My apologies for a low-knowledge-level question ... I was an Opera 12 user for a long time, but not a power user or a "techie" by any stretch, and am trying to hit the ground running with the latest version of Opera on a new system set up over the weekend after my old computer died.

I have a satellite ISP with strict bandwidth caps, and I seem to remember that one of the things I had to do to a year or two ago to manage bandwidth usage with Opera 12 was specify that it not constantly refresh pages in the speed dial -- I can't remember if this was done just by specifying how often Opera checked if cached pages had been updated on the server (Settings>Preferences>History) or if setting "redraw" times also had something to do with managing bandwidth hits (Settings>Preferences>Browsing>Loading).

Anyway, I don't see an obvious place to set either of these things in the new Opera. So the question is ... do they exist somewhere where I can't see them?

Is there anything else I should be doing to manage bandwidth usage by this new version of Opera? I'm running in "Offroad mode" ... have enabled plug-ins only on demand ... may do some image management when I have time ... and have disabled auto updates.

But I have been an extensive user of Speed Dial in Opera 12, and I'm concerned that without the ability to prevent Opera from constantly checking speed-dialed sites to refresh pages, if I behave the same way with this new version, I might inadvertently run up data usage. Am I worrying unnecessarily? Are there disadvantages to running in Offroad Mode in a desktop environment?

Thanks for any and all advice ...

Thank you all so much. Both solutions are helpful and have worked ... I really appreciate.

Yes, I thought about sticking with Opera 12 (porting over the old 12 setup download from my backup disc and installing it on this new win 7 machine) ... the reason I went ahead and downloaded the latest version is because the list of my "frequently used" websites with which I've begun to experience Opera incompatibilities in the last 3 or 4 months has gradually been expanding, and I've had to face the unpleasant reality that at SOME point, I just won't be able to use it as my go-to version anymore. I loved that browser.

Anyway, thought I'd give the new version a try and see if it'll work for me or if I have to find something else ... but it's really hard to see something that was so good for so long change.

Hi ... yes, I did search on this topic, and I understand there have been previous posts, but I don't entirely understand the answers. Some seem to suggest there are "workarounds" for this problem, but most seem to assume a certain amount of technical knowledge.

I am a long-time Opera 12 user, and loved it. I am not a programmer. I have had to switch computers, as my old machine has died, and finally "upgrade" to the latest version of Opera, which I had been avoiding doing since so many users have hated it.

I'm now trying to get the new machine set up as closely to the way my old machine was as I could. I am on an extremely limited bandwidth connection (satellite) and need to be able to schedule all non-time-critical downloads for a very specific 5-hour window every day. Last year, I was starting to go over my monthly caps, and could not figure out why ... realized that among the regular invisible "hits" my bandwidth was taking were constant page refreshes by Opera, and changed settings to cause these things to happen rarely rather than every 5 seconds or whatever. So I've gone to look for where to set this in the new version of Opera, and don't see anyplace? But while searching the Web for info, found lots of complaints about not being able to turn off autoupdates, and this clearly is going to be something that affects me, as well.

Has anything changed? Is there a way to turn off autoupdates, or to disable them so that the user can pick the time of day when they occur? Again, I am not a programmer ... really not sure why the ability to just toggle a checkbox has been removed ... I have this ability with Windows updates, and can do those when it doesn't count against my bandwidth caps? I really liked Opera for the last few years and hate to give it up, but I'll have to if I can't schedule updates to occur when they won't swallow the limited bandwidth I have.