First look at Opera 9.5 alpha (Kestrel)
Opera have released the first public download of the latest version of their ever popular browser. Codenamed ‘Kestrel’, Opera 9.5 alpha is a fairly major update and adds various new features as well as improving the already impressive tool set of the program.
The first thing I noticed on testing Kestrel was a definite improvement in speed. Opera’s always been fairly good in this respect but the developers have clearly pulled out all the stops to tweak yet more power from it. It also uses slightly less memory than before - which makes the performance improvements all the more impressive.
In terms of new features, Opera has introduced a more complete caching system which allows for the introduction of Full History Search. FHS lets you search within every page you’ve visited - for example when you’ve seen something interesting but forgot to bookmark it. Assuming you don’t delete your cache, Opera will search through every page you’ve visited, and not just the URIs of pages in your history. You can access this new interface directly from the address bar, so it’s pretty seamlessly implemented.
The new ‘Synchronize With My Opera’ feature is less exciting. It doesn’t really seem to do much but share your bookmarks and Speed Dial settings automatically onto a my.opera.com profile page. The aim seems to be to link the browser directly to a sort of del.icio.us and ‘blog this’ functionality. But the synchronization feature is poorly documented and so doesn’t really seem to be of much use. Those who accuse Firefox of feature-bloat would do well to take a closer look at the behemoth that Opera has become.
In summary: Opera 9.5 is faster and more efficient than previous versions. It still passes the Acid Test and has made improvements to text and bitmap rendering. The Full History Search feature is pretty cool but I’m not that keen on the Synchronize feature: not when I’ve got better solutions which I’m already using. Download from Opera.com here.
Posted at 12:24 am on Sep 5th
[…] The new Opera 9.5 alpha, which was released earlier today, has gotten a lot of very positive feedback with regards to its speed and performance. Many have noticed the increased performance and faster speeds with Opera 9.5. […]
Posted at 5:24 am on Sep 5th
re bloat: try running some tests comparing the out-of-the-box ff vs. opera in regards to ram usage after startup and after heavy use.
Posted at 2:25 pm on Sep 5th
Anonymous: you’re absolutely right. But I’ve been testing Firefox 3.0 alpha too and that seems both more stable and less RAM hungry than previous versions… it’s still all to play for!
Posted at 4:00 pm on Sep 5th
Tom: The synchronize feature is there so you can have the same bookmarks etc. at home and at work (or at a friend’s, or in an internet café, provided they have Opera) without you having to synchronize them manually or carry your profile around on a USB stick, etc. It just works in the background and you t don’t need to do anything - when you create a new bookmark at work, it will be there when you use Opera from your home computer (this is opt-in, of course, for the security conscious).
Regarding bloat, take a look at this: http://nontroppo.org/timer/kestrel_tests
Posted at 4:13 pm on Sep 5th
Hi Friedrich - thanks for the clarification, though I must say that the way that this feature has been implemented in Kestrel is really not particularly impressive. In fact, I spent quite a while trying to track down information about how it worked, to no avail. Also, I’m not sure why identical sets of bookmarks at home and work would be of any use to me. Hopefully this feature will be fleshed out a bit before release.
Posted at 4:36 pm on Sep 5th
I suspect this might in the future tie in with automatic synchronization with your mobile browser (as you might know, Opera makes two fantastic mobile Browsers, Opera Mobile and Opera Mini), but I don’t know. This is still an Alpha, and the threads over at my.opera.com concerning synchronization have quite a lot of developer presence, so I assume this feature is going to see some improvements. And, of course, this being the first alpha release, there probably isn’t too much documentation out there.
You can see a video of it in action here: http://cybernetnews.com/2007/09/03/cybernotes-exclusive-opera-95-features-video/
It’s really quite easy, you just need an account over at my.opera (which also gets yu 300 MB of webspace, a blog, photo albums, forum account - and the powers that be actually do read! - etc.).
Posted at 10:05 pm on Sep 7th
Well I’m not sure where you have be working at but having access to my bookmarks at home or at work is PARAMOUNT to me. I often do research after hours and being able to save bookmarks saves me hours of time when working on large projects. After all having access to your information is just as important as the information itself. What’s the use of having information if you can’t gain access to it when you need it the most? Rock on Opera!
Posted at 12:21 pm on Sep 18th
“Those who accuse Firefox of feature-bloat would do well to take a closer look at the behemoth that Opera has become.”
And what, may I ask, do you mean by “Behemoth”? Wikipedia suggests that “the name has come to be used for any extremely large or powerful entity”. In case of “powerful”, that is Opera. If extremely large or “bloated”..
1) Opera has a download size of 5.0 MB - not exactly extremely large or bloated
2) Opera uses less - or at least not more - resources than most other browsers.. Not exactly bloated!
3) Test results vary some, but Opera is at least one of the fastest browsers out there, and test results for Kestrels indicated that it might be by far the fastest (on Windows). Not bloated
4) Opera has a load of functions, but the main interface that a new user meets is not more bloated than the one of Firefox or IE. The sidebar might pop out now and then, but it doesn’t take much time to figure that out. And so? If I want the other functions, I turn them on and use them, if not, I don’t. The point is: they don’t slow Opera down, the don’t clutter the interface. WHAT is bloated?
5) To have as many functions as Opera mangages to put into a small, fast package, you have to use a load of plugins or extensions.. Now THAT is bloated!!
All of this said: My highest respect for Firefox!! It is my undisputed no2, and a really, really good browser. This is not to start the usual “Opera vs. Firefox” war. BUT - to indicate a “bloated Behemoth” in a review (especially in a place where I am used to finding un-biased interesting reviews) is either biased or.. at least very strange!!
Posted at 12:41 pm on Sep 18th
Stein - thanks for your eloquent comments. Perhaps you’re right, and perhaps I’ve been too hard on Opera. I guess what I really meant is that one of the main criticisms I’ve read about Firefox is that when it adds a new feature, it gets accused of moving away from its roots as a clean and basic browser with tons of extensibility.
I’m not convinced that Opera really needs to include a mail client or bit torrent features. But as you say, unless you use these features, they don’t really interfere too much with Kestrel’s operation. Clearly, Kestrel performs exceptionally well either way.
In order to prove my non-biased attitude, I’ll definitely give Kestrel a proper in-depth review when it reaches final release.
Posted at 4:58 pm on Sep 18th
Thank you very much for really *reading* (instead of just skimming) our comments and for answering to them. I really appreciate it
Posted at 12:29 am on Nov 13th
Tom:
The mail client eliminates the need for other larger clients like Thunderbird or Outlook. I’ve found its spam filter to be quite decent and the interface simply fantastic.
The Torrent client makes file saving more seamless by not having you launch a separate client to download torrents. Simply click and save a torrent like any other file.
Mind you, *all* this is crammed into a 5 MB package while any of these features alone would need a 5 MB program.
And none of these are in your face. They just sit behind until you decide you want to use them. Far from drawing criticism, these features deserve kudos.
Posted at 4:00 am on Dec 30th
I’ve been using Opera for about 18 months and is the best browsing experience i’ve had since I used Netscape a long time ago.
I was using v.9.24 until i switched to 9.5a and the syncronization is awesome. i exported my bookmarks and imported them on the 9.5, syncronized (i already had a login on opera) and my stuff was online. the best of all is that allows me to sync bookmarks on the three PCs I normally use (desktop, laptop and work).
The installation package is about 5megs and has tabbed browsing, bookmarks, IRC chat, bittorrent client, Email client, mouse gestures… all built in. is the best deal!
Posted at 6:16 pm on Feb 14th
Does anyone have an idea of when Kestrel will be available, that is, the “non-beta” completed version??