I couple of weeks ago I blogged about my impressions of Safari 4 beta for Windows. I have to say that I was very impressed with its features and the thought that went in to making it a great web browser that it is.
As with most people who use Windows, I also use Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 (IE 7). Last week Microsoft released a long awaited update to IE i.e. IE 8 (you got to love all of these IEs 🙂 ). I’ve subjected it to a daily (and nightly) use on my Windows XP and I have to say that I am very impressed with the quality. I have not spent much time learning the new features and concentrated on the stability. So far it has been rock solid on a wide variety of web sites and applications. Where IE7 would freeze up on a busy or memory constrained Windows, IE8 simply puts up a message that it is experiencing connectivity issues. A refresh of the page fixes it right up. Not ideal but much better than having all of your browser windows lock up and crash.
So, I still think that Safari 4 is way cool and would be the best browser for Windows … if it worked reliably. However, if you are using IE7 now, and if you are using Windows how can you not be, you really should get IE8. The upgrade is a simple visit to the Windows Update site.
Hi my name’s Feran and I am working with the Internet Explorer Outreach Team to help provide assistance to folks about their Internet Explorer. The final IE8 was released last week.
This is a great article and I am glad to hear your positive take on IE8. You mentioned you have not checked out many of the new features, and there are actually quite a few. Here is a good resource to check out for a general overview: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/internet-explorer/features/overview.aspx?tabid=1&catid=1 and here is a great site where you can see all the add-ons, web slices and accelerators that are available to personalize you IE8: http://www.ieaddons.com/en/.
Also, anyone else interested can download it here: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/internet-explorer/default.aspx?ocid=ie8_sm_a
Thanks!
Feran
Internet Explorer Outreach Team
Feran, thanks for visiting and commenting. I am aware that there are a lot of new features in IE8 and I intend to take a look at them as time permits. So far, I am just happpy to have a browser that is much more usable and stable than IE7.
Keep up the good work!
Thanks Leon, it’s always nice to hear that!