Recently I stumbled onto some tips how to speed up ones Firefox. Firefox, since the version 3, uses a SQLite database for various tasks such as storing bookmarks, histories, site specific preferences and backups.

Over time it's get filled up with unnecessary and old info if you want, and there's a simple method to ditch those useless info and speed up your Firefox considerably, or like most of the guides say to "vacuum" it.

Use it once in a while, I've seen an improvement on my Firefox since I used it.

1. Go to "Tools" -> "Error Console"
2. Paste this in the "Code" text box:

   Components.classes["@mozilla.org/browser/nav-history-service;1"].getService(Components.interfaces.nsPIPlacesDatabase).DBConnection.executeSimpleSQL("VACUUM");

3. Press enter or click "evaluate"
4. Your Firefox will freeze for a short time, just wait
5. Enjoy your speed up Firefox!

Related posts:

1. How to fix the video lag in Firefox!
2. Make your Firefox load faster!
3. 5 easy-to-do tweaks to make your Firefox faster!

I was angry and frustrated that Firefox once again has slowed down the i-lost-count-this time! Seriously, it's such a great browser but so full of little problems which really can get annoying as hell!

So I went to google and found 5 easy-to-do tweak with remarkable results! Remarkable, because you truly can see the difference between a standard and a tweaked Firefox. One might wonder why such tweaks are not standard options..

Type “about:config” into the address bar and hit return. Look for the following entries:

1. "network.http.pipelining" and set value to true
2. "network.http.proxy.pipelining" and set value to true
3. "network.http.pipelining.maxrequests" and set value to 30-40
4. "nglayout.initialpaint.delay" and set value to 0
5. "config.trim_on_minimize" and set value to true

If you don't have them, create them:

1. Right click -> new -> boolean -> type in "network.http.pipelining" -> set value to true
2. Right click -> new -> boolean -> type in "network.http.proxy.pipelining" -> set value to true
3. Right click -> new -> boolean -> type in "config.trim_on_minimize" -> set value to true
4. Right click -> new -> integer -> type in "network.http.pipelining.maxrequests" -> set value to 30 (default is 1)
5. Right click -> new -> integer -> type in "nglayout.initialpaint.delay" -> set value to 0

Now the explanation as to what does what:

network.http.pipelining and network.http.proxy.pipelining:

It enables pipe-lining, which means the browser normally sends 1 request at a time, with pipeline enabled it will send the amount of request you set in "network.http.pipelining.maxrequests"!

network.http.pipelining.maxrequests:

Like I said Firefox usually sends 1 request at any time. By setting a different value than 1, you force Firefox to send more requests thus enabling it to load faster, because he gets more responses at any time.

config.trim_on_minimize:

Each time you minimize your Firefox it will clear the RAM. Firefox is infamous of wasting RAM for Pages you don't need so you can go "back" to them.

nglayout.initialpaint.delay:

If this value doesn't exist or isn't set Firefox waits 250 milliseconds, or 0.25 of a second then starts rendering the requested page(s). People report that setting it to 0, ergo forcing Firefox to begin rendering immediately causes almost all pages to show up faster.

Addendum:

If you are one of the lazy lot, and don't want to manually tweak your Firefox, here's a great Extension with virtually the same effect

Fasterfox: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1269

Enjoy your new, faster Firefox!

Related posts:

1. Make your Firefox load faster!
2. How to fix the video lag in Firefox!
3. Using Firefox 3.x? Speed it up by vacuuming its SQLite database!