Like all web browsers, Chrome, Edge, and Firefox are high memory consumers, which can slow down your computer. Firmin free utility helps you control their appetite to give air to other apps.
It’s well known that web browsers all have the unfortunate tendency to use a lot of RAM – RAM – to operate. And as long as you leave your Chrome, Edge or Firefox with many tabs open, the Ram will inexorably clutter up, to the point of slowing down your computer and other applications from functioning normally, smoothly. Admittedly, Windows regularly performs memory cleaning to restore order and browser vendors try to improve the situation with each new version.
However, if you want to regain control of your browser’s Ram consumption, we advise you to use Firmin. This free tool and in French, initially designed to monitor the appetite of Firefox, can acclimatize other browsers like Chrome or Edge. Its purpose: to initiate a very regular cleaning of the memory occupied but not used by the browser and also to prevent it from exceeding a certain threshold. To work Firmin must run in the background at the same time as the browser it monitors. Nothing too awkward as it takes up very little RAM itself – only 2 MB, much less than an ordinary web page! Only available on PC, you can use it on Windows 10 as well as Windows 11.
How to control the Ram used by a web browser with Firmin?
Firmin effectively monitors the memory used by your web browser by cleaning it very regularly and allowing you to allocate an amount not to exceed it. Here’s how to implement it.
► Install Firmin on your PC and launch it. The Firmin icon then takes its place in the drawer of the taskbar. Right click on it and choose Open Firmin.
► By default, the Firmin interface is displayed in English. To pass it in French, click on the button Extended Processes.
► In the window that opens, click on the tab Languages and choose the French. Click Save then OK, and even OK to exit the program which must restart to take this new setting into account. Relaunch Firmin and open the settings window again as before.
► If Firefox is your favorite browser, that’s good. By default, Firmin is designed to do this. In the section Optionsclick the drop-down menu Memory reduced every and choose 500 milliseconds. This is the time recommended by the software developers. Firmin will sweep the memory occupied by the browser every half second.
► Also check the box Reduce memory if usage exceeds and choose from the drop-down menu the amount of memory your browser should not exceed (in megabytes). If your PC has a lot of RAM, don’t be too rigid with Firefox and leave it enough space (300 MB should be more than enough). Finally click on Register to save your settings. Remember to run Firmin at the same time as Firefox for the restrictions to apply.
► If Firefox is not your favorite browser, you can choose the one you use regularly. To do this, in the Firmin window, click on the button Browse. Navigate through your hard drive tree and choose the browser .exe file to monitor. Redo the above settings. Please note, Firmin can only take care of one browser at a time.
