I think FF still is ahead. It’s faster upon loading the first start page and I still feel more secure with it than with IE 8 B2 
Hi gdiloren,
What I also see as a backlash is the issue with SP3 that when you install IE8 B2 there is no way back, unless you undo SP3 first and you would not like to do that.
That IE started faster than Fx comes that the larger part of IE is loaded as you start up your machine, that was the extra bonus M$ got for building their software into their OS, you are especially aware of it on Vista, while Fx is faster on Ubuntu than Opera is, while on a Windows platform Opera always was the faster one.
I now give you the top 5 Firefox Flames we find on the Internet and a response to each of them:
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Firefox is more or less owned by Google, 85% of the Fx funds come from Mountain View.
Response not a lot of Fx users do not like IE, they changed browsers for other reasons.
Then Google is the only opponent that matters where Microsoft is concerned.
The same story can be told about Flock and Yahoo. -
The unique benefit to choose Fx always has been security. That was right when only a minor group of forerunners used this alternate browser, but now the malcreants are more on the look out for Fx bugs,
there were 1200 last year. OK, because it is open software and bugs are reported and dealt with, this cannot be compared to what happens to the IE browser exploits, skeletons may still be in the cupboard, who knows? -
Fx is unfriendly to users of older Windows platforms like 95, 98 SE and ME, users there have to switch to Opera. But then Microsoft does not support 95, 98 SE and ME, so what is the problem?
-
Firefox is slow, well I started my posting telling why that was a problem from the start, it is OS related.
Not according to this benchmark: http://mozillalinks.org/wp/2008/03/updated-web-browsers-javascript-benchmarks/ where Fx3 was 5 times faster than IE7 -
This final flame reads that add-ons are making Fx unstable. Is not true, because only a smaller part of extensions had compatibility problems, while a lot of these problems are profile related, nightly tester tools can solve a lot of these things. But it also produced NoScript, the best thing that happened to Fx browsers.
What we learn form these standard Fx flames:
The flamer uses
- a vague way to describe security (what is in a bug?)
- then an empty complaint about the browser being slow (all that is being installed onto Vista is slow, on Ubuntu Firefox works faster as Opera does)
- furthermore a complaint about third party software (“extensions exist that…”),
- and then starts dreaming on about the obsolete Windows 95 platform
(even Microsoft no longer supports this OS)
For the coming users of IE8, and we all are going to have it next to Fx 3.1, just a link for making this browser more secure:
http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2008/08/29/trustworthy-browsing-with-ie8-summary.aspx
polonus
What I also see as a backlash is the issue with SP3 that when you install IE8 B2 there is no way back, unless you undo SP3 first and you would not like to do that.Hi Damien, Maybe it was a good thing that I wasn't able to install this beta on my system. ??? ??? ??? I even tried installing it while in safe mode but no luck. We'll see if that becomes a problem when the final version is released.
I have it on my Vista system and it is stable, with a few more security tricks like privacy. This is where at your choice it will immediately delete all cookies and temp files from the nominated site as soon as you leave it… Paypal/banks/amazon etc. And as I do a lot of searching it is handy to have either MS KB or Google just a right click away. But as usual it is horses for courses - you use what you like ;D
Hi bob3160,
On their IEBlog Microsoft warns Windows-users that have XP SP3 installed after the first IE bèta. In that situation an IE8 Bèta 2 install will result in both XP SP3and the 8 version of IE cannot be removed.
“It is possible to upgrade to later IE8 builds, but you can no longer uninstall them”, according to IE-programmamanager Jane Maliouta. Maliouta advises to first remove XP SP3 & the bèta 1 van IE8 before setting back XP SP3 and only then install IE8 Bèta 2.
Vista-users having installede IE8 bèta 1 have some difficulties to reach the second IE bèta.
First manually remove Bèta 1 , then manually download several updates.
Then we have crashing programs. Compatibility problems like IE8 Bèta 2 is completely incompatible with Visual Studio .Net version and Windows Live Mail. When you have that mailprogram it will crash the browser when writing a mail or while responding to a mail. There are problems with Google Toolbar, Skype and HP’s Smart Web Printing,
My dear bob, you did the right thing, wait a bit,
polonus
My only issue with this beta version is that it starts-up slowly (it opens faster but finishes downloading the home page rather slowly respect to FF) and then when I imported my bookmarks from FF it mismatched the folder putting it inC:/users/xxx/Music ???
Anyway, they won’t get me as putting it as my default browser. :
I’m on Vista, also 1.6 GHz 2 core Intel processor and 1 GB RAM
Does anyone know the latest benchmark of Internet Explorer vs Fire Fox regarding the security vulnerability?
I cant decide which to use.
For me as long as IE is embedded into the OS, uses activeX and has BHOs, I will be sticking with a browser that doesn’t have these features, currently firefox. Whilst I don’t use it opera also falls into this category.
This before any security vulnerabilities are even considered and for that you need to check out secunia.
I use the free aimphoneline, it’s a VOIP phone service. It uses AIM. In order for aimphoneline to work, AIM must be downloaded with IE. If AIM is downloaded with Opera or FF you will have full fuction of AIM, but aimphoneline will not work.
aimphoneline obviously needs to be deeply entrenched into Windows to work. It can’t get that deep with Opera or FF. This seems to show surfing with an alternate browser is safer.