After much delving into why DeviantArt.com refused to load, I installed yet another Web browser to test on my Windows PC. And Opera, used in its Turbo Mode, loaded DeviantArt blisteringly fast!
None of my other browsers will load DeviantArt, or will barely load it and then hang (usually on page calls to st.deviantart.net). It’s nothing to do with my Firewall (on or off, no difference); nor my Windows hosts file; nor my browser add-ons (DeviantArt is unreachable across Firefox, Chrome and IE. I run Chrome and IE without any add-ons). I even tried changing my default ISP DNS servers to use the Google DNS servers instead (no change there, either).
But I’m glad to say that Opera works fine. Here’s their explanation of Opera’s ‘Turbo Mode’…
When you enable Opera Turbo [mode], the pages you request are passed through one of Opera’s data-saving servers. The server removes any extraneous page elements, shaves off image pixels you won’t miss, diagnoses the state of your connection and compresses downloads. This smart, cloud-based technology does all this before sending the page to your screen.
‘If in doubt, hit it with a large pink hammer. Yup, that should do it…’ 🙂