Opera 10.5 pre-alpha leaks: Windows 7 integration, per-tab private browsing

Filed under: Internet, Browsers

While version 10.5 has not been released yet by Opera officially, there’s a pre-alpha build that has been turned loose by someone. It seems legit enough: help -> about reports that the browser is version 10.5 internal, build 20192.

It’s important to remember that 1) this is a pre-alpha and 2) this could well be a build Opera never intended to see the light of day. In benchmarks like V8 and Peacekeeper, 10.5 performed about as well as the recently-released 10.2 alpha. Neither of those scored as well as Opera 10.1, however, which seems to indicate that Carakan hasn’t been bolted on as of yet.

Regardless of the benchmarks, general browsing with 10.5 feels reasonably fast. In non-scientific speed testing (read: stopwatch page load timing) it’s competitive with Firefox and Chrome. Javascript-heavy pages are another story, but again that should change once Carakan arrives.

Opera 10.5 takes full advantage of Windows 7’s Superbar. By default, the jump list displays your Speed Dial pages. You can pin pages as well, though right now it only works with Speed Dial items — so pinning isn’t all that useful just yet.

Per-tab thumbnails, on the other hand, work beautifully. I have yet to experience the bothersome spinning wheel which continues to plague Firefox builds with this feature. Hover over a thumbnail, and Opera flips between your open tabs and windows using Aero Peek.

About the only shell feature missing is the Superbar’s progress indicator for downloads, but I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see that integrated before 10.5 hits beta.

One other big addition is per-tab private browsing. It’s pretty similar to what we’ve seen with other browsers: browsing and download history are not saved. Everything which happened in the tab is forgotten about as soon as you close it. One big plus is that you don’t need to open an additional window, making Opera’s implementation just a little bit more inconspicuous.

Opera 10.5 pre-alpha leaks: Windows 7 integration, per-tab private browsing originally appeared on Download Squad on Sat, 19 Dec 2009 21:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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