Hotmail and Camino - Any way to make it better?

[J English Smith]

I use a Pismo 400 with 768mb RAM as my "daily driver." For most browsing, I find it quite acceptable, and Camino is my regular browser.

There is one site that slows to a crawl: Hotmail. Not sure whether it's the underlying java script or the ads on the right. At any rate, switching between e-mails takes too long. I can feel my arteries hardening after a while. Or, as a character on Modern Family recently said, "I can feel my heart beating in my eyeballs."

I use Eudora from time to time, but my problem there is that I rotate my machines, and every time I check my inbox with Eudora, it downloads all messages and empties the box on the Hotmail server. Not perfect for me.

Anyone have a good workaround on this? Is there a simple Camino settings tweak that would make this run better? Good old Microsquish...it figures. The NYT site is positively zippy compared to Hotmail.

 

[ClassicHasClass]

It's probably the JavaScript. I'm obviously horribly biased, but Camino is based on 3.0.19, and 3.0's JS compared to even 3.6 is about half again as slow. The ads are undoubtedly contributing because -based ads can use JavaScript too. Camino does have AdBlock, so that's one thing to see if it helps.

If you want to stick with Camino instead of Firefox 3.6, get the 2.1 alpha and see if that is better. 2.1b is based on 3.6.17, IIRC, so you get the same renderer but the browser chrome is still native. But, it's an alpha.

Although TenFourFox will do very well with the JavaScript, 768MB is probably a bit on the low end for it. However, you could see how well the 7400 version performs, for gits and shiggles.

 

[PowerPup]

Heh, I've run TFF4 on my Lombard 333Mhz with 384MB of Ram. (Though I don't actually use it for browsing, just testing TFF. Haven't tried TFF5 beyond starting and quitting at the moment.)

Your Pismo 400Mhz will run well enough, my Titanium G4 only has 1GB (its max,) which is only 256MB more. It's mainly the CPU that will affect your browsing performance.

Yeah, you should also try the Camino 2.1a CHC mentioned, I've used it and it's pretty stable for me. Although I think you'll still might have issues with Hotmail, I seem to remember having trouble in Camino with the Hotmail's Ajax after they updated something back in winter. (I would click on an email to open it and it would loud, then suddenly refresh back to inbox.) Who knows, maybe they've fixed it by now.

It is possible to use Thunderbird, you would just need to make sure the "delete mail from server" (or something like that,) is unchecked before checking mail for the first time.

 

[J English Smith]

Thanks for the suggestions! I downloaded the Camino new 2.1 alpha version, and it seems a bit zippier, at least on my work wi-fi. I will test at home tonight. I have set it to suppress ads, but not flash, and to play animations once.

 

[MacJunky]

hotmail is slow even on modern computers....

It is just shit.

 

[closeddoors1559]

I found out that there is a mobile version of Hotmail. It is really basic, but I hope it fits your needs: http://mail.live.com/m/

 

[J English Smith]

I will give that a try, thanks! The alpha Camino is better, a definite improvement. One of these days, I also need to get one of my Pismos up to a full 1ghz of memory and see what that does. My highest one is 768mb...

 

[ClassicHasClass]

A gig of RAM would help a lot. You could also run TenFourFox in that, hint hint.