K12IT

For the past few weeks I have been using Internet Explorer 9 Beta exclusively as my browser. With Google Chrome, and Mozilla FireFox now in the market and being the internet browers of choice by most IT professionals Microsoft has really set themselves up for an uphill battle to win people over. Here are a few things that has been improved in IE9 that might sway some people back.

Microsoft has streamlined and minimized the IE9 Interface. The biggest change that has pleased me is the "one bar" address bar. This is similar to what you see when using Google Chrome. Not only does this double as an address and search bar with Bing, Google, Yahoo, and etc, but you can also add other websites such as Amazon and Facebook for searches. This is the single reason that I have stuck with IE9. Customizing searches makes finding what I want on the web that much easier. One other update to the general interface of the browser is that there is finally a download manager in IE.

When it comes down to performance Microsoft has taken some nice steps in giving control to the user. The days of IE being all bogged down with bloatware that is next to impossible to remove are over. The "Add-on Performance Monitor" shows you what add-ons are running, and how much time they add to the startup of the browser. I have had great success with stopping all of the add-ons and it does make a difference.

I have been a FireFox (Windows) user for a few years now and I can honestly say that IE9 is going to be my browser of choice on Windows. In an Active Directory environment you can't beat the integration and for home use it is stable, and fast; two very important things for me when it comes to my web browsing experience.

Here is the web address if you wish to check it out for yourself.