Microsoft offers a *cough* totally unbiased comparison of the Big 3 browsers

First of all, its not the bloody add-ons that are the important part of web browsing. Its the Web Browsers engine and is compatibility with web standards.

If any of you were web developers you'd know exactly why IE 8 is the most ultimate piece of c*** when it comes to the Next Gen Web Browsers. Not only is its HTML / CSS rendering engine as much of a fail as its last 7 versions, Its Javascript engine is as slow as hell. Is Barely functions with CSS 2.1 and has very little support for any of the CSS 2.1 pseudo selectors. Also, as usual, Microsoft fails to realise that HTML 5 and CSS 3 exist and offer no support for that either and probably wont bring out any support for that for the next 5 years. Come on MS, if you want people to stop hating your browser start making life easier for for the people who make the websites.

why microsoft make a fake ? they have a portable version of IE8 or they can run on linux, bsd ? microsoft your domination will end

I personally enjoyed the comment about the add-ons as well! Leave it to Microsoft to tell us all what we want to download! Poor souls. They just have no understanding of marketing concepts at all!


"Sure, Firefox may win in sheer number of add-ons, but many of the customizations you'd want to download for Firefox are already a part of Internet Explorer 8 – right out of the box."

I don't understand why people are always against microsoft!!. check safari website and they too claim that safari is the fastest browser. But noone talks against Apple!! This is really a biased article.

I too agree that IE is not the fastest. But I still use it because it has many features that Firefox doesn't have. Firefox startup time is much higher than IE's. IE has dynamic font support. I can open regional language sites in IE without even downloading any font. IE installs flash plugin automatically when you open a flash used site. Like that IE has may adavantages than firefox. For a normal user, IE is the best browser.

IE8 is ok, but they got to fix the issue with the tabs opening very slowly, and I have a fast computer.

The last usable IE version was 6. Well except for the security flaws, but every non-idiot has an antivirus and a firewall anyway, so they did not really matter.

I dont know what's going on with Microsoft. In the first 5 years of the new millenium they were making product with amazingly functional UI. The UI was consistent over several products. That's why they were the leading software company.

Now they try to impress us with their ugly, shiny, inconsistent UIs that are different in all of their products. "Something new" isn't always good.

Lee, you may tag your blurbs 'Fun, Humor' all day ... if you only so much as mention the word 'browser', along comes always some fan boy taking the debate to a 'religious' level :)

what have i learned from this discussion so far?

i belong to a group of 'casual web users' who 'are not the most technically savvy people'.

my browser of choice was 'shoved down' my throat'

i'm an eejit for not having 'an antivirus and a firewall anyway'


keep 'em coming lads, i'm certainly having a good laugh here :)

http://www.mozilla.org/book/

... says it all :)

Lee, I have to say I have some "beef" to pick with you over this. Not that you're not entitled to your opinion, you are, all of us are. But, I think that the chopped off chart that you've showed really doesn't do justice to the actual full chart. I though Microsoft was off their ball, but reading the full chart, it does seem easier on the ol' aching heart.

To illustrate my point:

If I had written an article slamming your journalistic independence, and all I provided was:

"Yes, we know that Internet Explorer 8 isn't the same steaming pile of dung that past versions have been. Yes, we know it has some neat features like accelerators and InPrivate filtering. But we really had no idea that you had such a great sense of humor!"


or better yet:

"I do like the little green checkmarks, Microsoft. They suuuuure are purty!"


it really would not do justice to your entire article, would it? Well, your chart did the same for me, especially because the other points that were cut from your screencapped chart were actually more important, and more plausible.

As well, I *have* to bring the following up:

My personal favorite: the Firefox add-ons I'd want to download are already built in to IE8. You know, like my three must haves - LastPass, Weave, and Greasemonkey. Oh wait, no...No, none of that functionality is built in.

Knowing the power of language, I have to ask if it was your personal favorite, or your only point? Because, you really don't have any other points in your article aside from that one. And, understandably, you don't have to have more than one to have a personal favorite. The point about lack of evidence is moot because 1) should you want it, you could find it yourself, and 2) You don't really provide any evidence yourself, at all (for the studies, not add-ons).

And yes, I happen to agree with you on the part with add-ons. But it really is not as clear-cut, as you've made it appear. My non-tech friends don't even know that there is an add-ons menu.

Also, why am I writing your job for you? First, state what YOU think of the "points they make", preferably more than one, before you ask me about my opinion. Don't take offense, it sounds harsh on purpose. I come to downloadsquad to read quality articles and writing. All this article is you venting. If I want to hear rants and rambles, I go to CNN, or FOX.

Half-assed venting, I might add.

Finally, I am not supporting or opposing IE8, I use firefox and opera, and I would gladly use IE8 because I really like the way inPrivate browsing is implemented. I would, if it didn't happen to lock up and crash my Vista machine. The main point in question is not IE8 this or that, it is the quality of your writing. Not downloadsquad, but specifically you, as part of downloadsquad.

I did look at your other articles, they're good, for the most part. But this one, along with the opera one yesterday (darn, I supported you on that one, too) are too close in my mind to ignore these shortcomings.

I guess if you're going to vent, don't do it on a short timeframe.


I hope you consider these suggestions. I think they are valid, but maybe I am not looking at the big picture.


P.S. The green checkmarks are indeed very purty. The designer did a great job :)

Quote the 'infamous chart':
Firefox and Chrome have more support for emerging standards like HTML5 and CSS3, but Internet Explorer 8 invested heavily in having world-class, consistent support for the entire CSS2.1 specification.

Correct me if I am wrong, but isn't CSS3 better than CSS2.1?

Quoting yet again:
Only Internet Explorer 8 has both tab isolation and crash recovery features; Firefox and Chrome have one or the other.

Is it just me or does firefox not have recovery features after a crash because it doesn't need them?

IE 8 comes in far behind FF. No multiple session saving, No multiple tab rows, No customizing of tab size, or color, or Ctrl/Tab switch, No comparable extensions to what i use in FF (TabMixPlus, Colorful Tabs, SaveWithUrl, MenuEditor, StopAutoPlay, Converter, etc.) Google toolbar will not install from Google (use File Hippo)