Full of bugs and impossible to test the Beta of this product as it's almost rendered useless (Internet Explorer 8 (Beta))

Member Name: jbennett

Product:	Internet Explorer 8 (Beta)
Date:	04/01/09 (44 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Clean bulk free browser with pottential once updates are released and the final is available

Disadvantages: Only at Beta and not worth downloading at the current time

I downloaded and installed IE8 Beta 2 last week and I must say that overall I'm rather disappointed in this latest version of Internet Explorer. I'm fully aware that this is only a Beta but in my opinion it's not got enough for a Beta as testers like me will struggle to test this version.

There are so many bugs that it's not even funny. I've found that adobe flash doesn't work with IE8 and when I attempt to click hyperlinks they don't work on the first attempt and just move my cursor further down the page. I have also found a struggle with logging in to certain websites as it just sits their and hangs for ages.

Taking into consideration that this is only at Beta 2, I think the ideas they have included are not bad and I like the nice clean (bulk free) interface but some of the features like web slices are a bit gimmicky in my opinion and not really necessary. The favourites Bar is probably one of the few additions that I appreciate as this is great for ease of use when trying to access favourites that I require 'on demand'.

Unfortunately I haven't been a great Beta tester for this product as most the sites I visit use hyperlinks and flash which pretty much exempts me from using this version until they iron out the bugs and provide me with an update via windows update. I haven't rolled back to IE7 and I'm currently using Firefox but I hope they fix the bugs soon as I would like to learn more about their new browser and hopefully benefit from some of the new features they are incorporating.

Overall I can see they have some interesting ideas but in the future I wouldn't recommend that Microsoft release a Beta that is almost rendered useless as it doesn't really enable people to test the product and will more than likely annoy people and get them using different browsers like Firefox.

I would like to say Good attempt Microsoft but unfortunately I can't. I've now been waiting about a week for an update and hope they release one soon to fix the bugs.

Summary: Has pottential and i'm sure microsoft will iron out any issues within the next few weeks

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