The fact that I first installed Microsoft's Internet Explorer 7 Beta 2 for Windows XP on April 20 means I haven't even had two weeks with the browser yet. That's not enough time with a product of this importance and complexity to form a final conclusion. And yet, if there's nothing I've learned about reviewing software and hardware over the last 20 years, it's that if I don't become intrigued when first trying out a product's new features -- before I've come across all its warts -- I'm unlikely to be an actual user when all is said and done.
I'm definitely not excited. The sum of IE7's parts isn't greater than the whole. There's no there in there. It lacks soul. Although the IE development team has done a commendable job of grafting Microsoft renditions of some worthy Firefox and Opera features onto IE6, as well as heavily revamping security, the forthcoming version of the Web browser doesn't break significant new ground.
Is it better than IE6? Yes. I can't think of even a small way that Microsoft has taken its browser package in the wrong direction. What's more, were I to go over IE7 feature by feature, I would point out -- as I've done with earlier prerelease builds of IE7 -- several nicely crafted features and well-designed functionalities. On the other hand, saying it's better than IE6 isn't saying much.
If you're eager to try IE7 Beta 2 for yourself, my advice is not to install it on your everyday machine. It does uninstall, though. Please remove any previous version of IE7 before you install this one. You can find out more about, and download IE7 Beta 2, on Microsoft's Internet Explorer page.
The very first day I installed IE7 Beta 2 I got into the classic endless loop that the XP Service Pack 2 version of IE6 was famous for. I was attempting to use the main control panel supplied by one of my Web hosts. IE7 kept blocking an applet page from opening. The yellow info bar opened across the top of the browser window, asking whether I wanted to block the window or script from running. (I'm not even sure what kind of process the Web-host control panel runs.) When, in the info bar, I allowed the page to launch, the page process had terminated because of IE7's interruption. When I refreshed the page to run the process again, bang -- IE7 blocked it again. Endless loop. This doesn't happen often, but even one time is far too many.
IE7, like IE6 before it, will ask you over and over again to OK ActiveX controls or scripted features on Web pages. Even if you visit the same page every day for a year, you'll still be brought up short and asked to approve a Web-based process. It doesn't let you disable many of its security "features" by specific Web page.
Back to my Web host control panel example, I didn't know exactly what kind of script or code was trying to launch. All I knew was that I'd been launching it with no problems in Firefox for months. So, that left me guessing at security levels and settings I should "turn down" in IE's Security settings tab. After two or three attempts, I gave up and reverted to Firefox. Did I bother to crank back up IE7's security settings? If not, the browser is probably more vulnerable, thus defeating the whole point. This was the exact reason why I dumped IE6. I got fed up with security functionality whose user experience was, in a word, ridiculous.
On the plus side, IE7 loads Web pages quickly. It is at least Firefox's equal in my informal tests (each browser loaded some pages faster than the other). Perhaps IE7's best advantage over Firefox is how quickly it launches. IE7 loads several times faster than Firefox. Mozilla supporters may say that's because Microsoft loads a good part of IE's code into Windows. I was no big fan of Microsoft's past insistence that IE could not be separated from the Windows code. But about the argument that it constitutes an unfair advantage, my thought is: So what? I just want a browser that starts up quickly. Mozilla can do better on that score.
But nothing's really changed about the differences between IE and Firefox since the release of Firefox 1.0. In an initial review of Firefox 1.0, I wrote:
More than anything else, this is the smartest aspect of what Mozilla has done with Firefox: It's a realistic browser, a worthy successor to the Navigator line. It's a browser that inspires an emotional response. You don't have to learn to like it with your left brain; you just like it.
That's precisely what I don't feel about IE. I find myself comparing features and deciding that yes, this or that IE7 feature is marginally better. And Microsoft's slick revamp of the Favorites panel has the feature overlaying the browser window instead of pushing it to the right. (Plus, there is an option to make it work as it did, pushing the window right.) The browser's RSS Feed features have a bit more utility than Firefox's. But then Microsoft goes and does something stupid and turns off the classic File, Edit, View... menus by default. And the excellent configurable tool bar system from previous versions of IE (which has been heavily copied by a variety of other software makers), has been hobbled.
These days, Microsoft's user interface design clearly seems the result of internal corporate directives instead of planned around best-of-breed ideas. There was a time when Microsoft listened. Now, it's just patently sure of all its decisions. There appears to be little institutional memory about what strategies got them where they are.
I admire IE7, but I don't think I could ever learn to love it. It's like the minivan of Web browsers. It's a model of great engineering, but it's just not cool.