@leocg he knows there are differences, he specifically wants to know what they are. what is their defining characteristics you refer to, and what is the specific "public" that each caters to that you reference.

Do you want is to explain how Opera is better than Chrome?
It has several small things that chrome doesn't have. Mouse gestures, tab menu, sidebar for extensions, visual bookmarks, centered images, Opera turbo, discover and many more.

-i don't know. i think you'll find that chrome just leaves some of those things to the user to decide, so they can install an extension for that functionality. opera tends to integrate it (ex. mouse gestures). visual bookmarks and sidebar are more a layout thing and a personal taste. i'm not sure what you mean by tab menu? chrome uses tabbed browsing? so i must be a tad ignorant with that phrase(?).

-personally, i find them very similar. and i use both. opera has its own app store, but can use chromes as well. bit opera's apps are all found in chromes (as far as i can see).

-opera has a different updater.

-chrome has some added features that make it a little bigger (i believe). i could be wrong, but nacl and sandboxing, etc.

-chrome always annoys me by adding startup processes to my boot.

-overall very similar. but they used be be more similar a couple of versions ago. i think opera has started trying to implement things the vivaldi browser is offering, to try and take any wind out of their sails before they gain momentum. its a dog fight. will be interesting to see where it goes.

I use Avast with it running in the background. I have the Pagefile set on a different drive and is system managed. (I will soon be adding a 'boost' stick.) 4 gig of Ram and 2 gig of video Ram. a Dual Core 2.66 intel CPU.
The fault is just random enough to be annoying. Having opera start where I left off does help but sometimes your concentration can be broken and messages can be lost before posting.
Seems to be behaving since I turned my system into a dual monitor system. Weird

running in background is ok. i don't recall avast doing a scheduled scan when i used it, but check you settings just in case. and avast has a hardened mode that can cause problems when turned on (by blocking certain processes/programs). i think it is off by default, but peek inside the settings to make sure. avast sometimes has a update checker that might run on a schedule and a net work scan (smart scan?) ... i'd make sure they're not scheduled to auto scan also.

avast sometimes has a large emergency update that runs, seems to be separate from their regular update service. check your avast logs to see if that update occurs when you have problems (unlikely, but worth a look).

is it possible you have a memory hungry antivirus that likes to run a scheduled scan in the background without your knowledge?

Try this. Go into your profile folder (you can find its location in About Opera) and find the three files that start with session and delete them.

thanks, it worked. nice and zippy to start now. hope they find the issue and fix it soon, most people won't be bothered to do this.

my speed dial is taking 45 seconds to load at opera startup (i use it for my opera startup screen). version 28.0.1750.48

i do not have any sites saved to my speed dial, they are blank. and the 45 seconds, that is only for speed dial load, not opera load. opera loads (which i did not time), then comes up with blank white screen, then you wait for 45 seconds, then speed dial appears. ouch. this should be focused on, 'cuz it makes opera unusable to someone who opens and closes their browsers a lot.

run your browser in sandboxie. and you can use qtweb. my xp laptop is a little sluggish, and i found qtweb fairly light. i never tried pale moon on it though, and might compare the two:)

are you using a flash block extension? or a privacy extension? or ghostery or something?

likely turbo causing problems, particularly with flash games. i had those problems with older versions. easiest way to know for sure is to turn it off and see if that fixes your problems.

it is usually wise to use a different browser from your day-to-day browser for banking. or you could try banking software like trusteer rapport and see if opera works then.

https://www.trusteer.com/ProtectYourMoney

Opera Mail is basically dead.

thanks, good to hear someone say it (but sad to hear it). i'm using it and like it best, but am concerned with its continued security (it may not have holes to patch yet, but maybe b/c its dead, no ones been looking at it to see it it does have some??? would you suggest users of opera mail to move to an actively developed program? any chance opera mail could be sold or open sourced (so it could be developed)? or does it carry common code from the old browser that makes this impossible?