14 DAY TRIAL // UPDATE: Download Opera 10.5 Pre-Alpha 7x Faster than Opera 10.10 - official release. Just days ahead of the official release, an internal development milestone of the next iteration of Opera has been leaked and is now available for download in the wild. Opera Software had announced that it was planning to offer the first taste of Opera 10.5 on December 22nd, 2009. However, the leaked build of Opera 10.0’s successor started being up for grabs from various third-party sources over the weekend. The Norway-based browser maker has since then confirmed the leak, but advised users to steer clear of the leaked Opera 10.5 pre-Alpha Build.
Huib Kleinhout, from the Opera Desktop team notes that the internal development milestone of Opera 10.5 pre-Alpha that got leaked is not the same as the official build that will be available for early adopters to start testing tomorrow, December 22nd. “There are some reports about an old internal build of 10.5 being available. Don't run it, the official build on Tuesday is much better and you don't risk getting nasty trojans on you pc,” Kleinhout stated.
However, the Opera 10.5 Pre-Alpha internal leaked build is an official release from Opera Software, although, obviously not meant for “public consumption.” As users will be able to notice from the screenshots integrated at the bottom of this article, courtesy of techie-buzz and ghacks, Opera 10.5 comes with a range of enhancements.
In Opera 10.5, users will get a tad more room for browsing. Opera Software has decided to do away with the traditional menu, and integrate it into a Ribbon/Fluent graphical user interface type menu, in which a small icon in the top left hand side corner provides access to such items as File, Edit, etc. In addition, the Tab area of the browser is now one with the address bar, which also holds the search box. Additional UI enhancements involve less nagging notifications, and a new search experience which dims the entire webpage in order to better highlight queried items.
With Opera 10.5, the browser maker has promised that speed will be a key focus. This prompted speculation that Opera Software was gearing up to integrating a new JavaScript engine into the browser dubbed Carakan. However, the leaked Opera 10.5 pre-Alpha internal build doesn’t feature Carakan, but offers a new version of the old rendering engine (Presto 2.5.18).
Opera 10.5 will be the first browser from Opera Software to embrace Windows 7. As the screenshots reveal, Opera 10.5 pre-Alpha plays nice with the new Windows Aero UI in Windows 7, and its enhancements such as Thumbnail Preview, the Superbar, JumpLists, and additional Aero effects and eyecandy.
In addition, Opera 10.5 pre-alpha comes with Private browsing, a feature already offered by competitors such as Internet Explorer 8, Firefox 3.6 and Google Chrome 4.0. Another aspect worth noting is the level of support for modern web standards. Opera 10.5 pre-Alpha already scores 99 out of 100 in the Acid3Test, a score almost three times as best as the preview build of Internet Explorer 9
Opera 10.20 Alpha is available for download here.
The latest releases of Google Chrome are available for download here.
Internet Explorer 8 is available for download here.
Firefox 3.6 Beta 5 (Beta revision 5) for Windows is available for download here.
Firefox 3.6 Beta 5 (Beta revision 5) for Mac OS X is available for download here.
Firefox 3.6 Beta 5 (Beta revision 5) for Linux is available for download here.
