Details of IE7 Begin to Emerge

I will stay with Firefox.

Actually I hope IE7 blows Firefox out of the water.

Internet explorer always seemingly worked perfectly well for me, so IE7 will be a good upgrade to my existing system.

Actually I hope IE7 blows Firefox out of the water.

Why? Is FFx harbouring WMD's

@ WMD's

Actually I hope IE7 blows Firefox out of the water.

I seriously doubt that will happen. I don't believe for a minute that MS had any interest in improving their browser until Firefox forced their hand. MS has the talent and resources to produce some real quality programs when they want to. It just seems they don't want to until someone start stealing their market share.

I will stay with Firefox.

So will I, unless Kona gets his wish.

Kona, I thought you were running on Fedora Core, how are you going to run IE on that?

I ditched Fedora Core in favor of XP - just until I learn more about Linux!

I think it's great if IE can improve. I use Firefox 99%, but should it fail for any reason, or should I need IE to access a particular site, I want it to be the best IE they can produce.

I'll stick with Firefox unless somethings better, screw the name, if IE is better I'll switch back to it, if a random new browser comes out that is better than the other choices we have, I'll use it. I have high hopes for upcoming programs and features.

Well, IE7 won't blow FF out of the water. For one, IE7 will only work on XP SP2. I wonder what the stats are right now, but I am pretty sure most Windows users still use pre-XP versions. I personally know a lot of people still using 98, ME and Win2k. Firefox runs on anything (Windows 98, ME, Win2K, XP, Linux, Mac OSX...). I suspect some of these users may switch to Firefox when they see that they can't get an upgrade for IE.

I'm glad it will finally support pngs correctly, and their transperency.

I suspect some of these users may switch to Firefox when they see that they can't get an upgrade for IE.

Your pointing in my direction I know!!!

Well, IE7 won't blow FF out of the water.

I think it was more an 'I hope' rather than an 'I think it will happen.'

Ill stick with IE...No problems with spyware etc. here...Then again, I know how to browse safely.

Paxx said "I am pretty sure most Windows users still use pre-XP versions." I would disagree. Windows accounts for over 90% of the desktop market. Most people who have bought a Windows PC from a major manufacturer since 2001 are running XP. And I would guess that most of those have upgraded to SP2.

I tried to find a breakdown of PC users by OS. I coldn't find a current one. Maybe someone will be better at research....
It would be an interesting stat.

I have no reason to upgrade... im still using win2k

i don't see what they're getting at. if they are competing with firefox, don't you think they would want to make a browser BETTER than ff and not the SAME as ff. And it won't even be that good. they say added security but nobody really know what exactly they do. as far as I'm concerned, the so-called "security" won't see much of a change if any. Its still integrated with windows (if not more) so there will always be a risk to your system if ie fails. I hate to tell them, but they're gonna need something majorly out of this world and way better if they expect anyone to switch back.

and they still don't have rss streams.

Larry, most people aren't techs who change their computer every two years. The life of a PC for average JOe is about 5 years. Heck, I am sort of a techie and my home computer dates from 2001. My wife's computer is also 2001 and it shipped with ME. And even in 2001, there was still a lot of computers sold with ME, not XP. XP was the defacto OS more in 2002 or maybe late 2001 only, and that's only 3 years ago.

So, did some Googling around, and what I've found is that, right now, in March 2005, XP seems to have 63% of the market. Now, of that number, how many do you think are illegitimate versions of WinXP that can't install SP2? Now I have no numbers but I think 13% would be quite a conservative number. That would mean that it would be 50% XP SP2 and 50% something else. But my guess is that the number is quite higher than 13% of XP users haven't updated to SP2, whether it's because of the horror stories they've heard, because they don't care and don't want to bother or because they have a pirated version of XP.

Paxx, most of the techies are on XP, as you said that mostly non techies are using older systems. Firefox is mostly being used by those comfortable with computers. Which pretty much covers the XP population. The 64% I think would be very conservative.

I agree the WC users are mostly of those tech savvy, whay do I think that?

The numbers for WC are http://www.sitemeter.com/default.asp?action=stats&site=sm7wincustomize&report=19 and http://www.sitemeter.com/default.asp?action=stats&site=sm7wincustomize&report=13 - 94% of XP users out of which 29% uses Firefox and being tech enthusiasts I would say the WC crowd is among those spreading Firefox.

Now about the piracy, I think whomever was so resourceful to get his XP "the other way" will be smart enough to get their SP2 installed, have no doubt about that.

So IE7 is liable to be a big wilencer of the wind in FireFox sails. It's not going to stop its development but I'm pretty sure if it meets some basic user needs of today it will most definitely allow MS to regain its market share.

I use firefox every day for most of my browsing as currently it's the most convenient way for me to browse the Web, but to be honest I find it less than stellar in terms of quality. Having to deal with it's skinnig engine I can say there are some major problems with the design of its gui toolkit to say the least.

That said I will be back to IE if only they add tabbed browsing and a decent download manager. The one in Firefox is really good and I cannot do without tabbed browsing any longer. but in terms of quality (based on my experience with IE as a control (which I use for Blog Navigator) it is of really good quality. I'm pretty sure Microsoft will deal with the security threats (when in doubt throw money at it) and will be able to regain their good name in that term just like they did with XP after years of crappy 9x incarnations.

I don't know what it is with you Firefox boys. IE still stsarts faster out of the gate and generally does a better job showing websites. IE also organizes favorites better.

IE doesn't have tabbed browsing. Many people like this feature. Why should I have 5 open IE's instead of just one Firefox?

SkinStudio reads kona's comment and sighs.

Talking about pepole who can't change their mind and won't change the subject.

If you consider bad rendering a "better job at showing sites" then you need to get more informed. IE will display sloppy/bad coding because its joke of a rendering system only conforms to MS standards as compared to the actual W3C standards (and it seems MS had no real intentions on fixing the rendering engine).

We like firefox and prefer it to IE, get over it.

Bebi, calling bulletproofness a joke is not really a smart thing to say.

I believe our web people have quite an oposite experiences with MSHTML rendering and Gecko.

Oh, and IE is a standard. it's W3C that's not IE compliant

IE doesn't have tabbed browsing. Many people like this feature. Why should I have 5 open IE's instead of just one Firefox?

Maxthon has tabbed browsing and is IE based. Anyhow what about us people who would rather have 5 open IE's instead of useing tabbed browsing? I can't stand tabbed browsing.

Maxthon has tabbed browsing and is IE based. Anyhow what about us people who would rather have 5 open IE's instead of useing tabbed browsing? I can't stand tabbed browsing.

I use Maxthon also, but it still doesn't not compare to Firefox. It renders the pages much slower than Firefox.

We all know you don't like tabbed browsing, but many more people do.

I find it interesting that you want to get rid of Windows in favor of Linux, but defend IE all day.

Well Island Dog the reason I wanted to switch is two fold. Firstly becuse M$ says my XP key is not legal. I have to clue why they say that. And then M$ said no more updates to pirated copyies (or those they THINK are pirated) later this year. Secondly I wanted to switch to Linux because I thought learning a different OS would be cool. I was wrong. Linux is a headache.

Why do I defend IE? Because for me it's faster and I believe it to be superior. I am just waiting for a big security hole or big virus to befall Firefox so I can sit back and laugh as I type "I told you so. Now who wants to say FF is as secure as you thought?"