Mozilla Firefox 53.0 Web Browser Drops Linux Support for Older Processors

[Blizzardnh]

CPUs older than Pentium 4 and AMD Opteron not supported

The Firefox 53.0 web browser was made available for download earlier today for all supported platforms, and an official announcement was published by the Mozilla folks a few moments ago with details about the new features.

As revealed already, most of the new changes implemented in Mozilla Firefox 53.0 are related to the Windows platform, including the improved graphics stability by using the Quantum Compositor in a separate process, which should reduce browser crashes by approximately 10 percent.

But Linux users should know that, starting with this version, Firefox can no longer be installed on computers powered by older processors than Pentium 4 and AMD Opteron. It's something worth mentioning here because some users out there run various lightweight GNU/Linux distributions designed to bring old PCs to life. It is recommended to use Firefox 52 ESR as it will be supported until spring 2018.


more. http://news.softpedia.com/news/mozilla-firefox-53-0-web-browser-drops-linux-support-for-older-processors-514992.shtml

[Oceander]

The most recent pentium 4 chips are at least 9 years old, and the oldest are 17 years old, so I doubt if much is lost by FF no longer supporting those chips.  Most of the systems that still run P4s are most likely headless servers or support equipment that isn't used as anyone's primary internet surfing machine. 

[geronl]

I'm still using 48 because the next one didn't work on my laptop. I had to go online and find an old version.

[Frank Cannon]

It's something worth mentioning here because some users out there run various lightweight GNU/Linux distributions designed to bring old PCs to life.

Is this because of economy or because of people just playing around with vintage computers?

[ShadowAce]

@BikkFire @geronl @Smokin Joe @roamer_1 @Blizzardnh @markomalley @VarmintAl @Doug Loss @Rikki Tikki Tavi @guitar4jesus
@kevindavis

[Oceander]

It's something worth mentioning here because some users out there run various lightweight GNU/Linux distributions designed to bring old PCs to life.

Is this because of economy or because of people just playing around with vintage computers?

A little of both, and a desire to recycle old equipment.  Old machines make pretty good homebrew servers running Linux.

[roamer_1]

Firefox just dropped Java like a hot rock too.

[Oceander]

Firefox just dropped Java like a hot rock too.

How many websites really rely on java?  Isn't flash on the way out as well, especially with the new html5 specification?

[roamer_1]

How many websites really rely on java?  Isn't flash on the way out as well, especially with the new html5 specification?

I ran for a while without java and flash... Had problems with Youtube, especially vids stalling when expanded to fullscreen... So I put flash in and while the problem persists, it is way better with flash installed. So Flash, even yet.

And as for java, since FF blocked it, I have three times had to go to Edge to view retail sites.

So I will disagree... both are on their way out (huzzah), but not yet.