Ed "The Computer Wizard"

I was fist exposed to Opera back in early 2002 when I started using Opera 6.01. Back in those days the only other real alternative to IE was Netscape or Mozilla. Firefox didn’t come about until a few years later. I remember a February day in 2003 when a friend of mine asked if I had seen that new web browser that changed all the web pages text into Swedish Chef. Being a Muppet Show fan back in the day, I thought it would be interesting to try out. It turns out that the Opera “Bork” edition only modified the MSN web page, however the publicity helped to spread word about an alternative cross-platform web browser.

What started out as a novelty experiment turned in to a love for this unique web browser. It was way ahead of the curve with the built in features and the page rendering was quick compared to Internet Explorer and Netscape. I also like how with a simple mouse click I could change rendering engines. If the page didn’t look right in Opera, a quick click and it reloaded using the IE or Netscape engine. Another great thing was that I could install it on my Linux machine and have almost the exact same web experience. I couldn’t say the same for other browsers at the time.

Opera has come a long way since that early version 6.01. I use Opera 10 Alpha on my desktop and Netbook now. They sych my favorites, Quick Start Page settings, and a number of other things I select. This is nice and makes sure I am never without something I bookmarked on the other machine. But when I have a slow internet connection, like from an AirCard, or (GASP!) dial-up, I still had to deal with slow page loads. That’s where Opera Turbo really shines. Watch this little video for a demonstration of page loads in Opera with and without Turbo.

Now, even though I live in the middle of nowhere, the broadband fairies have finally decided to run DSL close enough to our house that I was finally able to hop back on the fast lane. I won’t need Turbo as much when I am at home as I will when I am on the road using an EVDO connection. I plan on trying this out in a few real world scenarios and letting everyone know what I think. I encourage you to give it a shot as well.

Opera Turbo can be downloaded from here: labs.opera.com

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