend you switch then they must be right. :rolleyes:

Geez how many more times are you gonna use that same old "US CERT recommends" crap.

Find some new material its starting to get tedious. :msnsleep:

[Reverend]

Oh and BTW i use IE & FF. :D

[Reverend]

and were on a linux server. :D

[Aloone_Jonez]

Wow, if US CERT recommend you switch then they must be right. :rolleyes:

Geez how many more times are you gonna use that same old "US CERT recommends" crap.

Find some new material its starting to get tedious.:msnsleep:

What's wrong with me repeating myself? It often needs to be done (not everyone has read that post) and it's only the second time I've said this .:rolleyes:

CERT know a hell of a lot more about this crap than you and I do or the person who wrote this site for that matter - there aren't any more official or well respected sources.

[Reverend]

What's wrong with me repeating myself?like i said its tedious.

CERT know a hell of a lot more about this crap than you and I do or the person who wrote this site for that matter - there aren't any more official or well respected sources.And...... :msnsleep:

[Aloone_Jonez]

like i said its tedious.
Like I said not everyone here has read that post - it was for the benift of others, not you.
And...... :msnsleep:
Their oppion carries more weigth than this site's author, mine or anyone else's for that matter - they know what they're talking about, they have also raised more valid reasons not to use IE than this person has to prefer it over Firefox.

[Reverend]

Their oppion carries more weigth than this site's author, mine or anyone else's for that matter - they know what they're talking about, they have also raised more valid reasons not to use IE than this person has to prefer it over Firefox.So if they said IE was better than Firefox you would use IE??? I think not.

Its yet another one of your lets slag off MS posts. Save them for Microsuck.

This yawn smilie is starting to wear out. :msnsleep:

Off topic, although still security related, you might want to advise the MSsuck admins to upgrade vbulletin.

3.0.6 is way out of date and has potential security flaws. 3.0.12 or 3.5.3.

[Aloone_Jonez]

So if they said IE was better than Firefox you would use IE??? I think not.
Don't know, if they had some valid point and were able to convince me I'd probably agree and promote Opera insetead, personally I think Firefox is crap just not as bad as IE, I prefer Opera it's the best browser out there. I know Firefox has the advantage of extentions but I don't need any with Opera as it's so feature packed the only disadvantage is it doesn't display as amny pages as Firefox but this is down to industry backing Netscape (same rendering engine as Firefox) and IE again.


Its yet another one of your lets slag off MS posts. Save them for Microsuck.

This yawn smilie is starting to wear out. :msnsleep:
Yes but I'm still being objective, notice I've never said Firefox is 100% secure and I've also mentioned that there are more affective methods to secure your system than switch from IE, if you want I'll point out an advantage Windows has over Linux and BSD, would you like that?

Off topic, although still security related, you might want to advise the MSsuck admins to upgrade vbulletin.

3.0.6 is way out of date and has potential security flaws. 3.0.12 or 3.5.3.
I know and it has been suggested but our webmaster is busy and it's not that important anyway.

[Reverend]

if you want I'll point out an advantage Windows has over Linux and BSD, would you like that? Cut out the sarcasm. :msnzip:

[Aloone_Jonez]

No sarcasm intended believe it or not Windows does have genuine advantages over UNIX operating systems.

OLE and DDE are consistant accross the whole platform - you can insert an OpenOffice Drawing into a Word document you can't insert OO drawings in ABI Word in UNIX.

All the GUI applications have a common look and feel - the theme applies to all the widgits in every application, for example a button looks the same in Word as it does in MS paint, and common dialog boxes also exist for example the Open file Window looks the same in all Windows programs. In UNIX this isn't the case one program might use GTK while another might use Qt or their own library.

You can associate programs to particular file types and it's consistant system-wide - you can set up a standard web browser, text editor graphics editor ect.

The desktop is standard, for example an installation program can create short cuts on the desktop and start menu on any Windows system, with Linux it depends on whether you have Gnome, KDE or Xfce.

Normally a nube Linux distro is fairly easy but installing software and hardware can be a challange when you can't find a package suited to your distro - this is because each one is differant.

However none of these advantages are unique to Windows, they are all present in Mac OS, I'm just making the point that I never slag off Windows unles I have a real reason for doing so.

[petard]

http://img115.exs.cx/img115/5941/offtopic8ys.gif

[d000hg]

It's true Internet Explorer does load more quickly than Firefox but that's because it's already loaded when Windows starts.

Minimum requirements, I wonder. . .

Microsoft always have BS minimum requirements for their software, they say Windows XP will run on 64MB of RAM and they recommend 128MB fo aceptable performance, when you and I both know you need at least 256MB to get decent performance. and exactly the same applies to IE.
What a load of crap.
Firstly, start your PC and then look in Task Manager. I doubt you'll find the iexplore.exe process running. And there's no reason a browser should take more than 1s to launch, even on a PII - it should be instant on a modern PC.

Secondly, XP launched when a 600MHZ 64Mb PC was fairly mid-range. It'll certainly run well on 128Mb on a top-end PII / low-end PIII. Of course lots of software is written to need higher specs but that's the fault of the software, not the OS. I guess you could complain that on a 64Mb/128Mb PC you can't usefully run many programs at once; but again that really comes down to what programs you try to run - you could run Word, IE and 9 notepads at once but if you want to watch a DVD while rendering something in 3DStudio you don't stand a chance!

[Aloone_Jonez]

What a load of crap.
Firstly, start your PC and then look in Task Manager. I doubt you'll find the iexplore.exe process running. And there's no reason a browser should take more than 1s to launch, even on a PII - it should be instant on a modern PC.

So?
The executable is only a small part of IE, in fact it's mostly a library some parts are contained within explore.exe (Windows Explorer - the desktop) which is running al the time, try typing a URL in the address bar and watch it pop up.

Secondly, XP launched when a 600MHZ 64Mb PC was fairly mid-range. It'll certainly run well on 128Mb on a top-end PII / low-end PIII.
Rubish.
Windows XP uses >64MB of RAM even with most of the services disabled and no anti-virus (>128MB is normal with anti-virus), most installs can't run like this as half the services are required for system stability. So if Windows uses 64MB minimum and you run it on a 64MB machine lots of disk swapping will occur as it's already running at its limits, this is why at least 128MB is required and 256MB is recommended, even MS fanboy Paul Turrott agrees with this:
http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/windowsxp_sg.asp
Windows XP System requirements and my recommendations
First, you must ensure that your system is even capable of running Windows XP. Microsoft has set the minimum requirements very low, but don't be fooled: The company's minimums are a joke, and not to be taken seriously. The following chart compares Microsoft's minimum requirements with their recommendations and my own, more realistic, recommendations.

Don't believe Paul and I, close down all your programs and right click the start bar to get task manager and I promise you your system will be using >64MB, mine uses 68MB minimum and that's with no AV and the services I don't use disabled.

Of course lots of software is written to need higher specs but that's the fault of the software, not the OS.
Both are to blame and some software vendors are worse than others and no MS aren't the only ones, Sun's OpenOffice is bloated and takes up far too much memory in my opinion and for OO 1.1.5 the recommended 128MB of RAM when you really need 256MB but OpenOffice is free so I'm not complaining - I would rather spend the money on upgrading my system than on an Office license, and yes I know it lacks something MS Office has.

I guess you could complain that on a 64Mb/128Mb PC you can't usefully run many programs at once; but again that really comes down to what programs you try to run - you could run Word, IE and 9 notepads at once but if you want to watch a DVD while rendering something in 3DStudio you don't stand a chance!
I would complain when my system is unresponsive and I'm only running couple of small programs like Thunderbird, Opera and ABI Word.

[rik]

Lets stay on topic please

http://img530.imageshack.us/img530/9460/offtopic13iu.gif (http://imageshack.us)

[Big Booger]

Regardless of myths, I love firefox. It makes my sticker peck out.

[GimieGimieGimie]

I also love firefox, although Opera v8.51 is what i use :p