Pale Moon Browser

[Corrine]

The Pale Moon browser is built on Firefox source code. After installation, I launched Pale Moon and it opened with my Firefox customized menu bar, bookmarks, add-ons, extensions, start pages. I've only been using it a few hours. Other than it loading much faster than Firefox, I haven't noticed any differences. http://www.palemoon.org/

Main features: * Highly optimized for current processors * 100% Firefox sourced: As safe as the browser that has seen years of development. * Uses slightly less memory because of disabled redundant and optional code * Significant speed increases for page drawing and script processing * Support for SVG and Canvas * Support for Firefox extensions, themes and personas System Requirements: * Windows 2000/XP/2003/Vista/Seven, 32-bit or 64-bit (64-bit O.S.es are not natively supported, but the browser will run fine on them) * A 7th generation or later processor with SSE2 support like a Pentium IV or Athlon 64 or later (see list of supported processors) Standard Pale Moon will NOT run on Athlon XP processors! Please GO HERE if you are running on an Athlon XP or Athlon MP processor machine. * 64 MB of RAM (128 MB or more recommended) * At least 35 MB of free (uncompressed) disk space

http://www.palemoon.org/technical.html

The following features have been disabled by design: * ActiveX and ActiveX scripting. ActiveX is specific to Microsoft's Internet Explorer, and is not natively supported by (any) Firefox builds. There are some extensions that enable ActiveX components and scripts to run in Firefox on Windows, which will, therefore, not run in Pale Moon. This is a security consideration more than a speed consideration. * Accessibility features. Most people, and certainly the people looking for speed optimized browsers, don't have a need for accessibility features. This cuts down some on the input complexity, and increases speed, but will, obviously, not be suitable for people who need these features. * Parental controls. Pale Moon aims to be a fast browser for general use, not a "secured family browser". The design impact of parental controls as introduced in Firefox 3.0 and later is significant, and has had serious implications for building the browser. As such, parental controls have been disabled. * A few miscellaneous things like the crashreporter and automatic updater, since they require server-side components that are not in place at palemoon.org. You will have to check manually if you have the latest version and update accordingly.

It also doesn't support all AMD processors.

[Jeber]

A Windows-only browser based on Firefox? That doesn't seem right.

[Tushman]

A Windows-only browser based on Firefox? That doesn't seem right.

Why do you say that?

[Corrine]

From the home page:

Mozilla does not provide optimized browser packages for Windows, while many Linux ("from scratch") users get the advantage of a browser built specifically for their system. That needs to change! So, here is the Pale Moon project: Custom-built and optimized Firefox browsers for Windows Operating Systems.

[Tushman]

From the home page:

It's got too many bugs and I wouldn't use it for my everyday browser until they fix it. I've been trying it out the last couple of days and I'm going back to using Fx.I should clarify that the bugs I'm talking about are primarily the fact that it does not respond to the 'back' button my Logitech mouse. Another major annoyance is that the font sizes are all screwed up when posting on the boards and there is no blinking cursor to let you know where you're typing. Edited April 18, 2010 by Tushman

[Corrine]

So far, I haven't run into anything like that.

[Frank Golden]

So far, I haven't run into anything like that.

Me neither, one cool thing is my Firefox is the Portable version from John Haller.I have it located on a separate partition and I've created a desktop shortcut to run it in Sandboxie.The Pale Moon folder I've located on the same partition and I've created a modified shortcut to run it sandboxed in Sandboxie as well.Running the modified Pale Moon shortcut opens Pale Moon sandboxed just like running the modified Firefox shortcutopens Portable Firefox sandboxed.The sandboxed Pale Moon even runs with the same permissions I have setup for Portable Firefox.This is Win 7 Home Premium.I guess Pale Moon accesses my roaming profile.

[Frank Golden]

Some benchmarks.Portable Firefox vs. Pale Moon using Sunspider Benchmarks.http://www2.webkit.org/perf/sunspider-0.9/sunspider.htmlLower numbers better.