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I must admit that I wince whenever I read a claim that a particular program will speed up my PC. I've been trying these programs for more than a decade and frankly most don't work. But there is always an exception that proves the rule and SpeedyFox is indeed, such an exception.
SpeedyFox is a program designed to speed up Firefox. It doesn't claim to speed up your browsing but rather to make Firefox load more quickly and to accelerate some specific operations such as viewing/searching your browsing history and working with cookies.
According to the SpeedyFox website the program works by contacting the databases that Firefox users to store its information.
"Firefox uses SQLITE databases to store lots of its settings. By over time the databases grow and Firefox starts working slowly. SpeedyFox compacts those databases without loosing any data."
This seems like a credible claim but as ever, the proof of the pudding is in the eating.
I tested it out on my personal laptop and it worked like a charm. After running SpeedyFox my version, of Firefox definitely loads quicker. However I was unable to assess whether there was any improvement in dealing with browsing history or with cookies - I'm not even sure how I would go about measuring that. But the improvement in loading speed alone more than justifies the use of the product.
I should say that my version of Firefox was an excellent candidate for improvement as my profile was very old. Users with newer profiles are unlikely to see the same sort of improvement I experienced.
Usage of SpeedyFox couldn't be simpler. The program doesn't require installing so all you need do is download and run the executable. You will then see the following screen.
Unless you are using the portable version of Firefox you will normally just accept the default setting for your profile. Then click the " Speed Up My Firefox" button and you're done.
The optimization process is quick; only a few seconds in my case and the improvement is immediate, you'll notice it the next time you load Firefox.
All up, a pretty useful free utility that provides a genuine benefit to most Firefox users. The degree of benefit will depend on the age and condition of your profile. I suspect some folks will see a significant improvement while others will see almost none. But what the heck, you've got nothing to lose, so give it a try.
http://www.crystalidea.com/speedyfox (300KB, Windows 2000/XP/Vista/7)
Gizmo
Thanks to regular contributor Lex Davidson for the suggestion.
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CCleaner now compacts Firefox databases too, but I'm not sure if it does the same thing.
Yes, you are right! I didn't know that. It does the same thing, I just tested it.
Maybe that's why speedyfox and a few others have disappeared?
Oh well, at least you can get a really good fasterfox!
Didn't like various hacks etc. So here is what I do.
Download the SQLite command line utility here;
http://www.sqlite.org/download.html
This is the one you need
sqlite-3_6_22.zip
(254.29 KiB) A command-line program for accessing and modifying SQLite databases. See the documentation for additional information.
Copy the extracted executable to your firefox default profile folder.
Paste the following into a text file, and save it as "compact.bat" in the same folder.
MAKE SURE FIREFOX IS CLOSED Click on the compact.bat file to compact all SQLite DB's in the folder.
This also works for Zotero, or any other programs which use SQLite databases.
That will give you more speeed. Having done that, go here and download this version of Fasterfox;
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/14833
MAKE SURE YOU GET THIS! There are three versions there and this is the one that works properly.
Simply install it, and restart Firefox. The default installation should increase your speeds a lot, and there is no need to change them.
Enjoy!
Oops!
Here is the batch file;
@FOR %%G IN (*.sqlite) DO ( sqlite3 %%G "VACUUM" )
Speedyfox is no longer available it seems. I am running the above tweaks on 3.6 RC1 with no problems at all. Also runs on 3.5. Can't vouch for any other versions.
Runs a very great deal faster! You might be surprised!
By the way, the tweaks run on Windows 2000/XP/Vista/7
Lastly, the developer of this version of Fasterfox is very helpful indeed, and has some more very good tweaks on his page. Just look through the recent reviews at the add-on site.
With regard to frequency of running the compact.bat file, that depends on how you use your machine. If you use it a lot, then run it once a week. There is no real point in running it at every start of Firefox, but it wont do any harm to do that. All it does is compact the SQLite databases.
If you are running XP > SP2, then patching the settings will also increase your speed;
http://www.speedguide.net/read_articles.php?id=1497
Brilliant
Many thanks
GeezBlues
Do you need to run it each time you start up firefox?
No. Just once. If Firefox upgrades to a new version, then I would suggest running it again.
The new version, 1.4, supports the command line, allowing it to be run from the task scheduler.
Command line options are available in the menu via Help > Command Line Syntax.
It works on Vista very well. Thanks
Tried the latest version of SpeedyFox yesterday. Did not notice any improvement in loading up of Firefox :(
Anupam
Does SpeedyFox provide an improvement in Firefox load times over Firefox PreLoader? That is the question!
Version 1.3 of SpeedyFox is out.
Anupam Shriwatri
It worked well for me on my home pc. On another pc it would not start. I guess it's ok for a free utility.
This thing works great. Has anyone figured out how to make an autorun shortcut or add it to the task scheduler? There don't appear to be any command switches as far as I can tell.
Why do you need an autorun shortcut for it? Do you have to run it each time you start firefox?
Works exactly as described - improved my load time very noticeably.
Chrome - fast Firefox!!!
Yes, software with less functionality tends to be quicker. So what.
Great tim,good advices for us !!
This really does work. Thank you!
Completely messed up my firefox, can not access home page, google or google mail. DONT TOUCH IT!
messed up google chrome,explorer and opera
Amazing. How did it manage to do all that?
It would appear that you are in a minority of one, but we would still like to help if you could share some more details?
Doesn't work for mac but it wouldn't need it anyway!
Thank you.
I run a portable version of Firefox from my USB Flash drive. Can anyone provide me with instructions for this scenario??
Thanks
Jim
Yes, it does work, and couldn't be any simpler to use. I usually have to wait about a minute and 1/2 for FF to open. I have dial-up so everything is slow. Now if there was only something like Speedy Fox that will speed up Gmail.
Wow! This worked great for me and has just been added to my toolkit! Appreciate the heads-up, and thank you once again...
I use FireTune but I will try this!..
I use FireTune but I will have to give this a try..
I am impressed it really works. Its much better than this post, which never worked for me.
http://www.techsupportalert.com/how_to_make_firefox_faster.htm
Thanks--I loaded it on two machines and both work great now and load fast.
Wondering if it works with Namoroka 3.6 Alpha 1. This will eventually become Firefox 3.6, but am doing some Alpha testing on it !
Please humour me by sharing what you all do now with the extra 20 seconds?
Well you never know Midnight.....they may need to get a cup of coffee or a cold one.......but they had better be quick about it.
Wow!!! From thirty-three seconds to four seconds. This little utility really works.
It does not get installed in FAT32 Drive. Can anybody suggest a way of installing in FAT32 drive.
Wow - what a difference! From something like 45 seconds down to 10. Thanks Gizmo, an excellent find.
Thanks, cool find - 27 seconds to about 5 now :) Real happy with that.
...Very nice....from 35 seconds to under 4 seconds.....thank you
I just got up off the floor after reading "... the proof of the pudding is in the eating." Finally! Someone got it right!
What's usually heard is "The proof is in the pudding".
Yay for being a month late: http://lifehacker.com/5344418/make-firefox-faster-by-vacuuming-your-data...
Congrats.
Yay for being a day late with this post. Someone posted this link yesterday.
Ok, Guyz, I have to say that even with Gizmo's seal of approval, and all the positive comments ahead of mine, which I read, I was very pleased to see this program actually load my firefox before I could say "click"! That's all my fourteen firefox tabs, which I never timed but normally I click firefox then sip coffee then pick my nose or scratch me bum, do some other stuff, check to see if firefox has loaded yet and so on. That's all done with. Now I'll click, sip, and browse. Just the way I like it. Aha, aha.
Did wonders for me - from 28 to 4 seconds!!! Thanks for this great tool.
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