Firefox keeps a copy of every image on screen decompressed in memory anyway, that's one of the downsides to using large sprites, they can take up a large amount

Firefox keeps a copy of every image on screen decompressed in memory anyway, that's one of the downsides to using large sprites, they can take up a large amount of RAM. I doubt non-sprited base64 images compare in size issues. See the discussion on http://blog.mozilla.com/webdev/2009/03/27/css-spriting-tips/ http://blog.mozilla.com/webdev/2009/03/27/css-spriting-tips/