5 ms·

Which doesn't change anything since the Macbook Pro has been sold with Retina displays for what, the last 6 years? The fact that Firefox works exclusively on an

Which doesn't change anything since the Macbook Pro has been sold with Retina displays for what, the last 6 years? The fact that Firefox works exclusively on ancient laptops or edge cases doesn't make anything better. All Apple devices today are sold with Retina screens and the Pro Lineup, and therefore most devs has had Retina screens for 6+ years.

inferiorhuman 8y ago
Sure, it's a mid-2012 MBP with the "high res" matte screen. A six year old machine is hardly an edge case in the context of a problem you've been seeing for at least five years. I've not had problems with FF performance on the handful of retina machines I've used for work either. If the Mozilla devs aren't paying attention to and haven't remedied the problem you're experiencing, perhaps you're the edge case?
- kossTKR 8y ago
  What? I just wrote that their support subreddit is filled with posts about performance on OSX, this thread in itself already has loads of posts with people complaining about it, and my post just is getting lots of upvotes - how is that an edge case? Also all Firefox threads on Hackernews has these posts, every single one. As i said before i have been following this for years. You having a 2012 computer is 100% the edge case - not that there is anything wrong in that, i love keeping tech for as long as possible.
  - 1996 8y ago
    There is no excuse for firefox bad performance on decent hard. And such "old" computers are not edge cases! Any Sandy Bridge i7 from 2012 easily outperforms most odern laptops. There is some progress made in performance per watt, but raw performance strongly decrease after the 39xx series.
  - inferiorhuman 8y ago
    > You having a 2012 computer is 100% the edge case How so? It's the same processor (Ivy Bridge) and GPU combo (HD 4000 + GT 650M) as the first few revisions of the retina MBP models. The big difference is the display resolution (1680x1050 vs 2880x1800). You're saying this problem goes back five years (2013). Whether or not the 2012 model is particularly common now, the guts were common in 2013 back when you claim to have seen the problem. I've got a newer (still non-retina) iMac and have used a variety of retina machines for work and haven't seen any performance problems with FF either. Sure, if I run a bunch of flash based video players I can get the fans to go nuts but that's not a FF problem (the same thing happens if I use Chrome, flash is just an inefficient means of rendering video). If the Mozilla devs haven't reproduced your complaint on a first class platform it's a pretty safe bet that you're doing something whacky whether or not you realize it.
    - kossTKR 8y ago
      So all the people in this thread are doing something "whacky" including all of the people from all of the other Firefox threads on Hackernews, and the constant stream of people in the subreddit? We are not discussing if your computer is an edge case tech wise, but if it represents a "commonly used device" on the osx platform, ie, a device with a Retina display. In other words an edge case market wise. Also another guy just wrote "Definitely not an edge case", about all his companys computers above me. I don't get your point in trying to say we are "whacky" people because we say there is a problem. Once again read other FF threads on HN an these posts are in every one.
      - inferiorhuman 8y ago
        > So all the people in this thread Eleven people out of the thousands of people that use FF on a Mac daily? Perhaps it's not Mozilla that's wronged you.
        kace91 8y ago
        It's not eleven, not by far. It's enough that I see this bug as the number one reason no one uses firefox at my job, where there are hundreds of devs - anecdotal evidence of course, but still telling. I don't know why you're trying to deffend the idea that this bug is not a (relevant) thing. I'm not OP btw.
- leandot 8y ago
  Definitely not an edge case, our whole company uses MacBook pros with retina display and all have the same issue. Fans spin like crazy, usability is abysmal. The moment that is fixed I'd switch. I've also reported the bug to Mozilla.
shaan7 8y ago
I have a colleague whose Mac has the same issue as you (2015 MBP 15" Retina). Chrome runs awesome for him, Firefox crawls. However, I have the same model and for me Firefox is as snappy as anything. You're right that this needs to be fixed, but its lame to assume that Firefox devs do not test on Macs. You're simply experiencing a bug that is hard to reproduce, that is all.
- kossTKR 8y ago
  I have sympathy, debugging is hard! But it's weird that across hundreds of threads no one from the dev group has anything to say, or that there is not disclaimer or "ask for help" or whatever. "Yes we are aware that a certain percentage has severe performance problems on osx, we believe this has to do with the Retina displays blah blah" - instead it seems like no one from the dev group has been following this problem when you ask them. Despite weekly threads, just like the posts here on Hackernews in every FF thread.
  - michaelmrose 8y ago
    Possibly because complaining on hacker news and calling people incompetent on threads they have no reason to personally follow isn't an optimal strategy for receiving tech support.
    - kossTKR 8y ago
      I wrote that i talked to the devs directly? I also wrote that i have followed the issues for years. What makes you think this is the last resort? Check my other post: https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=18626325 https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=18626325 This issue is all over the place. I will admit it was too harshly written, the issues seems to only be on the osx platform and Firefox is great on all other platforms, but the issue has been detailed in their own tracker and subreddit for many years.
- nathan_f77 8y ago
  Firefox is snappy at the beginning, but starts getting really slow and clunky after about 8 hours, or sometimes 2-3 days of the laptop being suspended and then turned on again. I can make it fast again if I close the browser and re-open it. But it's not slow right out of the gate. Also slow is relative. If someone hasn't had an experience with a faster browser, then "slow" just feels normal. I had that after using Firefox for ~9 months. It just felt normal, and then got a bit slow and unusable after a while. After switching back to Chrome on Mac, it was like a breath of fresh air. I forgot what a responsive UI felt like.
bryanrasmussen 8y ago
Usually I expect software to perform better on newer hardware than it does on old. Are you suggesting the probles you're experiencing have to do with a retina display. I have periodically had firefox problems in performance on all platforms including the new Mac air I bought my wife, her old Mac Pro and various Ubuntu and Windows installations. As a general rule it is because I've kept it open for several days with lots of tabs with media in them running. I mean it's irritating but not an ongoing catastrophe that means I can't use. As I said in some other thread recently I have over the past 10 years I think had two occasions where FF performance was so bad I had to leave the platform for a some time until it was fixed. I see a lot of people in this thread claiming problems, and I see a lot of people claiming no problems, and some like me in between. So I don't know what the statistical breakdown of performance complaints about FF in comparison to all other issues (and if those complaints are actually likely to be related), but maybe it is not as great as you think it is?
- kossTKR 8y ago
  Good question. As i wrote in my other comments these comments are large amounts in every FF thread on HN. Also loads of devs (including myself) are at companies where no one uses FF because of performance issues which of course is anecdata albeit a bit broader. Searching Google for "FF performance issues site:reddit.com" time span : last 24H, and off course there is a thread where the highest rated comment is someone saying FF is "laggy" on OSX :https://www.reddit.com/r/mac/comments/a3gk1k/macbook_air_2018_issues_laggy_and_cooling_fan/ https://www.reddit.com/r/mac/comments/a3gk1k/macbook_air_201... My guess would be most people have issues but most consumers don't know better. Some have no issues, and it seems that's the ones with older "non retina" displays.

inferiorhuman 8y ago

Sure, it's a mid-2012 MBP with the "high res" matte screen. A six year old machine is hardly an edge case in the context of a problem you've been seeing for at least five years. I've not had problems with FF performance on the handful of retina machines I've used for work either. If the Mozilla devs aren't paying attention to and haven't remedied the problem you're experiencing, perhaps you're the edge case?

kossTKR 8y ago
What? I just wrote that their support subreddit is filled with posts about performance on OSX, this thread in itself already has loads of posts with people complaining about it, and my post just is getting lots of upvotes - how is that an edge case? Also all Firefox threads on Hackernews has these posts, every single one. As i said before i have been following this for years. You having a 2012 computer is 100% the edge case - not that there is anything wrong in that, i love keeping tech for as long as possible.
- 1996 8y ago
  There is no excuse for firefox bad performance on decent hard. And such "old" computers are not edge cases! Any Sandy Bridge i7 from 2012 easily outperforms most odern laptops. There is some progress made in performance per watt, but raw performance strongly decrease after the 39xx series.
- inferiorhuman 8y ago
  > You having a 2012 computer is 100% the edge case How so? It's the same processor (Ivy Bridge) and GPU combo (HD 4000 + GT 650M) as the first few revisions of the retina MBP models. The big difference is the display resolution (1680x1050 vs 2880x1800). You're saying this problem goes back five years (2013). Whether or not the 2012 model is particularly common now, the guts were common in 2013 back when you claim to have seen the problem. I've got a newer (still non-retina) iMac and have used a variety of retina machines for work and haven't seen any performance problems with FF either. Sure, if I run a bunch of flash based video players I can get the fans to go nuts but that's not a FF problem (the same thing happens if I use Chrome, flash is just an inefficient means of rendering video). If the Mozilla devs haven't reproduced your complaint on a first class platform it's a pretty safe bet that you're doing something whacky whether or not you realize it.
  - kossTKR 8y ago
    So all the people in this thread are doing something "whacky" including all of the people from all of the other Firefox threads on Hackernews, and the constant stream of people in the subreddit? We are not discussing if your computer is an edge case tech wise, but if it represents a "commonly used device" on the osx platform, ie, a device with a Retina display. In other words an edge case market wise. Also another guy just wrote "Definitely not an edge case", about all his companys computers above me. I don't get your point in trying to say we are "whacky" people because we say there is a problem. Once again read other FF threads on HN an these posts are in every one.
    - inferiorhuman 8y ago
      > So all the people in this thread Eleven people out of the thousands of people that use FF on a Mac daily? Perhaps it's not Mozilla that's wronged you.
      - kace91 8y ago
        It's not eleven, not by far. It's enough that I see this bug as the number one reason no one uses firefox at my job, where there are hundreds of devs - anecdotal evidence of course, but still telling. I don't know why you're trying to deffend the idea that this bug is not a (relevant) thing. I'm not OP btw.
leandot 8y ago
Definitely not an edge case, our whole company uses MacBook pros with retina display and all have the same issue. Fans spin like crazy, usability is abysmal. The moment that is fixed I'd switch. I've also reported the bug to Mozilla.

shaan7 8y ago

I have a colleague whose Mac has the same issue as you (2015 MBP 15" Retina). Chrome runs awesome for him, Firefox crawls. However, I have the same model and for me Firefox is as snappy as anything. You're right that this needs to be fixed, but its lame to assume that Firefox devs do not test on Macs. You're simply experiencing a bug that is hard to reproduce, that is all.

kossTKR 8y ago
I have sympathy, debugging is hard! But it's weird that across hundreds of threads no one from the dev group has anything to say, or that there is not disclaimer or "ask for help" or whatever. "Yes we are aware that a certain percentage has severe performance problems on osx, we believe this has to do with the Retina displays blah blah" - instead it seems like no one from the dev group has been following this problem when you ask them. Despite weekly threads, just like the posts here on Hackernews in every FF thread.
- michaelmrose 8y ago
  Possibly because complaining on hacker news and calling people incompetent on threads they have no reason to personally follow isn't an optimal strategy for receiving tech support.
  - kossTKR 8y ago
    I wrote that i talked to the devs directly? I also wrote that i have followed the issues for years. What makes you think this is the last resort? Check my other post: https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=18626325 https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=18626325 This issue is all over the place. I will admit it was too harshly written, the issues seems to only be on the osx platform and Firefox is great on all other platforms, but the issue has been detailed in their own tracker and subreddit for many years.
nathan_f77 8y ago
Firefox is snappy at the beginning, but starts getting really slow and clunky after about 8 hours, or sometimes 2-3 days of the laptop being suspended and then turned on again. I can make it fast again if I close the browser and re-open it. But it's not slow right out of the gate. Also slow is relative. If someone hasn't had an experience with a faster browser, then "slow" just feels normal. I had that after using Firefox for ~9 months. It just felt normal, and then got a bit slow and unusable after a while. After switching back to Chrome on Mac, it was like a breath of fresh air. I forgot what a responsive UI felt like.

bryanrasmussen 8y ago

Usually I expect software to perform better on newer hardware than it does on old. Are you suggesting the probles you're experiencing have to do with a retina display. I have periodically had firefox problems in performance on all platforms including the new Mac air I bought my wife, her old Mac Pro and various Ubuntu and Windows installations. As a general rule it is because I've kept it open for several days with lots of tabs with media in them running. I mean it's irritating but not an ongoing catastrophe that means I can't use. As I said in some other thread recently I have over the past 10 years I think had two occasions where FF performance was so bad I had to leave the platform for a some time until it was fixed. I see a lot of people in this thread claiming problems, and I see a lot of people claiming no problems, and some like me in between. So I don't know what the statistical breakdown of performance complaints about FF in comparison to all other issues (and if those complaints are actually likely to be related), but maybe it is not as great as you think it is?

kossTKR 8y ago
Good question. As i wrote in my other comments these comments are large amounts in every FF thread on HN. Also loads of devs (including myself) are at companies where no one uses FF because of performance issues which of course is anecdata albeit a bit broader. Searching Google for "FF performance issues site:reddit.com" time span : last 24H, and off course there is a thread where the highest rated comment is someone saying FF is "laggy" on OSX :https://www.reddit.com/r/mac/comments/a3gk1k/macbook_air_2018_issues_laggy_and_cooling_fan/ https://www.reddit.com/r/mac/comments/a3gk1k/macbook_air_201... My guess would be most people have issues but most consumers don't know better. Some have no issues, and it seems that's the ones with older "non retina" displays.