There is an option at: preferences-graphics-rendering..............'show avatars that haven't finished loading'.
I tried too, in this section, the option for loading or not from http.
There is another issue, at least for me, with cache. When exit from firestorm , the next time it run there is no cache.
These are the errors I have at console when I closed it:
2011-12-23T12:04:44Z WARNING: llcommon/llapr.cpp(456) : write: apr mFile is removed by somebody else. Can not write.
2011-12-23T12:04:44Z WARNING: newview/llvocache.cpp(715) : writeToCache: Failed to update cache header index 0. handle = 1993414581465088
2011-12-23T12:04:44Z WARNING: llcommon/llapr.cpp(456) : write: apr mFile is removed by somebody else. Can not write.
I just compile the 4.0.1.24285 versión and there is no solution yet.