Safari loads pages faster than Internet Explorer and Firefox

Safari is the Internet browser all Macheads swear by. It has recently been launched to lure Microsoft users away from Windows and Internet Explorer. Safari is also the browser that the newly launched Apple iPhone uses. Most third party applications for the phone will work on this browser’s technology. So how good is it?

Safari definitely loads pages much faster than Internet Explorer. Apple says, “Safari loads pages up to 2 times faster than Internet Explorer 7 and up to 1.6 times faster than Firefox 2.” Also, it runs scripts on web pages much faster than these browsers. This means you get to see your pages faster and enjoy quick navigation of most websites.

Safari has a very clean interface with just Back and Forward buttons, a +sign to add bookmarks and an icon for the home page. I really like the address bar. You do not have to waste time typing, for example, http://www.nytimes.com. Simply type “nytimes” and it will take you to the site. In Internet Explorer too, there is a similar but little known shortcut. Type the name of the site and hit Control+Enter. IE enters the http:// and the .com automatically. But Safari goes even further. Suppose you want to go to a site other than a .com one — something like .org or .co.uk. All you have to do is type the basic name of the site. For example, just write bbc and Safari will take you to www.bbc.co.uk. Fantastic, isn’t it?

Safari introduced tabbed browsing long ago in Macs. IE 7 came up with it only recently. With tabbed browsing, you can see many websites from a single window by just clicking on the tabs under the menu bar.

Most browser preferences of Windows are very complex. Safari’s is simple and easy. A little window holds all of Safari’s security preferences — and there aren’t too many either. This pattern is followed for its Appearance, Bookmarks and Advanced tabs too.

One problem I found in Safari though is that it cannot render Bengali sites properly. Go to www.anandabazar.com and you will see that the text is garbled. I have pointed this out to Apple and hopefully their final version will be better.

Remember, Safari is still a Beta version; it is just for testers. You can download it from www.apple.com/safari. Even in its Beta version, it is worth it.

You can speed up your browsing by manipulating the Registry of your Windows. But be warned: one small mistake and you are in deep trouble with your Windows. Always create a backup of your Registry before you attempt any changes. To back up your Registry, go to File —>Export after opening up Regedit. Save the file where you can find it easily.

Reader Abir Atarthy of Kharagpur shares with us some great tricks that work on Windows XP Service Pack 2 and Vista. Even with a broadband connection, many sites open very slowly, especially if they contain heavy graphics. Here is what Abir suggests —

Speed up Internet Explorer: Open the Registry editor by going to Start—>Run and typing regedit. Once in Registry, navigate to the key:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\InternetSettings. Now right click on the window on your right and add a New DWORD Value. Rename it MaxConnectionsPerServer. Next right click on MaxConnectionsPerServer to edit the Dword Value. Choose a base. If it is Hexadecimal, set the value to 99. If you opt for Decimal, set it to 153.

Create another DWORD and rename it MaxConnectionsPer1_0Server. Here, too, put the values mentioned above.

Restart Internet Explorer and watch the boost you get in your connection.

DNS Trick: When you connect to a website, your computer sends information back and forth. Some of this deals with resolving the site name to an IP address. This is the stuff that TCP/IP really deals with, not words. You can increase the DNS cache by a simple Registry tweak. Open Notepad and type the following code exactly as it is typed and save it with the filename dnscache.reg. Now double click on it and click Yes to merge into Registry. This is what you have to type:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Dnscache\Parameters]

“CacheHashTableBucketSize”=dword:00000001

“CacheHashTableSize”=dword:00000180

“MaxCacheEntryTtlLimit”=dword:0000fa00

“MaxSOACacheEntryTtlLimit”=dword:0000012d

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