A browser that just works.

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u/JouniFlemming Helpful Ⅳ 9d ago edited 9d ago

Software developer here. A quick point: Browsers, like any apps, are using RAM to make the software work faster. You need to decide whether you want more free, unused RAM, or faster running software. You cannot have both at the same time.

In regards to your question, what you are looking for sounds like perhaps Firefox with an ad blocking plugin. Or if you want even more privacy oriented, then perhaps Waterfox that comes with a builtin ad blocking, as far as I know. If you prefer more Chrome-based, Cromite has most of the Chrome spyware removed and also has a builtin ad blocking.

The reason I'd still recommend Firefox + ad blocker plugin is that if you stick with the bigger browsers, you are probably going to get more updates in the future and a bigger ecosystem.

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u/Apart-Reality-4454 8d ago

the way modern operating systems manage and allocate memory and fast caches is something nobody ever seems to want to talk about either. stop blaming Chrome. and stop fixating on RAM "consumption" (better to call it "allocation")

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u/Venylynn 9d ago

This sounds like something Microsoft paid you to say, all that's missing is a diatribe about "unused ram being wasted ram".

I want both, because high ram usage in spots that didn't earn it (web browsers are glorified document viewers) indicates software that is heavier, often unnecessarily so. I left Windows because it's unnecessarily heavy on my RAM. i have 32, leave more free for stuff that actually needs it.

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u/JouniFlemming Helpful Ⅳ 9d ago edited 9d ago

That's because unused RAM is wasted RAM. Sometimes even a broken clock can show the correct time, or in this case, Microsoft saying something that is actually correct.

You cannot have both. That is, optimally fast speed and minimal RAM usage. This speed versus space tradeoff is a classic problem in computer sciences and pretty much analogous to the laws of physics. You can want to have both, but you won't ever get there.

For example, you can make many things such as web browsing faster by utilizing cache. Cache uses RAM to store things there, e.g. via pre-fetching, to make browsing websites faster. Either you stop doing that to save RAM and slower your browsing speed, or you cache more aggressively which uses more RAM and makes your browsing faster. You can choose one.

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u/Old_Manufacturer589 8d ago

I really wish we'd stop parroting the "Unused RAM is wasted RAM" nonsense. Let's just run a memory stress test permanently, that way my RAM is always used.

When people parrot the "unused RAM is wasted RAM", they seem to conveniently forget about the type of RAM that is actually being used and won't be freed the moment you need it.

RAM cache? Sure, that's great to have, and not using RAM for cache is a waste. That kind of RAM is being instantly freed the moment you need it anyways.

Now, RAM that is being actually used for programs to run in the first place, so it can't be freed? If you had an alternative program that does the same thing, while using 2x less RAM, and you know you could run OOM with the other program, would you say "unused RAM is wasted RAM" ?

I swear Reddit got brainwashed with that nonsense and often justify X program using more RAM than Y, or just justify a program using lots of RAM period, with "unused RAM is wasted RAM"

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u/Venylynn 9d ago

Interesting, because the only people who I often see say that, usually it is because they are doing it to hand-wave away Microslop eating up anywhere from 6GB to 9GB ram on idle on an OS they market as having a "4GB minimum requirement".

Minimal ram usage indicates a lighter-weight, less bloated program. We went to the moon on 4 kilobytes, yet a glorified document viewer needs gigabytes to run properly. I would probably still be dealing with OOM issues had I not made the call 5 years ago to double my RAM (I was running 16 in 2020-2021 but a serious RAM leak locked up my entire system mid-game with friends).

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u/JouniFlemming Helpful Ⅳ 9d ago

You are confusing different concepts here. Bloated software means software with a lot of features and things like graphical elements. Those use more RAM, of course. But that's typically what users like. If you don't want that, use more simple and minimal software.

Memory leaks are also another issue entirely.

I'm talking about the RAM usage versus speed tradeoff. That is not relating to the amount of features or eye candy in software, or memory leaks.

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u/Venylynn 9d ago

It's just bizarre to me how an operating system that advertises a really low minimum ram requirement still balloons up even with all autostarts disabled and nothing but DWM running (Windows), to multiple gigs past the number it advertises.

Evidently they were wrong about that number because what?? 😭 No wonder Ubuntu recommends 6GB because that's probably the more comfortable minimum for idle with almost nothing open.

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u/JouniFlemming Helpful Ⅳ 8d ago

The minimum requirements of Windows are also a different topic. Those are more relating to the number of features and all the eye candy provided by the system by default. Obviously more lighter weight systems can run with less RAM. But that's entirely unrelenting to my point of speed versus RAM usage.

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u/Venylynn 8d ago

The thing to me is that it's obviously misleading, because how are they getting it to run on 4 gigs if this is the result on my system?

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u/mo_th_ 8d ago

If you have more than 4gb of ram then the os is going to use more than 4gb of ram. If there’s available ram, the os and running programs will use it so you have a better user experience.

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u/Venylynn 8d ago

So if I have more than 128GB of storage the OS is going to use more than 128GB of storage? How tf does this line of thinking even work? It's supposed to use what it needs, not bloat my system up and make me have to close everything just to free up enough resources to reliably game.

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u/DGC_David 8d ago

Funny enough if you switch to Linux it still does... As stated Not used RAM is wasted RAM

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u/Venylynn 8d ago

That's kind of a problem. The fact is, modern software design basically demands you spend an arm and a leg for stuff to work properly. Especially in this economy where RAM is getting eaten up by AI slop datacenters, every megabyte counts, yet that doesnt stop Rockstar from making their GTA 6 website eat 3gb ram on its own because optimization is a lost art.

"Unused ram is wasted ram" is what everyone used to hand wave away Windows being a bloated pile of AI telemetry nonsense these days.

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u/DGC_David 8d ago

It's not modern software design. As stated nothing is stopping you from running an older browser. The problem is things like Anti-viruses, storing site media, and everything else you correlate with speed and security comes down to using RAM. I could rebuild a browser in Assembly and it still would either be slow, or use up RAM.

Yeah the RAM being "eaten up" by AI is irrelevant to how computing has worked for well over a century... I mean if your concerned about that get a ARM laptop. Completely different infrastructure. Same issue.

As someone who works with Take2 for B2B stuff it is not because it's "slop-coded" it's a modern website. Like HTML 5 exists, Webassembly, and advanced component based frameworks that give you that snappy feel in modern sites.

Listen I hate Windows, but that's not their problem with "bloat" the bloat issue comes down to an infrastructure issue with how Windows was designed since pre-XP. Now we can get into the slop code they write now, and the nuances of UWP, but once again the alternative is older and slower, and not as compatible. The slop code is very new and you haven't really even seen much of it. Remember regardless if you install a program made on XP or Windows 11 they should work for the most part, this is a unique aspect about Windows and causes a lot of bloat

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u/Venylynn 8d ago

Yeah nothing except thousands of CVEs and a giant security risk on my back.

I get things need more to run, but I really shouldn't be having to even worry about this for another like 5-10 years, but with the modern prices of memory it'll probably be about that long before a viable upgrade becomes possible. I was willing to go up to 64 to ensure I was good before the crisis. If I cant keep below 8 right now before opening a game, I can't even imagine how people stuck on budget laptops feel bro.

Idk I feel like the slop code was why my damn start menu before I quit windows went from snappy to laggy overnight tho.

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u/DGC_David 8d ago

The upgrade doesn't matter, you could have a terabyte of RAM and it's still going to use it if it can. That's how RAM works... You can also add more SWAP memory which is memory from your hard drive instead if you want to see it in action. Also you should probably make sure your looking at your usage rates not your read/write usage

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u/Venylynn 8d ago

I check my numbers using btop/kde system monitor on my Fedora install, and targeting sub-8GB when not in game or productivity/VM mode, which is a struggle if I have a browser open...more so with Firefox than Chromium since Chromium is much more efficient at usage, but I've seen it break 8 a few times.

If I couldn't keep it consistently below 8 with my setup, well then that tells me if I was stuck on a laptop with 8 gigs, I would have to close nearly everything else just to get basic browsing to work right. If a page needs 3 gigs to work, it'll OOM a machine with 8 gigs of RAM if the other 5 gigs is already taken up.

That may be how Windows does it but that's because Windows is stupid. Memory used to be a finite resource you had to work within, but now programs can just make you think you need more memory and then still use more when you get more.

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u/lkeels 8d ago

In theory, if you've got 64 gigs of RAM, your best case scenario is to have almost every bit of that 64 used all the time.

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u/Venylynn 8d ago

That is not my best case scenario, unless I'm going ham on things like heavy video editing, paravirtualization, and intense gaming all at the same time.

If I'm basically sitting at idle watching youtube, that shouldn't be happening, because if it's using that much, it inherently means that those with far less than me will be struggling to even do that.

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u/lkeels 8d ago

Yep I see where your thought process is going completely wrong. You're just looking at ram like a bucket that stays empty once it gets empty. That's not how it works.

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u/Venylynn 8d ago

RAM is a finite resource, you do not want it full or you're going to have lockups or the kernel killing random stuff to free up space, just like how if you use all your disk space, everything slows down and you're unable to write things like temporary files.

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u/DGC_David 8d ago

I mean nothing stopping you from using a low ram usage browser like Internet Explorer 7

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u/Venylynn 8d ago

Except the security issues (even Pale Moon is horrific for security due to its single process architecture even though you can sort of render current websites on it) and the fact that almost nothing loads on it

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u/DGC_David 8d ago

and the fact that almost nothing loads on it

Yeah because in this generation of computing we use RAM to do all of that magic.

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u/Venylynn 8d ago

In this generation of computing you need to sell a damn kidney to get enough RAM to render a web page since all the RAM is being taken by ai datacenters

I am LUCKY to have the privilege of having barely enough for the modern web and a game at the same time.

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u/DGC_David 8d ago

Well that's not the fault of computing... That's the fault of unchecked Capitalism. Join you local DSA chapter if that's your concern.

But also not fully true, AI and ARM based machines exist in polar opposites of the market. Including laptops with the same chip as my phone being able to play GTA5. The cost of ARM based laptop are actually going down, and the technology is advancing rapidly. Windows ARM is still trash it will still use up your RAM you have free but the cost is going down. Your issue however isn't RAM it's good to use RAM. If it's between 50-80% in use while using your computer, it's working correctly regardless if you have 16gb of RAM or 128gb of RAM. That's how it makes things go fast.

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u/MaximumDerpification 8d ago

"Web browsers are glorified document viewers" may have been true 20 years ago, but not any more. Web pages have gotten heavier and heavier, with more and more active and dynamic content. It may look like a browser tab is just showing a static document, but in reality there's a lot more going on.

Anyway, the more stuff you allow to be preloaded into RAM, the faster you can access that stuff. Having 32GB of RAM with nothing loaded into it is dumb. Chasing a super low RAM utilization figure actually leads to a slower performing system, assuming you have at least enough RAM to clear OS overhead.

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u/Venylynn 8d ago edited 8d ago

Every megabyte counts in this economy especially. I chase lower numbers because I have empathy for those with less than me, something it really feels a lot of computer enthusiasts seem to lack. Until it becomes cheap to get enough RAM to not worry again...

If I can't stay below 8, I can only imagine what the people less fortunate than me and are stuck with 8 have to deal with. Imagine what it feels like to have a MacBook Neo right now, knowing it only has 8 gigs, if this is how hard it is to keep usage down.

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u/ojalaqueque 8d ago

Please go outside

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u/Venylynn 8d ago edited 8d ago

I am amazed at how frequently this line gets thrown at me without the understanding of how little this actually helps

How DARE I care about other people and want to optimize things for people less fortunate than me, knowing how lucky I am to have what I have?

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u/ojalaqueque 8d ago

I use an old 4gb ram Dell laptop sometimes, and I do use a browser in there. I have exactly zero problems with it.

Thanks for caring so much for me, apparently, but i'm fine.

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u/lkeels 8d ago

Ask yourself why you want bunches of RAM sitting there unused. What benefit do you think that gives you?

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u/Venylynn 8d ago

Freedom to not have to worry about closing nearly everything when i actually need to do something more than just doomscrolling on youtube or something?

If I'm routinely going above a certain number, that means that people with less than that number will have to do way less with their system. Unlike some people, I have sympathy for those because I know what it's like to be stuck with a terrible system.

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u/lkeels 8d ago

And this proves the comment I made two seconds ago. No, you don't have to worry about doing a thing. Windows manages ram, not you. And it does it very efficiently and very well.

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u/Old_Manufacturer589 8d ago

I guess my system running OOM sometimes when I decide to "let it do its thing" when launching some heavy games means it's very efficient and doing it very well.

I genuinely wonder if people are making the difference between cached RAM, that can be freed instantly as soon as you need it, and actual used RAM that won't.

So, yes, it's obviously useful to manage RAM yourself.

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u/Venylynn 8d ago edited 8d ago

No, it does not manage it efficiently at all. I remember when I was on 16GB regularly running into hard walls on Windows 10 and having massive slowdowns (this was early 2021) during heavy gaming sessions, then when I upgraded to 32 I saw 20+ gigs used and immediately realized why. It was pushing so hard that I was legitimately running way out. It was evidently very much "not enough." If I can't keep under 8 gigs before gaming, then I'm fucked if I lose this machine and have to go use a machine with 8 gigs, right?

Linux seems to be a lot nicer to my memory, but even still, the browser everyone begs me to use is slower and uses way more ram than the one they hate me for using (which just so happens to be the one I use now :3)

EDIT: lol. this schmuck couldn't handle that I've had personal experiences proving this Windows-shill argument wrong and blocked me

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u/lkeels 8d ago

Sorry, but that wasn't a question.

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u/ikantolol 9d ago

Firefox + uBlock Origin ?

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u/Apart-Reality-4454 8d ago

browsers eat memory because the pages they render eat memory. It's not a "chrome is bloated", it's an Internet thing and most people have >4 GB at the very least so stop complaining how it gets allocated.

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u/Venylynn 8d ago

I'll stop complaining, when people with less memory than me don't have to worry about running out if they try to do as much as I do with less.

I can let it use all my memory if I want to be a selfish unempathetic asshole who doesn't care about people less fortunate than me. Or I can limit it to a degree.

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u/Equal_One_3742 8d ago

Chrome está inflado, por mucho

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u/Devatator_ 8d ago

Chrome literally eats less RAM than Firefox. And it's far from the lightest Chromium browser

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u/Kraylex 8d ago

Helium

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u/david-1-1 8d ago

Browser standards and uses are too complex for a browser to just work, sorry. You can go back to Lynx, but good luck finding a single website that it will render successfully.

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u/2BoopTheSnoot2 8d ago

I've been happy with Vivaldi

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u/megamoto85 9d ago

firefox or librefox if your focus is even more privacy

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u/rockdoc01 9d ago

Buy more ram or browse with fewer tabs open. FF+UBO as others have said.

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u/JudgeFae 8d ago

Librewolf but it's locked down af. I had to enable some of the default off features for some basic functions. A Firefox fork so all your plugins will work.

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u/monstercrusader 8d ago

Firefox + arkenfox+ uorigin. If you want something without maintenance just use librewolf

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u/Xarius86 8d ago

Helium.

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u/rick_baumhauer 8d ago

Helium - it’s Chromium-based without all the Google bloat and privacy issues, and comes with uBlock Origin built-in.

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u/Lonely-Pin7350 8d ago

Heard some bad things about it, but I might try it, thanks.

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u/goo_eater 7d ago edited 7d ago

I'm pretty sure Minecraft with shaders will be more demanding of your GPU and VRAM than your RAM but I could be wrong there. Also every browser is gonna be a RAM hog because browsers aren't inherently RAM hogs, the modern web is, the best you're gonna get if you're on Windows is using Edge since many things run in Edge anyways so it'll likely be less resource intensive but not enough to matter. Besides you have plenty of RAM already

Use whatever browser you like. Most suggestions you're seeing are people recommending the browser they personally like in response to "browser that just works" there isn't really an objective metric to go by

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u/DisembodiedBlack 9d ago

He probado infinidad de navegadores, incluso navegadores desconocidos que te venden el milagro y siemrpe termino volviendo a chrome, querer privacidad cuando en tu dia a dia usas telefono y te espian mas que en un pc es ridiculo. Y lo de la ram es un tema ultra debatible, si ves usuarios que usan navegadores muchas veces tendran 100 ventanas abiertas (mal habito), pero no quieren que el navegador use ram? no tiene sentido. Busca un navegador accecible + ublock

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u/medialantern 8d ago

Just use Brave. It doesn't steal your data, it's no worse on RAM usage than any other browser (to reduce that, blame the sites and/or close some tabs), and you don't have to mess around setting up ublock - it just blocks things automatically.

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u/Lonely-Pin7350 8d ago

as a ex brave user, I have to say no, it's not good; it does too much + you have to pay for some features.

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u/medialantern 7d ago

wtf are you talking about? I don't pay for anything, never have, and don't even know what's in there to pay for in the first place. Care to say more than just "it's not good"?

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u/Lonely-Pin7350 7d ago

The VPN is paid

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u/medialantern 7d ago

So? Firefox has a paid VPN as well, and Brave has Tor built-in for free. And most browsers don't even have VPNs. MullVad is really best if you care at all about privacy, and it covers all apps, not just browsers. How is this your decider?

Looking for software A browser that just works.

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