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Five Ways to Surf the Internet Faster

By Tara Swords

If your family is like most, you probably spend a good amount of time each day browsing the web and searching for information you need -- maybe a bit too much. Perhaps you can't always find what you're looking for, or annoying pop-ups slow you down.

The good news is that you can speed things up by making over your web browser, be it Internet Explorer, Netscape or Firefox. Here are five simple ways to surf the Internet faster by getting the most out of your web browser.

1. Add a search toolbar
Normally, when you want to search the web, you'll type in the address of a search site, like: Google or Yahoo. Then when you arrive at Google or Yahoo, you type your query into a search box and get your results, right?

But did you know that you can scour the Internet directly from your web browser without having to go to a search site first? All you have to do is add a Google or Yahoo search box -- known as a search toolbar -- to your web browser.

Here's how it works: When you first open your web browser, and your home page launches, look at the area above your homepage. See the box where the web site address appears? That's called the navigation toolbar. When you add a search toolbar to your web browser, a blank search box for Google or Yahoo (or other search sites) will always appear right next to your navigation toolbar. So when you want to find a hotel in France, you'll type "hotels in France" directly into this new search toolbar, and "Voila!" your search results are revealed.

Popular browsers and search sites, such as Google, Yahoo, MSN and Firefox, offer free search toolbars. Once there, follow the step-by-step instructions to download and install the search toolbar.

The best part about search toolbars? Instead of searching just Google, for instance, you can add a dictionary, thesaurus, language translator, Amazon or Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia, to your toolbar, too. In other words, you never have to make a direct trip to a search site again -- what a time-saver!

2. Use bookmarks 
Bookmarks are exactly what they sound like: a way to mark a web page so you can easily return to it later. You probably already figured out that to mark your favorite pages all you have to do is click Bookmark in your browser's main menu.

But did you know you can bookmark web searches too?  For example, if your teenage son is a local track and field star, you might occasionally do a search of his name to find the latest press clippings or race results. The next time you search his name, bookmark the results page -- then there's no need to type in his name every time you search. Here are some other time-savers:

• Organize favorites  The popular browsers let you organize your bookmarks in folders. Just go to Bookmark or Favorites in your browser menu, and from there click Manage Bookmarks or Organize Favorites. You might name your folders "research," "press clippings," "blogs" and "recipes," for example.
• Save fast  Peter Kent, author of Search Engine Optimization for Dummies, says there's an even speedier way to save web pages for later. "If I'm visiting a site and I want to come back but don't want to bookmark it, I will drag [the URL] onto the desktop. You just double-click it to open it [again]. Most people don't realize you can even do that."
• Create a short list  If you want your favorite sites at your fingertips, save them in your browser's Personal Toolbar Folder (which you can find under Manage Bookmarks or Manage Favorites). Web sites you store in this folder will always appear at the top of your browser windows in plain sight so they'll be a click away.

3. Use tabs
Imagine that you're reading the news in one browser window, checking your emails in another, and searching for bargains in a third. When you have a bunch of browser windows open like this, your desktop can get cluttered.

But with tabbed browsing, you can open several web pages in a single window. Each web page you open appears as a new tab -- just like sections of your phone book or a set of file folders. Then you can swiftly click between the tabs.

Firefox offers tabs as a standard feature, or you can use tabs in Internet Explorer if you download the MSN Search Toolbar.

The coolest thing about tabs is that you can set your homepage to be a set of tabs rather than a single page. Let's say you have the same routine every morning over coffee: You read CNN and your two favorite blogs, sign in to your bank account, and post to your "working moms" discussion board. With tabbed browsing, all six of your favorite sites can open automatically in one window when you launch your browser. To set up your homepage this way, go to your browser's Preferences and select Tabbed Browsing.

4. Block pop-ups 
Pop-up ads are a hassle, but you don't have to tolerate them. Install a free pop-up blocker to prevent the vast majority of pop-up ads. Yahoo, Google and MSN include pop-up blocking software in their toolbars. Again, just go to Google, for example, and follow the step-by-step instructions to download and install the toolbar.

5. Use auto-fill 
There's no bigger time drain than having to type in the same personal information over and over into different web site forms. But here's a little known secret: Most web browsers or search toolbars come with an auto-fill function that will automatically fill out all, or part, of these forms for you.

For instance, using auto-fill, your browser can remember your name, address and phone number to speed up your online shopping purchases. Or your toolbar's auto-fill function can remember your username for your favorite newspaper site that requires registration to read the latest headlines.

Here's how to use auto-fill: If your browser is Internet Explorer, for example, in the browser's main menu, go to Tools and then click Content. Next, click on AutoComplete and select the items you want Explorer's auto-fill function to remember.

Or if you want to use the auto-fill function in your Google toolbar, it works a bit differently. Each time your browser recognizes that you're filling out a form, a window will pop up and ask your permission to automatically fill in the information.

As a security precaution, however, you should not use auto-fill for sensitive information such as your financial account numbers, Kent says: "Be aware that auto-fill can pass your credit card info without you filling it in because someone can create a hidden form that can grab that info."