Firefox 105 Now Available - Better Linux Performance Under Memory Pressure

[Quackdoc]

Phoronix fails to report the facts once again. Better behavior when Firefox / OS is running out of memory is not a performance improvement in most cases nor for very many people. We don't run out of memory on a daily basis. It is also not a significant improvement especially when it isn't backed up with benchmarks.

speak for yourself and not for others, memory issues are a occurrence for a great many people

[Quackdoc]

I think some people misunderstand something about browsers. a good browser should be able to utilize a lot of ram, but on the other side of the coin, be able to function under very slim amounts of ram. for me, firefox has been lacking under the dept of being able to work under serious ram constraints. will test this later and see how much better it is now

[bug77]

Subjective opinion. Compared to what? A very vocal few still stuck in the early 10s with only 4GB of system RAM? People that don't clean up their open tabs (moot point, FF doesn't load the contents till they're brought to the front)? Chrome? Safari? If you're running out of RAM such that you're under memory pressure, you don't have enough RAM for whatever you're doing with your system. Yes, it's just that simple. It appears the vast majority of Firefox users just aren't 'abusing' Firefox in the way a handful are apparently doing so to have problems with its resource utilization. If you're going by top-like programs, those memory metrics aren't the whole story, especially if you don't know what they're actually reporting (hint, it's probably not what you think it is, example for those that report allocation it's not the same thing as active utilization.)

It's not subjective, it's very, very objective. Somebody actually measured (a small study or something like that a few years back) and found that we routinely transfer a few MB of data just to convey 2-4kB of useful information (i.e. text). The rest is images, styles and whatnot. That alone puts a hard lower limit on RAM usage.

Otherwise, yes, it's ok to use free RAM for caching, but you need to give that back when the pressure on RAM rises (easier said than done).

[bug77]

Calm down, this article is just about the release announcement. Michael tends to benchmark Firefox once or twice a year, he'll show you some results soon enough.

Also keep in mind memory pressure is not easy to replicate in an automated test. Not impossible, just not easy.

[Vistaus]

Subjective opinion. Compared to what? A very vocal few still stuck in the early 10s with only 4GB of system RAM? People that don't clean up their open tabs (moot point, FF doesn't load the contents till they're brought to the front)? Chrome? Safari? If you're running out of RAM such that you're under memory pressure, you don't have enough RAM for whatever you're doing with your system. Yes, it's just that simple. It appears the vast majority of Firefox users just aren't 'abusing' Firefox in the way a handful are apparently doing so to have problems with its resource utilization. If you're going by top-like programs, those memory metrics aren't the whole story, especially if you don't know what they're actually reporting (hint, it's probably not what you think it is, example for those that report allocation it's not the same thing as active utilization.)

Yes, I don't have enough RAM. Guess I need 64 GB instead of the 32 GB I have now...
And for the record: I don't even have that many open tabs. I have about 25-40 tabs open on a daily basis, but only about 10 of them are actually loaded simultaneously. Yet FF manages to use a ridiculous amount of RAM per tab. And I do look at active utilization.

(And 10 loaded and 25-40 total tabs isn't all that much. Maybe a bit more than the average user, but a lot of people, esp. in tech communities, have over 100 total tabs, so compared to them, my usage is still pretty light.)

[Slartifartblast]

To all those whining about Mozilla, at least they aren't going to mandate manifest V3 as Google are with Chromium.

[finalzone]

Same on AMD, at least for me.

Which AMD graphic card of APU? Hardware acceleration is enabled on Raven Ridge series.

[Vistaus]

Which AMD graphic card of APU? Hardware acceleration is enabled on Raven Ridge series.

Not sure which one, but I have an AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX and Inxi reports:

[FONT=monospace][COLOR=#5454ff][B]Graphics:[/B][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#5454ff][B]Device-1:[/B][/COLOR][COLOR=#000000] AMD Cezanne [/COLOR][COLOR=#5454ff][B]driver:[/B][/COLOR][COLOR=#000000] amdgpu [/COLOR][COLOR=#5454ff][B]v:[/B][/COLOR][COLOR=#000000] kernel[/COLOR][/FONT]

[Vistaus]

Yes, I don't have enough RAM. Guess I need 64 GB instead of the 32 GB I have now...
And for the record: I don't even have that many open tabs. I have about 25-40 tabs open on a daily basis, but only about 10 of them are actually loaded simultaneously. Yet FF manages to use a ridiculous amount of RAM per tab. And I do look at active utilization.

(And 10 loaded and 25-40 total tabs isn't all that much. Maybe a bit more than the average user, but a lot of people, esp. in tech communities, have over 100 total tabs, so compared to them, my usage is still pretty light.)

I do have to admit that the situation has gotten better with today's 105 update. I'll continue to monitor it...

[finalzone]

Not sure which one, but I have an AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX and Inxi reports:

[FONT=monospace][COLOR=#5454ff][B]Graphics:[/B][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#5454ff][B]Device-1:[/B][/COLOR][COLOR=#000000] AMD Cezanne [/COLOR][COLOR=#5454ff][B]driver:[/B][/COLOR][COLOR=#000000] amdgpu [/COLOR][COLOR=#5454ff][B]v:[/B][/COLOR][COLOR=#000000] kernel[/COLOR][/FONT]

You can also view about:support which may show WebRender (software). I encounter similar issue with AMD Ryzen 7 5825u equipped with updated Vega8 (Barcelo).