Opera 8.5 Beta for Windows Mobile

I’ve just tried out Opera’s new web browser beta for Windows Mobile 2003 and 5.0. On my Dell Axim X50v it was a revelation compared to any other mobile browser I’ve ever used. It’s pretty fast, supports VGA including landscape, and renders pages with far more features than any other mobile browser I’ve ever used.

With Carsurvey.org, it renders things as well as a desktop browser would given a tiny screen size (unfortunately the current Carsurvey.org CSS layout doesn’t degrade well for sub 800 pixel wide screens). I was especially impressed that my CSS tabbed menu system rendered correctly, and Google AdSense ads (with their heavy use of JavaScript) worked too.

5 Responses to “Opera 8.5 Beta for Windows Mobile”

  1. Gary Says:

    Have you checked out Netfront. I’m using it on my Axim, it’s luverly !

  2. steven Says:

    I’ve used Netfront quite a bit, but Opera is in a different class in my opinion. 10 minutes after trying Opera, I’d uninstalled Netfront. That pretty much says it all.

  3. Gary Says:

    What we need is PPC Firefox…

    Come on mozilla, get your arse in gear !!

  4. steven Says:

    There’s already a Pocket PC browser based on Mozilla - Minimo. Unfortunately it still seems to be a bit of a work in progress. I couldn’t get the latest version to run on my X50v, although it can be made to work apparently.

  5. Distant Parts » Blog Archive » New Opera beta for Windows Mobile Says:

    [...] I previously posted about Opera launching a beta browser for Windows Mobile. While I was very impressed with the first release, it did tend to crash a lot. They’ve now released a new beta, and it’s far more solid. Sites like Yahoo! Mail and Amazon now seem to work fine. Based on this progress, I’ll definitely be purchasing the final release. [...]

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