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Microsoft Showcases Early Internet Explorer 9 Build

Martin Brinkmann — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 10:05:09 +0000

Most Internet users agree that Microsoft made good progress with Internet Explorer 8 compared to previous releases of the web browser. Internet Explorer 8 introduced some interesting new features, increased the performance of the web browser by a lot compared to previous versions and introduced some new security concepts that made the web browsing experience more secure. It still did not come close performance wise to web browsers like Google Chrome but the difference was not that big anymore.

Microsoft has now confirmed that they started working on Internet Explorer 9 and it seems that they have big plans for this browser. Three demo videos have been released by Channel 9 that show some of the Internet Explorer 9 developers showcasing some of the improvements that they already build into the web browser. The Sunspider Javascript benchmark comparison looks very interesting as the new Internet Explorer 9 JavaScript engine closes the gap to Firefox 3.6 Beta 1 to about 100 ms.

Standards and Interoperability

JavaScript performance:

Surfing On The GPU

The most interesting changes that have been announced so far:

New Javascript engine
GPU enhanced page rendering
Better interoperability and web standards support

It is interesting that Microsoft is giving the public a chance to view the progress that they are making. They already changed their strategy during the Windows 7 development phase where they created blogs, videos and other means of showcasing the development progress and features to the public.

Internet Explorer 8 Download

Martin Brinkmann — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 07:38:07 +0000

Yesterday we mentioned that Microsoft would release the final version of Internet Explorer 8 later that day on the official website. They did that which surprised many tech savvy users as it was generally given that the release would be in the second half of this year and not the first. Even more interesting is the fact that Microsoft is not only distributing it as a web download but also over official update channels like Windows Update.

Microsoft has released Internet Explorer 8 for various Windows operating systems including Windows XP and Windows Vista but Windows 7. Windows 7 users who want to download Internet Explorer 8 are greeted with a message telling them that they will not be able to download Internet Explorer 8 for Windows Beta at this time.

It is however very like that Internet Explorer 8 will be included in upcoming Windows 7 builds. Microsoft is offering a selection based download of Internet Explorer 8 on the official site that lets users pick their language and operating system from a list. Here are some download links for Internet Explorer 8 English:

Windows XP 32-bit (link)
Windows XP 64-bit (link)
Windows Vista 32-bit (link)
Windows Vista 64-bit (link)
Windows Server 2003 32-bit (link)
Windows Server 2003 64-bit (link)
Windows Server 2008 32-bit (link)
Windows Server 2008 64-bit (link)

Those links are direct download links to Internet Explorer 8. Just pick your operating system and the download should start immediately. Users who prefer other languages should follow the link that I posted above leading to the official site with the language choice pulldown menu.