I decided to give the IE 7 Beta 2 a try. Now, I am an avid Firefox user, one of those people who try to get people off IE and onto Firefox, because compared to IE 6, Firefox is the better browser. However, I think now, even though I still prefer Firefox, IE is starting to come back into the running.
First things first, the interface. The new interface in IE 7 is very sleek. It cleans up a lot of the clutter, while keeping the functionality there. Here's a screen shot on my computer.
As you can see, they cleaned it up a bit. It has a bit of a Firefox look to it now, although there are a few notible differences and add-ons. First thing I noticed was the lack of the File/Edit etc etc. Now, you can bring that back, however its not needed. The tools button there has everything to configure. It makes it fairly easier to change settings. It seems they wanted to group things together a bit more. The page button allows you to open windows, and do things that would normally be spread around a bit. The printer icon there allows quick printing and preview, and the tools, as mentioned, allows you to enable certain settings, open up the options, and change other things as well. Finally, the home button, which I don't see much a point to, gives you quick access to mess with home page settings. They added the search bar in the corner (defaults to MSN but I changed it to Google) and homepage is MSN by default as well. Finally, at the buttom it has the security lock (on https sites), and a few other things like IE 6. The new one is a Zoom changer, which lets you change the zoom on a page. The nice thing about this new interface overall, is it leaves more room for pages to be displayed while keeping functionality. That I can live with!
As for the tabbed browsing, it works fairly well. The options to use all tabs, and when you want tabs to open (clicked links that would normally pop up new windows, or if you get a regular pop up if you want a tab or pop up, etc) which is something that I needed the Tabbed Browser Extention to do in Firefox. The button to create new tabs is to the right of your most recent opened tabbed, and will open up a tab to an about:tabs page which explains a few things. You might be able to configure it to load multiple or different homepages, but I haven't messed with anything like that. To the left of the tabbed bar you have two buttons, one to open up and organize favorites, and the other will either add a page to favorites or subscribe to RSS feed, depending. Overall, it works like tabbed browsing, and it does it well. About time, Microsoft.
They embedded RSS feed support into the browser now. It automatically will update feeds and allow them to be used in other programs and viewed. I don't know how it works exactly, since I don't really deal with RSS feeds, but its there for those of you that do.
It comes with some new tools. Windows Defender, which checks for malicious programs on your PC. It updated and scanned quickly, but as for its reliability I cant say since it didn't find anything. IE 7 also has an embedded pop-up blocker, which can be configured to varying security levels, and finally a "phishing filter" which will verify if a site you are at is legitimately the site it says it is. Nice for people who might get scammed by those fake eBay or Paypal sites but for most of us, it can be turned off to only be used manually (because I dont want URLs I visit going to Microsoft.)
Now, a few things that it could've done better on. Frankly, why doesn it have a download manager? Firefox does. It might not work that great, but its something and still more reliable then IE's downloading methods. The pop up blocker doesn't seem to work as well as Firefoxs, but I haven't done any long and extensive tests on it. Also, it might be too early to say, but I still don't know if I trust IE in terms of security. I'm sure its better, but IE is still the most used browser on the net, thus the most open to security holes. It also has no option to theme settings, and although it supports add-ons, its ntohing compared to the Firefox extentions.
Overall? Nice job Microsoft. You have a browser that I can at least stand by and not dispise with a passion. I actually like quite a few things about the new IE. Will I switch over from Firefox? I don't think so, but at least those who insist on using IE now have a browser that doesn't feel like it belongs back in 1997. The new interface is nice, the new features feel well implimented, and it seems to work pretty fast.
I give it a 4/5.
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