You had to wait very long for this. First my device didn’t work for weeks and when I noticed that NetFront had to be the best Palm OS browser I wanted to test it a little bit longer than other browsers.
NetFront – developed by Access – is pre-installed on some Sony Clié devices, but you never could buy or download it. When you installed it onto your Palm it confused to start because it didn’t detect a Sony Clie. Last year people noticed that they can run NetFront if they hack into the hex code. Then Tam Hanna developed MakeMeClie, a tool that changes the device id of your Palm. So (almost) every Palm OS 5 device can run NetFront.
Getting started
See http://tamspalm.tamoggemon.com/2006/01/02/netfront-on-the-txt5/ how to install NetFront. If you don’t own a TX/T5 you don’t need MaxX.
Browsing the web
I could visit the most sites very well. There are four page rendering modes, for example full desktop layout or handheld optimized layout (small screen rendering). Very good is the handheld optimized rendering mode which keeps tables. Other browsers display one column after the other while NetFront tries to keep the layout.
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Four rendering modes
On my device there was a problem with the connection: on the German site “T-Online” for examlpe, NetFront asked about 25 times “Connect now?” while loading although there was a (good) connection. This is similar on other pages. You should enable “Auto connecting” in the settings.
You can use the stylus for both marking text and scrolling the page, but you can only use one mode at the same time. I think you don’t need marking text so often, but when NetFront is in scrolling mode you can’t tap on hyperlinks. And as I prefer scrolling with the stylus on the whole screen instead of using scrollbars, I call this a problem. Unfortunetly – because it “belongs” to Sony Clies – there is no support for the 5-way-navigator.
The dialogue you open an URL with has many features: a history, bookmarks, and it can open saved files. Pages you save are stored in the MTH format (HTML with images) on the card. The bookmark manager has also a “auto-crusing” capability.
Opening an URL
Downloads and settings
A good web browser should be able to download files. NetFront is. Using a Tungsten C near to an Wireless AP with a 2 Mbps connection I downloaded a ~ 712 KB ZIP file in ~ 12 seconds. Of course the wireless module of the T|C doesn’t support 2 Mbits/sec. I repeated the download and confirmed a download speed of 60 KB/s. Not bad. Unfortuanely all files are downloaded into /Palm/Programs/MSFiles and you can’t change this path in NetFront. And you can also upload files (and choose every file, everywhere on your card)
NetFront seems to support secure pages. When I logged into my GoogleMail I got a message “This page is not secured. Data will be sent without encrypting.”. Nevertheless my GoogleMail account worked, but I don’t know anything about the security of this connection…
In the settings you can disable images, animations, tables, JavaScript, … you can set cookie and cache preferences, a proxy, the user agent and the homepage.
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My results
NetFront IS the best browser that is out nowadays. No other browser combines so much features: many rendering modes, downloads, uploads, bookmarks, saving a page, small fonts… Like other browsers it has its problems on several sites, but on the most sites it has no problems. My only tip for you is: GET IT 
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Cool review! I’ve heard a lot of positive comments regarding Netfront. I think what really sucks is that it’s available for free download for PocketPCs, but not Palms
So, just to make sure, if you say, own a T3, then you wouldn’t need to install MaxX?
MaxX is used to get NetFront on the whole screen, but it doesn’t work on a T3. So, unfortuanely either you use another tool like CodeDriver or you have only 320×320 screen.
Alex
Hi,
I can confirm that the program didnt go HiRes+ on my T3 when I tried it out last time…
BTW, I am pretty happy with my Webpro, so I didnt update yet…
Best regards
Tam Hanna
I’ve installed NetFront on my TX and really like the fact that I can upload files…. makes gmail all that much better. One thing I do not like about Netfront though is the large font it insists on using. I even used Fonts4OS5 to change the font to a small font, but Netfront still displays it very large. Is there a good way to make the font in Netfront smaller?
Have you installed all files, listed in the article “NetFront on a TX/T5″? There is a small font extension.
Alex
I figured it out! I had to make the largest font option in Fonts4OS5 the same as the smallest and the two in the center the second to smallest… It looks great!
I got NetFront running on my Tapwave Zodiac 2. It required Dmitry Grindberg’s UDMH utility to run at all (apparently, the 10MB of dynamic heap the Zodiac provides wasn’t enough…), and Code Diver to go full screen on the Zodiac’s 320×480 display.
Curiously, Code Diver didn’t see it installed in RAM. I had to move it a a card, and create a Launcher X shortcut to it. Code Diver could see that and work its magic. The last app I had that did that was Picsel Browser. In Picsel Browser’s case, the issue was apparently that it was pure ARM code, and Code Diver only saw 68k apps. NetFront may be the same.
It works well enough, but seems on the slow side. I use a SanDisk 256MB+Wifi card, and test speed using DSLReport’s Javascript based mobile speedtest page, which downloads a file of specified size to the device and measures how long it takes.
The bundled Tapwave browser (based on the PalmSource browser v2) clocks in at about 60K/sec. So does NetFront 3.1. Novarra’s nWeb gets about 150K/sec, as does Web Pro 3.0 (based on Novarra’s engine). Mobirus’s Xiino 3.4e claims 400K/Sec, but I think nWeb’s numbers are closest to reality.
Hi dmc
good benchmark!
However, are rendering times included into the benchmark? IMHO, the main problem with Palm OS browsers is not the download speed, but much rather the rendering time…
Best regards
Tam Hanna
Yes, but maybe he means just the download speed. He loads a file, which is big enough, lets say about 4 MB. If you know the time the download takes you can calculate the speed in KB/s. And some browsers (NetFront) even shows the speed.
But 400 KB/s seems very high…
Alex
Thanks so much for this. Netfront adds internet-appliance capability to the TX. I like that I get a “Get Firefox” add on the article, too
So when’s minimo getting ported?
I think some is porting Minimo already, but I have no news yet. If it won’t be ported, we may use it with Palm Linux / GPE.
Alex
nice review folks anyway where i can download this program??
See this thread here: http://1src.com/forums/showthread.php?t=110728