The Phantom that is Opera
It’s been a few weeks since I first started using the Opera web browser, and I must say I am quite impressed with it. It’s currently my browser of choice, and I haven’t even tapped into its full potential.
It’s not that I had never heard of it before. It’s usually included in articles about web browsers, but I’ve always regarded it as the “red headed step child” of web browsers – probably for no good reason other than my own vague familiarity with it.
Until recently, I had been using Firefox pretty steadily. Before that I had actually switched from Firefox to Google Chrome. I stopped using Google Chrome when I decided to distance myself from Google due to the way they handled the roll-out of Google Buzz and the ensuing privacy issues (tangent alert! I’ll cover that in a future post.).
I’m not really sure what enticed me to finally try Opera, but I’m glad I did. For me, it has been noticeably quicker than Firefox and seems to be generally more responsive. It seems to have all sorts of little features that I didn’t know I was missing. For instance, if you have multiple tabs open, you can simply mouse over a tab and see a small preview of what is on the tab.
Features I have not yet tried but that look downright awesome include Opera Unite, which allows you to share content directly with others without having to have a website. That’s right, you can stream music, share files, even host your own website directly from your Opera browser.
You can also synchronize Opera on all your computers and devices, so that your bookmarks, notes, and other info are the same across all your gadgets!
These and more features make for a secure, fast, and feature-rich browsing experience. Give Opera a try and see what you think. I, for one, am becoming hooked.
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