I have been very happy with DuckDuckGo, and it has helped me break free of routines that I did not feel safe with. Especially the small flame icon that would clear all history, cookies and cache from websites that are not "fireproofed" was great!
But today I had to do a quick example on Tinkercad (3D browser design tool) and it was so slow! I thought that my PC maybe was busy doing something (yeah its an older PC but not THAT old), but when I open the same page on my now parked Opera browser, everything went smoothly.
I am ok with using Opera, or any other browser for 3D work, as I don't really do all that much of it, but I just feel gutted to find out that my now favorite browser sucks so bad at something, not to mention the Microsoft Edge processes when that is the last of any browser that I would choose to use
EDIT: I found out that this was due to hardware acceleration was off, on my DuckDuckGo browser. I had turned it off, because the fonts on websites looked blurry when it was on. The solution was to turn off antialising on the Nvidia control panel, and restart the PC. It is now working well!
Please dont use DDG browser or even worse edge or opera.
Use Librewolf, Firefox or Ungoogled Chromium.
Opera in particular is a dangerous browser to run these days, it’s owned by confirmed scammers and investment-scheme operators.
If you want something with the same ideological history as Opera, run Vivaldi, which was created by ex-Opera engineers.
But yes, for true openness, Librewolf, Waterfox, or Firefox is the way to go.
Vivaldi close sources its browser's ~5% non-Chromium source code in the name of "performance and security". Red flag browser.
5% of non Chromium source code corresponding to the unique UI, 100% auditable and even moddeable by the users. rest of the code degoogled, basic APIs like Google save browsing, Chrome Store, etc. as userchoice in the settings. No red flags, EU browser (overcomming GDPR), don't spread nonsense
You cannot audit closed source code. Being able to customise cosmetic UI elements is not equivalent to open sourcing. I see no reason to use Vivaldi when FOSS Firefox and its incomparably rich and open addon ecosystem exists. Opera died for me when they started becoming shady after selling out.
Their "security" reasoning for that non-Chromium code is absurd, and I rather have internet connecting programs open source unless an alternative does not exist (games, professional work software).
Yeah If you need any reason to stop using opera, here it is: https://www.spacebar.news/stop-using-opera-browser/
Is vivaldi a good alternative?
It is okay, but has little fingerprint protection and still some tracking.
Just use Firefox.
Try googleteller, its a program you can easily clone, compile and run, which beeps if you are connecting to a google server. Chromium even with a very extensive policy and everything GUI degoogled ALWAYS connects to google, repeatedly and very worrying
I switched from Opera to Vivaldi since it is the closest alternative I can get. I heard about Firefox can get the same look and feel with enough customisation, but I am not sure how to do it.
Yeeeah not easy. Try Floorp, look at their code.
They use ESR poorly so outdated as hell (but still secure). But their interface changes can be applied to regular FF too.
Floorp can be pre-configured like opera and Vivaldi :D
Yes, but its still ESR. You might get compatibility problems, for example Nightly supports JXL which is very much needed (its such an easy fix even damn Palemoon supports that, which is based off a totally outdated version of Firefox). This will hopefully arrive in Firefox stable, no idea of the ESR cadence.
Floorp is a nice Firefox fork with a similar mind of customisation as old opera or vivaldi
They use ESR because otherwise their GUI stuff would break. So under the fancy hood you have a very dated browser...