In the past times, depending on a serial modem for internet access,
I preferred Opera, because it allows to switch ANY graphics OFF // ON
through simple menu buttons:
[View]--> [Images]--> { [Show images] || [Cached Images] || [No Images] }
(Any of the three options can be made the default, to be altered according
to one's need while browsing.)
So I had "No Images" as my default, starting Opera in "text only" modus;
this allowed me to move between URLs pretty fast, and when I had reached
an interesting URL, I could easily turn on graphics mode.
As pure text browsers, I prefer both: "elinks" and "lynx".