Opera 8.5 - now not only free but ad-free browser! (1 Viewer)

[Kimmo Jaskari]

Opera 8.5, the latest incarnation of what I personally believe is the best and safest browser out there, is now completely free to use. The previous version was also free but had an ad window in the interface if you did not pay for a license.

Get it at: http://www.opera.com

This version is completely "registered" for everyone. As usual, it is the fastest browser out there both for rendering the web pages and in how speedily it works for the user - the user interface is snappy and very well adapted for keyboard use, which speeds things up even more.

For new users (indeed, any Opera users), the 30 days to become an Opera lover site is very highly recommended. It will help you get all the benefits out of this fantastic browser.

 

[Ray Chuang]

Why bother.

I use the Maxthon 1.3.3 "shell" program for Internet Explorer and Firefox 1.0.6, both of which render web pages more accurately than Opera.

 

[rob-h]

I agree, Opera is better. Firefox is no better then IE. Symantec just released a study that said IE is more secure then mozillia (which firefox is based on).


For HTPC use it is the best period. Its zoom ability and other features make web pages on a a TV the most useable.

 

[Kimmo Jaskari]

Personally I prefer not to use either a Mozilla- or IE-based browser as my day-to-day browser for security reasons, and as I said; Opera is so much faster especially when it comes to the user interface that I have no desire to move to the others. I wonder if Maxthon leaves you vulnerable to exploits for both Gecko (Firefox) and IE simultaneously...?

It's also faster when it comes to rendering the pages, for that matter: http://www.howtocreate.co.uk/browserSpeed.html#winspeed

Admittedly, Opera is weakest when it comes to page rendering but for me that is a non-issue, I rarely if ever experience problems with that. Certainly, for me, it's not nearly as important as speed, security and some of the unique Opera features.

Just the fact that I can set it up to keep track of what pages I have open and re-open them should I close the browser precludes the use of another browser. It does this if the browser should crash too. You can approximate this behaviour with Firefox and an extension too, but the same is true for a whole slew of Opera features - you need a dozen extensions just to match Opera and you're still less secure.

But I digress... what you prefer is of course up to you, just wanted to share the glad tidings that Opera is now ad-free!

 

[Todd H]

Don't believe everything Symantec says. Secunia is a better source for this type of information. And according to Secunia:

Firefox - Currently, 3 out of 22 Secunia advisories, is marked as "Unpatched" in the Secunia database.

IE - Currently, 19 out of 85 Secunia advisories, is marked as "Unpatched" in the Secunia database.

Opera - Currently, 0 out of 8 Secunia advisories, is marked as "Unpatched" in the Secunia database.

So in terms of security, it looks like Opera is first, Firefox is 2nd, and IE is last.

p.s. As long as IE continues to use Active X scripting, it will be less secure than Opera and Firefox. Why Microsoft hasn't dumped Active X yet is beyond me.

 

[Kimmo Jaskari]

Because Active X is proprietary and the more people use it, the harder it is for non-Microsoft browsers to make inroads into the web browser market. Microsoft just loves proprietary technologies, because it gives them what is effectively a monopoly position.