Opera Software has officially released Opera 6.0 for Windows.

Opera 6.0 for Windows includes a number of new and improved features, including a customizable user interface. Opera Software reports that there have been 500,000 downloads of the beta in the last two weeks. With this release, Opera for the first time also displays non-Roman alphabets, opening up the local markets in the Asia/Pacific and Eastern European region to true browser competition. Here are the new features in Opera 6.0 for Windows: As always the Opera team has focused on making Opera faster. Significant portions of the code have been optimized for increased speed, including the image code and general display code, leading to faster displaying of Web documents. Opera 6.0 makes better use of the memory resources available on your machine, compared to earlier versions. Opera's user interface has received a major overhaul with a new start-up dialog, default main bar (that can be enlarged to a full main bar set by right-clicking), skin and panels in a blue and white color scheme. Users can choose default, classic Opera look or their own design. Double-click a word or right-click a selected phrase and a pop-up menu is displayed full of powerful features including search, encyclopedia look-up, and translation. Users can organize and personalize favorite bookmarks and searches in one place. New pagebar in the single document interface mode (SDI) lets users keep track of visited Web pages and drag bookmarks from the Personal Bar to the Pagebar. New keyboard shortcuts in addition to the many popular easy full keyboard shortcuts already in Opera. For the first time, Opera supports the Unicode Worldwide Character Set, making Opera available in local languages for the Asian/Pacific and Eastern European regions. Opera now has support for LiveConnect, to enable scripting of Java applets and plug-ins through JavaScript. Users can now run more than one instance of Opera at a time, thereby letting different users of one computer use separate preferences for set-up, e-mail, bookmarks, etc. Switch easily between document windows with the new Ctrl+Tab feature. New import update lets users import e-mail from Microsoft Outlook Express accounts. Added Transport Layer Security (TLS) support for POP and SMTP accounts increases e-mail security. Opera 6.0 for Windows supports the following technologies: 128-bit encryption, TLS 1.0, SSL 2 and 3, CSS1 and partial CSS2, XML, HTML 4.01, HTTP 1.1, ECMAScript, JavaScript 1.3, WAP/WML and partial support for DOM. Opera 6.0 for Windows is available for free in an ad-sponsored version at www.opera.com/download/ After download, users can register the browser for $39 to remove the banner ad.