Thinking of changing to Firefox from IE8 but anxious

[PEV]

I run Window XP with IE8.

With XP no longer supported by Windows and IE8 allegedly being vulnerable to BUGS AND security breaches I am advised to change to Google Chrome or Firefox and just had a look at downloading Firefox.

What are you guys thoughts on which browser to move to?

As I was moving through the Firefox download I was given the option to import the stuff from my present browser IE8.

I stopped the download there and then as was worried that if the stuff were imported to Firefox would it be recoverable should I not want to stay with Firefox and move back to IE8, Google Chrome etc?

 

I run an HP Pavillion 2002 version with an HP PSC 1110 all in one which still works fine and I want to avoid any change that is not essential as am not tecky and it usually ends in a monumental **** up when I try to do any stuff like this!

Your valued advice please.

Ray

[Ray1000]

Hi Ray,

 

I moved from IE to Firefox years ago and then to Google Chrome.

 

Regarding your bookmarks on IE ... if they are important you need to save them to your hard drive using the Export function in IE.

 

Importing them from IE to FF still leaves them on IE in any case ... you could simply start IE up at any time afterwards and it would still look the same.

 

Having two browsers on one machine only brings up an extra box asking if you want to make this browser your default one.

 

There's nothing to lose by giving them a try ... just be sure to choose "custom install" and disregard or untick all the extra toolbars and so on.

 

Take note of of what you have in "Add and Remove Programs" before you start ... that way you'll be able to see if you gain anything you weren't expecting, or didn't need.

 

Ray

[Starbuck]

After using Firefox for many years. i've just moved away from it.

I was always very happy until the latest update.... this changed everything and i just couldn't get along with it.

Have now moved over to Pale Moon

Pale Moon is an Open Source, Firefox-based web browser available for Microsoft Windows and Linux

And it looks and works like Firefox used to.

It will import settings from IE and Chrome, but if you are presently using Firefox you will need to download the Pale Moon profile migration tool

To copy your Firefox profile over.

All of my addons for Firefox still work with Pale Moon .... so at the moment i'm very happy with it.

 

It does download as a zip file, so you will need to extract the contents.

 

Firefox is still installed on the system, so hopefully they'll stop messing it up one day and make it great again.

[Plastic Nev]

How does Palemoon compare with Firefox for memory use Starbuck?

Though I recently updated, I soon got used to the new interface in Firefox, it just irks me that in comparison to IE the memory use is so high, regardless of what version Firefox is or has been. Still use it, but if doing something else that is RAM intensive, I have to remember to shut Firefox to get the best out of whatever I am using.

 

To put your mind at ease Ray, I have been using Firefox for many years and seen it go through a lot of changes as they update to new versions. I can assure you that all favourites in IE do stay there, they are only copied to Firefox, not completely moved.

 

The only gripe with Firefox is its hunger for memory or RAM use, I just looked at "Task Manager" and after being on for a couple of hours it is running 330,000K of RAM, which in comparison to other tasks is a lot, the highest other process is my Windows Live Mail which is using around 53,000K.

It isn't too much of a problem for me with a total RAM of 4GB, however with older 32bit machines maybe still running XP with the minimum 500KB, other processes will be struggling without first shutting Firefox down.

 

Nev.

[Starbuck]

How does Palemoon compare with Firefox for memory use Starbuck?

Browser with 2 tabs open:

Firefox 310,000K

Pale Moon 234,000K

So, yes Pale Moon is better than Firefox.

But both are still higher than IE

[PEV]

Thanks for all your quick responses guys.

Unfortunatley I look like sticking with IE8 reason? Both Firefox and Chrome are driving me mad!

Whatever I do I cannot get any of the simply available stuff I have in IE8 for example I cannot find my favourites or half the other stuff that was easily at hand. Firefox tells me with the instructional to open another tab to get to my favourites - I open the other tab and there's nothing there. I tried to work out These two browsers a while back but they defeated me then!

The whole thing is alien to IE and I just sit here fiddling and getting no where!

What am I doing wrong or do I

[Starbuck]

Whatever I do I cannot get any of the simply available stuff I have in IE8 for example I cannot find my favourites or half the other stuff that was easily at hand.

For some strange reason Firefox decided to change things awhile back and remove the Menu bar.

Putting this back makes things a lot easier.

 

Right click on a blank part of the header and then make sure there's a tick against Menu Bar.

It should then appear at the top left.

Favorites are called Bookmarks in Firefox.... so just click on the Bookmarks tab to see your list.

 

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v708/starbuck50/ffmenu_zps3a4185e8.png

[PEV]

Guys I have made the move to Chrome for my online stuff and connect to it by desk top icon so it is not set as my default browser ATM

This keeps the old IE8 on hand via a Google icon on desktop, when I am more confident with Chrome I will likely make it my default browser. Thanks for all your help/advice.

Ray

[Ray1000]

Good thinking Ray ... have you got the bookmarks toolbar showing, you can edit or shorten the title of each bookmark in order to get more on view.

 

For importing favourites from IE to bookmarks in Chrome ...

 

Click the Chrome menu Chrome menu.

Select Bookmarks.

Select Import bookmarks and settings.

Select the programme that contains the bookmarks you'd like to import.

Click Import.

 

Ray

[PEV]

Thanks Ray your advice appreciated.

Ray