Netsurf requirements for RiscOS is 16mb ram and 030 equivalent ARM6 CPU.
I suspect that was an older version of NetSurf but the 68k should have better code density (smaller executable) than ARM processors when optimized (Chris's NetSurf currently isn't optimized). I would recommend 32MB minimum for Chris's NetSurf to be usable in its current state. I would also recommend at least a 68040 for usable speed but a fast 68030+68882 should work. A 68030@50MHz with fast memory is almost as fast as a 68040@25MHz with slow memory for integer performance but lacks the larger caches of the 68040 and the 68882 is a fraction of the performance of the 68040 FPU.
SDL/Framebuffer requires 060 and 64mb ram, so if someone decides continue/help Chris with native version, it would be possible to use it with 030 hopefully.
I don't know if Chris's native NetSurf could be much faster than Arti's version but you are correct that it uses less memory. Chris's version is more forgiving of installation problems but there are known problems including rendering clearing and font crashing for some users (not reproducible here) which make it less than usable, IMO. Most of Arti's NetSurf versions crash after some time on my real Amigas but not in my AmiKit/WinUAE install.
NetSurf is a bear to compile which keeps me from helping more. Wawa had all kinds of trouble and I am even less of a Unix person (I tried Cinnamon Mint but went back to XP). NovaCoder probably could have done some good but he is leaving the Amiga. It would be nice if Arti tried to help Chris more but Arti is still learning programming and has a different philosophy. Part of the problems with Chris's NetSurf is bugs and lack of support in AmigaOS 3.x compared to AmigaOS 4.x. I talked to someone "important" about porting AmigaOS 4.x Reaction to AmigaOS 3.x and there was some interest but Reaction is highly dependent on the intuition.library and graphics.library. There is a known bug in one of the intuition.library BOOPSI classes (parent classes of Reaction and datatypes classes) which I think I could fix with a patch (intuition.library and graphics.library are in ROM) but newly compiled modules with new support and new ROMs are the proper way to add support. Also, the AmigaOS 3.x intuition.library is an inefficient mess currently as the ancient Green Hill compiler requires stubs for all external functions. Updating AmigaOS 3.x to be more API compatible to AmigaOS 4.x would be a major undertaking and take a considerable amount of work. Users may be disappointed without a level of optimization and integration at least equal to AmigaOS 3.9. Current high end (FPGA based) 68k systems are perpetually delayed and/or have other problems I won't go into. There isn't much motivation to do anything as the Amiga hits new lows and dies more everyday.
