System Requirements

[borgward]

What are the system requirements to run the latest Firefox well. I don't mean minimum requirements.

[patclash]

https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/5 ... uirements/

[borgward]

Those are minimum requirements. I already stated that I did not mean minimum requirements. I seriously doubt that you can get many things to boot well now days with only 500 MB of RAM, much less run Firefox on it. Firefox 50.1.0 does not even run well on an Intel Dual Core 64 bit w/2 GB RAM. Good luck getting it to run on a P4 w/500 MB RAM.

Right now Firefox is consuming 279 MB of RAM web content is consuming 203 MB of RAM. That leaves 18 MB's for the OS for someone that has only 500 MB of RAM.

What are the system requirements to run Firefox well. That would be how much RAM, What CPU specs, and what graphics for Firefox to run smoothly?

[dickvl]

The actual way you experience how a program works always depends on what other software is running at the same time.
If you would run a lot of heavy CPU load applications or application that use a lot of memory then you will obviously need a more sophisticated computer (more RAM and faster) than the bare minimum requirements.

Firefox will also use more memory when this is available and release memory quicker when the system runs low on RAM.
With that much memory that you have and a 64 bit system that doesn't limit the memory to 4 GB then there is no need to worry.
Only with little memory when the OS starts paging to the hard drive then you will have to see if you can shutdown other applications.

[borgward]

Again, What are the system requirements to run Firefox well. That would be how much RAM, What CPU specs, and what graphics for Firefox to run smoothly?

Firefox does not run well on Intel Pentium 64 bit dual core and 2 GB RAM. I am trying to determine how much RAM, Processing power, and graphics power is needed to run Firefox 50.1.0. I do not want to have to shut off Thunderbird, and other apps just to run firefox. I am currently using 75% of RAM plus to run my laptop, with Firefox, Thunderbird, a terminal window and a system monitor. I do not do any gaming.

I am planning to upgrade to Intel 800 MHz bus Core 2 Duo - T9500 and 4GB RAM 800 MHz. Can not upgrade the video W/out upgrading to another mobo on this laptop. Will that be enough to keep up with Firefox for a while?

This laptop is about 9 years old (Dell Inspiron 1520). It has done pretty well until several months ago with recent Firefox upgrades. I will probably replace w/ used Dell Latitude that supports at least DDR3 RAM, USB 3, more graphics, and a more powerful Intel processor. That is why I am asking what do I need to keep Firefox happy while I have a lot of tabs open and many apps running.

As for my choice of a used Latitude, they are easy to work on and are pretty rugged. I do not want any of the ultra thin stuff that are extremely hard to work on.

[therube]

In general, you're asking an ambiguous question that can only be answered by you.

What you do, how you do, where you visit, extensions & what not all play into how something works & what "requirements" there might be in order for your experience to be acceptable.

And there are plenty of "crap" sites out there that will bring any browser/system configuration to its knees.


I have an e4300 CPU (look that one up ), 2 GB RAM, & regularly* run with 100's of windows/tabs open.
Now I do very little "video" & I use NoScript to help keep things in check.
So what I do, how I do, works for me.

But that might be totally unsuitable for you.


> regularly*

I use SeaMonkey, & up to SeaMonkey 2.40, regularly was just that, regularly.
With the (just released) SeaMonkey 2.46 (akin to FF 49) that changed, where memory usage increased to a point where my "regular" usage, regular ways of doing, just isn't working that well any longer. (Haven't figured out yet, just what method I might use to get me back to "regular" again?)



Not too clear, but if your "upgrade" is an upgrade of existing components, to me, component upgrades are not a cost effective way of upgrading.
If you are upgrading by changing from an existing laptop to a newer (even if still old) laptop, that's different.


You might ask others who might be running similar hardware their experiences (for whatever that might be worth)?


You might see if you notice "performance" differences when running the current FF 50 compared to the latest ESR version?
(Do that with separate Profiles for each. As in you don't particularly want to be jumping back & forth between versions with the same Profile.)

[dfoulkes]

What are the system requirements to run the latest Firefox well

The problem with that questions is of course... one user might never exceed 2-3 light-weight tab on a daily basis... others may have 50+ tabs going all the time... with lots of killer type sites loaded... so, the answer can be hard to come up with... so, I'll tell you what I have in here...and of course, you are using Linux so that can also affect ram-use...versus my Win7 windows...

Plus, the number is extension (and their types) ... 'one' has installed will affect performance.

So, all that I can state is this...

I use a 8 year old ACER laptop with 4gig of memory and with a Flash-drive as opposed to the normal mechanical drive (changed it over about 2 years ago... made a big diff.) ... and that drive is only 250gig (I don't store much data).

Then only issue I have here is I have to lower the resolution on some vids in order for them to play properly and since I'm on a laptop I just live with it...no big deal.

So right now my mem-usage is at... 2.25gig ... out of 4gig.
I have two Firefox profiles going right now... this one with around 30 extensions in it and the other one with 3 extensions loaded. Current mem-use of this profile... about 530meg.. the other one... about 410meg. I also have T.B. running ... plus a number of smaller background apps. running.... Avast AV software etc.

If I start up any other major apps. then I might see a small delay in my system but not much. If I start seeing somewhat major hits in response I'll close down my other profile etc.

But overall I'm very happy with all of this... and BTW.. I don't play games here either.

When you upgrade... 8gig would be good... but use a Flash-drive in here made a big. diff. in response times, so I suggest that you go for that.

[borgward]

I am currently running Firefox 51.0.1, Mint Cinnamon 18, and Intel dual core 64bit 1.7 GHz on Inspiron 1520 with 4 GB DDR2 RAM. The processor is running at 100% anytime I click on anything on the Internet. I know the Inspiron is old, but it runs anything well except the browser. I am using the same extensions, etc as before performance began going downhill. I am using about 2+ GB of 4 GB of RAM now.

Until last summer I could run so many tabs until they disappeared to the right side and have several desktops up w/little problem until last summer when performance began to go downhill with each following Firefox upgrade.

By flash drive do you mean a SSD or USB stick? A SSD is not a good option for this laptop, as it does not have the capacity to benefit from the speed of an SSD. I bought a Western Digital Black 750 GB HDD for under $100. That size SSD would cost $600 to $800.

I am unhappy that Firefox has become such a resource hog.

[Grumpus]

Just a couple of thoughts:
You could run a 250GB SSD which could cost as little as $139 US.
The WD Black which I installed is a bit of a slug when compared with an RE4 and it's dead in the water compared to my Samsung SSDs
You could also open the repositories and using Synaptic install the following:
Hardinfo (latest available version) will give complete system breakdowns and run various tests and provide guiding results
System Monitor (latest version) Provides similar information like Firefox's about:memory but with more detail
You can see specifically which and what is using your system.
Also it may be some of the slowness isn't from Firefox directly but from some protective service loadings more applicable to Windows not Linux.
Frequency of loads including page, phishing protection, malware protection and others bog down the system.
One of the things I found slows Firefox are the the data transfers from /edit/preferences/advanced/data choices. See if unchecking them or partially changes speed.
Also in /edit/preferences/network/connections:
The line Choose how many simultaneous connections are allowed in various instances: Click on settings and hit the "slow internet" button.
It will reduce the connection amounts.

[borgward]

1 No doubt ssd is faster than hdd. Thats not the issue. I would not gain much performance w/ssd because it is faster than my system.
2.See above
3.hardingo been there done that. I know what I have.
4 System Monitor shows about 2 GB of 4GB used, processor at 100% with Firefox.
5 As for slowness from Firefox, what protective service loading for Windows.? what are they doing in Mozilla Firefox for Linux MInt (if indeed they are there) How to remove?
6 Unchecked /edit/preferences/advanced/data choices - do discernable difference.
7 /edit/preferences/network/connections - Use system proxy settings is the only thing selected. I assume that is by default. Will selecting No proxy affect mail.google.com? There is no "Choose how many simultaneous connections or slow internet" button"
8 Firefox is simply not performing well after updates since last summer. I still have the same # of add ons and extensions. I am still using the same protections

Thanks for the suggestions anyway.

[JayhawksRock]

Have you ever dumped the Cache(s) at Tools > Options > Advanced > Network > Cached web content and press the clear now button and restart Firefox
You could also dump the ofline content cache

[borgward]

Yeah, to little or no effect.

[therube]

The processor is running at 100% anytime I click on anything on the Internet.

That isn't right.
As a test, create a new, clean Profile, make no changes, open it, browser & what happens?


Do you have other browsers to test with (Chrome or whatever)?

[pdrummond]

I am unhappy that Firefox has become such a resource hog.

I am running windows 10 v1607 and Firefox Portable v 53.0 and the 'out of memory' warnings are becoming so frequent I will onto use another browser. I've removed most addons to help - Noscript is next to go. I found a memory reducer in "about:memory" but benefit is temporary.

My Acer switch has 2GB of ram and 32GB of SSD storage (which I keep as clean as possible). I install as many portable apps as possible on a D drive (SD card), all Windows storage options are pointed to the D drive, I store all my personal files on the D drive. Until recently this was working fine. Only Windows updates are a problem (creator's update has not arrived but the November update required an installation download to the D drive). As I type this (nothing else running) I got a memory warning...

[Grumpus]

Note: there is a warning not to install the creators update from MS Register article this morning.
Also you should look at about:memory and also about:performance and see if there is an extension or something else which is at play.