Look at that image that the other guy posted. Look where it says firefox.exe Then look over to where it says memusage. 394852k. That is only 4mb away from 500mb.


And to the last poster:

For me, active x controls are not a problem. I’m not going to random sites and accepting active x controls. They can turn the web from text and images to a full featured program. The site logmein.com uses active x controls to allow you to use your computer from anywhere with a browser that supports active x. If a browser lacks active x it is taking a lot of functionality out. I prefer functionality over security.

Indeed - some people do. Those same people though (not nessecarily inclusive of yourself) tend to be the ones thaqt come running to places such as these forums and complain about how their computer is infested.

Furthermore - your entire premise is wrong - Java (etc...) can do much the same in many ways, as can browser plugins (a feature employed by most browsers).

In terms of the high resource usage of firefox, there were some problems for about 10% of firefox users a little while ago with a CPU usage issue, which are resolve now I believe. In terms of that screendump, I've had some pretty sever memory leaks in IE at various times, even in the latest version - just as bad as that one - it depends on how long you leave it leaking for. I've never had one in firefox myself.

If Firefox consumes what you would call "too much" RAM, it's normally an issue on that machine. I've never seen Firefox use more RAM than what I would call out of the ordinary.

Is it faster than IE? Not that I can tell, but it's not slower.

Does it do a better job of stopping Spyware, Adware, pop-ups and other items I would deem "unwanted". Yes. Certainly. Especially with extensions such as NoScript.

NoScript will solve 90% of your problems (obviously if you allow scripts on a page and click something you shouldn't or download some file that is full of malicious code then it's your own fault). Popups are 99.9% eliminated and so are scripts, except for those sites that you click to accept scripts from. It's easy and quick. In my opinion it is THE solution to stop most problems and will do the job better than anything else out there (NoScript).

Yes, there are alternatives to active x like java but none of them will provide as much functionality as active x. Active x allows you to use your web browser as more of a full featured program. It allows a web site to communicate in ways that would let it find updates for your software, pinpoint what driver you need, and allow you to remotely control your computer from another computer. I like internet explorer. I like active x. I have never gotten a virus. This is because I know how to browse the web safely and I know what to click and what not to click. Many average users do not and they accept the active x control from dodgy site and give their computer a virus.

I sincerely doubt that there are many people in your position of having never obtained a piece of malware (doesn't have to be a virus) through IE and activeX.

The difference between a bad activeX and a bad browser plugin, as that an activeX is directly liked to the COM.

Besides this, MSIE is so closely integrated with windows that it can cause problems in itself - take the recent WMF exploit and vulnerability. In firefox - no problem unless you specifically agree to a download because of the way firefox is built. In IE, infection was automatic.

While even a badly written browser plugin can be dangerous, at least it tends only to have limited exploitability, but a badly written activeX can be an easy entrypoint to the whole system (for example, the Sony DRM activeX exploit mentioned by Thom.).

I use MSIE6SP1 myself, as well as Firefox. I've rarely had a problem with MSIE either. but I've had substantially more of them when compared to firefox.

Given that I'm a reasonably seasoned internet user, I'm not at all of the opinion that MSIE is a bad browser per say - but I am of the opinion that it's a bad choice for people who aren't quite as internet savvy as youre average computer orientated person. For such people (ie, most people) firefox is without doubt a safe(er) choice.

It might be working fine for you but there's obviously significantly more out there that it's not working so well for

It's a moot point though as Microsoft are locking down on ActiveX in IE7 *because* of security issues. Just because somethings done in ActiveX currently isn't an indication it can't be achieved by other means - Microsoft's Genuine Windows Validation for example is an ActiveX control in IE, but available as a plugin for Firefox.

Java & the like are safer ways of achieving such functionality as they run sandboxed. I think .Net works similarly in that regard (I'd have to check that out though).

Security experts such as Georgi Guninski for example have also repeatedly advised disabling ActiveX due to exploits they've found over the years. I mean, I realise that there are people out there who are quite savvy as regards authorising content to run, but most PC users out there aren't & will hit yes to anything. You might recall Microsoft would repeatedly ignore vulnerability warnings on the basis of "user interaction" required; something they've obviously had to change their approach to with this whole trustworthy computing initiative.

IE7 puts security first, functionality second.

There's load more at the Blog; http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/default.aspx Highly recommended

Yes, even I have to admit that the forthcoming version of IE is looking better than its previous history would suggest

Well, Mastertech -- aka Nemo, etc -- is going to be crapping his pants if he reads the recent special issue (spring 2006) of Maximum PC as there is an article in it that is titled "Ditch IE for Firefox"...has anyone else read this article?!?!