Iâm on Firefox 3.6 in Windows XP Home Edition service pack 3. I experience a
lot of âserver not foundâ when opening Firefox. Should i have proxy settings
checked â âno proxyâ or âauto-detect proxy settings for this networkâ. I really
donât know about proxy.
This is actually a very simple answer: unless you know
youâre using a proxy, select no proxy.
Even better, for IE and Firefox users alike, âauto detectâ, while intended
to make life easier is â fundamentally evil.
Not for any malicious reasons, it just gets in the way. Iâll explain
why.
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The issue here is very simple, when âauto detectâ is turned on, your browser takes time on every start-up to figure out what the settings should be.
For 99% of you thatâs time totally wasted.
Most of the time, there is no proxy, and spending time every time you start your browser looking for one is just silly.
In Internet Explorer the setting is in Tools, Internet Options, Connections, LAN Settings:
Make sure that âAutomatically Detect Settingsâ is unchecked. In many versions of IE it is checked by default and slowing you down.
In FireFox go to Tools, OptionsâŠ, Advanced, Network, SettingsâŠ:
Make sure that âNo proxyâ is selected.
Caveats
If you know youâre behind or using a proxy server, then donât do what I just suggested, itâll probably break your connectivity.
If you suspect youâre behind or using a proxy server, then look at the settings and perhaps even jot them down before you do anything. If it shows youâre connecting through a proxy server, then donât do what I just suggested because it will probably break your connectivity.
If things break after doing this, then return the settings to their previous values.
But for the vast majority of you, particularly at home, this little tweak may speed up your browserâs load time noticeably.
But This feature is important when connecting from various location, and many times, when behind Routers, specially for detecting DNS Servers, am I right ?, This feature is not important if you connect from single source, but for a portable Laptop, I think itâs important to detect various Sourcer
04-Apr-2010
Related to this: we just got a piece of spyware (ironically called AntiVirus) from a video streaming site on Sunday and one of the things it did was configure a proxy server in IE (it didnât do this in Firefox, which is the default and most used browser on that machine). So if you go into your proxy settings and see one configured when you normally wouldnât be using one (say, at work and on a big corporate intranet) DONâT just assume itâs *supposed* to be there.
Awesome! Itâs amazing all the neat âstuffâ Iâve learned from you, Leo! Youâve made my computing experience much more enjoyable, efficient, and stress-free. Thanks for all you do!
Phoo!!! [edited] No wonder people detest Microsoft!!!
There is no WAY that âAuto-Detectâ should EVER work this way! An âAuto-Detectâ option, once checkmarked, should be intelligent enough to:
          1. Search out whatever relevant settings the program needs, JUST ONCE;
          2. Record  those settings for the programâs future reference; and then
          3. Automagically âuncheckmarkâ itself!
In that way, the program WOULDNâT be slowed down, yet the âAuto-Detectâ option would still be available for the user if his or her future needs should ever change. This should be applicable to ANY Â program with any âAuto-Detectâ feature (or equivalent), not just a browser!
I have been using computers since before Windows 3.11, and now use XP, SP3, IE7, and never have been made aware of this little tib bit about speeding up my startup by deselecting the auto- detect. Thanks very much.
omg you saved me my browser on windows 7 which is IE8 was slow i unchecked this and now its fast again thanks.
Thanks for such a plain English explanation! I was on the Microsoft âSupportâ site for over a half an hour trying to figure out the answer to this.
Even though Iâm not a programmer or an IT expert, Iâm definitely Not computer illiterate and can usually figure out things as long as I have a user guide or can find a decent help article. But sometimes it seems like Microsoft takes extra time to make their âhelpâ pages unintelligible and make people feel like idiots (perhaps so we wonât mess around with settings that MS thinks we should keep?).
Anyway, thanks so much. You were able to explain this in 1 page, and it took me all of 5 minutes to read, understand, and adjust my settings. Well, maybe 10 minutes, if you include the time for me to write this comment â but it was well worth it!.
Thanks for Not making me feel like a complete idiot! Iâll be sure to come back to your site in the future, especially if (when) the MS pages start trying to make me feel stupid. :-)