Opera 9.6 Delivers Improved Mail, Syncing Tools
Opera has pushed out a nice upgrade to its flagship desktop browser. The new Opera 9.6 adds some welcome improvements to the e-mail and newsfeed handling, improves synchronization through Opera Link and packs in a number of security and bugs fixes. The update isn’t as big of an update as the leap to Opera 9.5, but it’s a worthwhile upgrade nonetheless.
The most noticeable changes in Opera 9.6 are in the Opera Mail section which has a new “low bandwidth” option that grabs your e-mail in a minimalist fashion to conserve on transfer bandwidth. Opera Mail’s low bandwidth settings will truncate your messages (for POP accounts), limit downloads to new messages (IMAP accounts) and strips out attachments (both types of accounts). You can find the new Mail option, also called M2, in the menubar.
Opera Mail also includes a slick new option to ignore or follow contacts. If you choose to ignore a contact Mail will leave the messages on the server — a bit like Gmail’s “mute” option. Following a contact has roughly the opposite affect, giving those messages priority.
The feed reader portion of Opera has also seen a makeover with a new feature that allows you to preview feeds before subscribing to them.
Other changes in 9.6 include some improvements to the Opera Link synchronization tools which which now record and sync custom search engines and typed history.
Also in Opera 9.6 are a number of big fixes and security patches, along with some behind the scenes improvements that bring Opera closer to passing the ACID 3 browser test.
For a complete list of everything that’s new, be sure to read through the release notes.
Opera 9.6 is free download for Windows and Mac and, thanks to the security patches, a recommended upgrade for Opera fans.
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