Firefox 48 Released With Multi-Process Electrolysis Architecture, Expanded Protection, UX Improvements

[Lucian Armasu]

Mozilla announced Firefox 48 with the multi-process Electrolysis architecture enabled by default for a small portion of users, expanded protection, and new user experience improvements.

Firefox 48 Released With Multi-Process Electrolysis Architecture, Expanded Protection, UX Improvements : Read more

 

[Chaoss86]

I have just updated and unfortunately opening more than 3 or 4 tabs on heavy pages still brings the browser to a stuttering laggy mess. Firefox is quickly dying because of this and it's a real shame.

 

[uglyduckling81]

I have just updated and unfortunately opening more than 3 or 4 tabs on heavy pages still brings the browser to a stuttering laggy mess. Firefox is quickly dying because of this and it's a real shame.

I've never experienced any real lag in Firefox. My PC is 5 years old but still doesn't struggle with a browser.

I just tried 8 complex pages to see if I could recreate the lag you mentioned but they all opened silky smooth.

Possibly it's because I have UBlock Origin and NoScript running which reduces the load on page loading. More than likely though it might be time for you to upgrade your PC if it's struggling to even use a browser.

Do yourself a favor and dumpster that Netburst CPU and get a Core processor. It's a big upgrade.

 

[John McGaw]

I have just updated and unfortunately opening more than 3 or 4 tabs on heavy pages still brings the browser to a stuttering laggy mess. Firefox is quickly dying because of this and it's a real shame.

I have been using 48 from the first beta forward (as well as 20+ versions before that) and have seen no changes and no undo lag when opening my 'home page' of 36 tabs. This is on a semi-antique i7 with 6gb RAM which I built back in 2009. I can't imagine that any competent machine should do worse under similar load unless there was a configuration error or some bogus add-on was interfering.

 

[caspy7]

> I have just updated and unfortunately opening more than 3 or 4 tabs on heavy pages still brings the browser to a stuttering laggy mess. Firefox is quickly dying because of this and it's a real shame.

Curious, did you read this bit of the article?
"Firefox 48 will initially enable Electrolysis by default for only one percent of the users who don’t have any add-ons installed."
Only a small number will have it enabled (if you have any addons, you know immediately you won't have it) and the article also tells you how to check if it's enabled.

 

[jackt]

Sadly firefox is getting spyfull and partners with google lukly you can still disable these settings...

 

[caspy7]

Sadly firefox is getting spyfull and partners with google lukly you can still disable these settings...

In what manner is Firefox getting "spyfull"?
(Just saying "they partner with Google" does not answer how.)

 

[amk-aka-Phantom]

If you have previously set browser.urlbar.unifiedcomplete to FALSE in order to disable this messy, annoying "Visit <site>" prompt whenever you type something in the URL bar, do yourself a favor and do NOT update. This preference is now ignored and FF forces an ugly, wide "awesomebar" where the URL to the right of the page title instead of below. Thanks a lot, Mozilla devs! Good on you for forcing something literally all advanced users hate and ask for an option to remove.

THAT is what killing Firefox - developers IGNORING actual user requests (how many years since people asked them to Sync custom search engines users add?) and adding stupid "trendy" junk, not it lagging on someone's machine for years because of something they still can't set up right. (Doesn't lag for me even on a Core M) Firefox succeeds because it's a browser for advanced users who like to customize their experience to streamline their workload. It will quickly lose to Chrome if it tries to become Chrome, because Chrome is better at being Chrome. You know the saying: don't try to argue with a fool, they'll drag you down and beat you with experience.

 

[amk-aka-Phantom]

Oh, and GG Tom's for NOT mentioning ONE thing that mattered: how to actually enable multiprocessing if it's disabled.

1) about:config
2) browser.tabs.remote.autostart > true
3) restart
4) about:support > check that it's enabled now
5) if not, about:config > browser.tabs.remote.force-enable (this has to be added as a new boolean, it's not present by default) > true (you must have an addon that is "incompatible" with Electrolysis, chances are you will, because Firefox Hello is one such addon and it's forced for everyone, about:config > loop.enabled > false to turn it off and be on the safe side)

 

[Adam Johnson]

thanks AMK... I was about to post the same thing, until I read through the comments to make sure nobody else posted the same.

I definitely have noticed a speed improvement (or maybe "responsiveness" improvement is a more apt description) when switching tabs / opening links in new tabse.

 

[whimseh]

I still see no reason to switch from Chrome. Anyone got pros/cons?

 

[amk-aka-Phantom]

I still see no reason to switch from Chrome. Anyone got pros/cons?

Yeah. No need to sign in to Google. All add-ons work in incognito mode. Don't need an addon to patch WebRTC DNS leak. UI customization is more extensive. Still has 32-bit support if you got an older PC or a 32-bit Atom tablet. More add-ons for power users (IME). Actually performs better on all hardware I tried (RAM hogging aside, both do that). More important: Firefox was here before Chrome and many users were familiar with its shortcuts and general principles, and Chrome still hasn't offered anything that would make us switch.

 

[tamalero]

Great news.. can now they fix their horrible java script performance?
Websites like tumblr.com constantly freeze when loading multiple windows.
And its only on firefox.

 

[gaaah]

So Firefox can do hair removal now too? Don't I need a supporting peripheral for that?

 

[bit_user]

I wish Firefox would do something about the 10's of GB/day it often writes to disk. It's probably the thing causing the most wear on my SSDs.