Internet Explorer 8 Beta 2 has just been released to customers for download. After having terrible experiences with IE7 (will NEVER use again) I decided to try IE8 on this soon-to-be-replaced piece of junk HP (buy their printers, not their PCs.) I uninstalled it within an hour, I couldn’t stand it any longer. IE8 starts to address the issues of IE7, which failed trying to emulate Firefox to compete, but only starts to solve the problem of usability. IE8 starts with the basic idiocy of IE7, but it starts to have the functionality to customize. It still won’t let users move the back buttons, I couldn’t remove the favorites button, and I was only allowed to move the toolbars to certain positions. It’s a start though.
It also was ridiculously slow. A page that took 5 seconds in Firefox, took between 15 and 25 seconds in IE8. I also found it a bit difficult to navigate the menus, as I never found how to turn off the browsing habits tracking after installing with it on. Apparently Microsoft realized the huge mistake it made by not communicating with the developer and user communities when it released the ‘Vista’ line of products. They’ve started looking for opinions with thier new lines. Hopefully they will improve some by the time they get to RC status. I’m wondering if my problems may be related to the fact that I’m running XP. This version may have a few more bugs than the Vista one. Whatever the problem is, they have gotten my attention, and I will be trying again when a new version comes out. Just how they’ll let me move my address bar back down someday…
