BRAVE: Yet Another Web Browser

Jim

Beyond the edge is the unknown. Here be Dragons
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My computer is old. How old? 'Bout 12 years. In computer years that makes it the equivalent of a '32 Ford Coup... except uglier. Like flying to the Moon using an abacus. Like.... well you get the idea. It's a Dell that came with Windows 7. I upgraded it to 8, then 8+ or whatever they called it, then to Windows 10. It didn't want Windows 10 cause it was too old even back then. Lots of research on hacks and about a week and I had it running 10.... anyways... where was I? Oh right.... BRAVE.

ZDNet yesterday called Brave "The best browser to replace Chrome." Some excerpts...

"Brave is fast, secure, packed with privacy features, has a built-in ad-blocker, supports most of the Google Chrome extensions available... "

"And let me tell you, it's good..... Really good."

"Performance is outstanding, and the browser is capable of handling more tabs than we probably should be throwing at a browser, no matter the platform."

"Page loading speeds must be seen to be believed. It's the fastest browser that I can remember running, no matter the platform I'm running it on."


So, never heard of it.... but I'm already sold. :rolleyes: I downloaded it onto my '32 coup and let 'er rip. Turns out Adriane is spot on. I'm now surfing the web in a '76 Trans Am. This ol' Dell will never be a Tuatara or a Cobra.... but a '76 T/A is good.... good enough for me.
I use Youtube TV for entertainment. Playing that with my current suit of browsers... Firefox, Chrome, Opera... is mostly an exercise in futility. I could use it, but only if I didn't open any other tabs... and only at 480p.... and don't touch the mouse....:banghead: Moving up to 720 HD would have it stuttering and freezing to the point of being useless. And 1080p was in the land of Unicorns... far away from the roads this 'ol '32 runs on.
Running Brave, I opened Youtube and watched a video at 480p. At the same time I rapidly opened 10 other tabs.... yes 10 of 'em. Youtube never skipped a beat. 5 tabs without Youtube is enough to crash Firefox.
So... feeling a little giddy, I closed all the tabs except Youtube, crossed my finger... held my breath... and stepped the quality up to 720p HD. Sumbich it works. Quality improved to HD and it never skipped a beat. I think I died and went to heaven.
OK.... so now I'm feeling slightly intoxicated.... dare I? Why not.... I kicked it up to 1080p. Holy crap, it works. Now I'm in love... :heart:
I'll give this thing a few days to sink in and make sure it's stable, then Firefox, Chrome and Opera are headed for the dustbin.

If you're a cheap bastard like me that runs ancient crap like this ol' Dell, give Brave a go. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.

Here's some screen grabs of memory usage in Firefox and Brave.

Firefox running Youtube TV.
Firefox.png



Brave with Youtube TV
Brave.png



Both on XS650.com
both.png



Brave running a Youtube video at 720p

720P.png



Oh... almost forgot, you can download Brave here.
 
According to the ZDNet article, the author says it works great on all platforms.
Ubuntu?
 
Never heard of it. Used to run Ubuntu. Been ponderin' going back to it. I might have a look at Zorin instead.
 
i use 2016 ubuntu with unity and have about a half dozen browsers i run through, incl. brave. brave has built in onion router, if that's important. the browser i use most is named "opera". it blocks ads on youtube. amazing difference in viewing experience! for financial stuff i still use chrome, because who knows about the others, really... opera recently stopped blocking some youtube ads, so installed an extension, that i think is called ublock origin, and they're all blocked again. opera could be a chinese spying product, like tik toc, not sure.

browsers i use at various times, chrome, chromium, firefox, opera. firefox development edition, vivaldi, brave

for laptops, i use thinkpads. they're plentiful used, and luxury products. most comfortable keyboards in a laptop. very durable and work with ubuntu better than windows....

zorin seems to be another linux variant, but ubuntu is the best supported of them. if you want to run it from a thumb drive and have it retain settings, i think you have to use no later than version 12 though (from memory)
 
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Well I too am running an old Dell, but still using Chrome for now. I ran into a problem that started with the last "upgrade?" of Windoze 10.

Not sure if it was Windoze or the old hard drive in the Dell. Was right on the verge of ordering a new computer and before doing that decided to buy a SSD to at least try to save as much off this hard drive as I could. Well just as an experiment I decided to see what would happen if I loaded 10 on to this new drive. To my surprise it worked just fine and boot-up time is way faster! I had got in the habit of not shutting down computer at night as the boot-up time was so long, I would go to the computer and turn it on and go back upstairs to make coffee or do something else.

Now with this SSD I just this morning timed it and from sitting over night to where I am at my "Desktop" including the time it took me to input my PIN was just one minute! Not sure what the newest computer s can do but I can live with that!
 
Well I too am running an old Dell, but still using Chrome for now. I ran into a problem that started with the last "upgrade?" of Windoze 10.

Not sure if it was Windoze or the old hard drive in the Dell. Was right on the verge of ordering a new computer and before doing that decided to buy a SSD to at least try to save as much off this hard drive as I could. Well just as an experiment I decided to see what would happen if I loaded 10 on to this new drive. To my surprise it worked just fine and boot-up time is way faster! I had got in the habit of not shutting down computer at night as the boot-up time was so long, I would go to the computer and turn it on and go back upstairs to make coffee or do something else.

Now with this SSD I just this morning timed it and from sitting over night to where I am at my "Desktop" including the time it took me to input my PIN was just one minute! Not sure what the newest computer s can do but I can live with that!
I take it you installed an internal SSD
 
I take it you installed an internal SSD
Yes, Internal 250 GB HP and just for fun added a 500 GB HP as an external as I store 99% of my files on the external drive. I did have a 500 GB external mechanical hard drive but think it was getting old as it to was acting strange around the same time. It would load and unload several times so before it went toes up permanently decided to replace it and did copy everything off the old mechanical drive.

Next step might be to replace the CD drive with one that will burn double sided DVD disks. To give me a better way to create back-ups. The double sided DVDcan hold 8.5 GB!
 
The double sided DVDcan hold 8.5 GB!
Unless you're making DVDs, you can back up to 128GB thumb drive for $25 or less from Wal-mart. I bought a bunch of 64GB there last "Cyber Monday" for $6 each, couldn't believe it, Sandisk brand
 
Yes, Internal 250 GB HP and just for fun added a 500 GB HP as an external as I store 99% of my files on the external drive. I did have a 500 GB external mechanical hard drive but think it was getting old as it to was acting strange around the same time. It would load and unload several times so before it went toes up permanently decided to replace it and did copy everything off the old mechanical drive.

Next step might be to replace the CD drive with one that will burn double sided DVD disks. To give me a better way to create back-ups. The double sided DVDcan hold 8.5 GB!
I take it I need to know what kind of system /and or interface the old computer has to be able to make it fit
mind you I'm a cave man when it comes to this stuff
(I miss Windows XP Lol)
 
Hey, Jim!
Thanx much for this "BRAVE" recommendation.

My Samsung Galaxy Tablet has been slowing to a creepy crawl over this last year, and mysteriously using more storage than normal. Just now installed Brave (Android version), this is its first post.

Will be testing, evaluating, learning this new thing for awhile...
 
Hi Steve,
Good to see ya 'round the farm.
I put Brave on my Pixel phone (Android) a few months back. I think it's a little faster than Chrome. Hopefully that'll be your experience too.
Let us know how it goes.
 
Hey, Jim. Thanx.
Like your status-sig sez, I'm surrounded by Dragons out here.

Well, so far cruising thru the "Jokes" thread, about half of the pics were replaced with the "img-url" symbol. Not sure if that's Brave, or my countrified net connection...
 
Jim, I gave this thread a shout-out in Gary's recent "Orange Mailer" thread.
I switched to Brave shortly after you started the thread. I was an early adopter, but I had to give up on my beloved Firefox after it became an unwieldy anchor on my operating system. Brave has been great. Thanks!

2M -- I think I owe you a phone call...
 
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