New IE8 Promising But Slow: Mossberg

While some features are unmatched, slow page loads hinder updated browser

By Clay Dillow, Newser Staff

Posted Mar 19, 2009 9:56 AM CDT

(Newser) – Internet Explorer 8 becomes available at noon, but don’t go ditching your current browser just yet, writes Walter S. Mossberg in the Wall Street Journal. Microsoft's latest is "a big improvement over its predecessor, IE7, and a much closer competitor to its main rival, Mozilla's Firefox"—but slower than Firefox, Google’s Chrome, and Apple’s Safari, Mossberg cautions.

IE8 has some features its rivals can’t match. Automatic color-coding of related tabs, a search field that shows images and text, and improved ability to elude advertisers’ prying eyes are improvements, as is the ability to quickly change search engines without retyping your entry. But "IE8 loaded a variety of pages I tested more slowly than any of the other browsers, and it grew sluggish when juggling a large number of Web pages opened simultaneously in tabs," Mossberg writes.

[Images (2)]

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This is an image of a page on the Microsoft Internet Explorer 8 Web site taken Thursday March 19, 2009 announcing the release of a new version of Internet Explorer. (AP Photo)

Google software engineer Ben Goodger introduces their new browser, "Chrome," during a news conference at Google Inc. headquarters in Mountain View, Calif., Tuesday, Spet. 2, 2008. (AP Photo/Paul Sakuma)

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If you would be bothered by the speed difference, or the slowdown I saw under a heavy load, Firefox would still be better.
- Walter S. Mossberg

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New IE8 Promising But Slow: Mossberg