Here's a tip (gHacks, via Connected Internet) that is supposed to reduce the memory usage of Firefox when it is minimized to the Task Bar:

• Fire up Firefox
• In the address bar type:
  about:config
  Hit Enter
• Right-click and select New > Boolean
  
• Type:
  config.trim_on_minimize
  Hit Enter
  
• Select True from the next dialog box
  
• Close and restart Firefox

I've tried this and the results are, well, odd.  With two pages open in Firefox the memory usage when maximized is about 30MB.  When minimized the memory usage goes down to about 3.5MB and then increases to about 12MB.  However, after a few minutes this memory usage starts to creep up and ends at around 28.5MB and stays there.  I've tested this on two systems (both running fully patched Windows XP Professional) and the results are the same.  While my findings aren't conclusive, this tweak doesn't seem to be worth applying in my opinion.

Tested with Firefox version 1.5.0.1.  Performance usage measured using Process Explorer by Sysinternals.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 11th, 2006 at 13:13 and is filed under PC Doctor's Thoughts, The PC Doctor Performance Tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.