Items tagged with IE9
The presence of a zero day security flaw in Internet Explorer 10 and Internet Explorer 9 has caught the attention of Microsoft, which decided to release a temporary patch rather than let it loom until next month's Patch Tuesday. According to Microsoft, the vulnerability doesn't exist in Internet Explorer 11, nor does it affect IE versions prior to 9. "The vulnerability is a remote code execution vulnerability. The vulnerability exists in the way that Internet Explorer accesses an object in memory that has been deleted or has not been properly allocated," Microsoft explained in a security advisory. "The vulnerability may corrupt memory in a way that could allow an attacker to execute arbitrary...
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Internet Explorer has its television ads, and Firefox has it's fiery fox logo. But Opera has a growing user base of its own, and the latest edition of the browser-that-could is now available. Opera 12 Beta has launched this week, presenting an entirely new look and feel, including new themes that provide some of the most stunning skins yet. With the new implementation, anyone can style Opera just the way they want. There's also 64-bit support, enabling startup times and page loading to be quicker than before. There's also a new implementation that runs plugins (such as Flash) as separate processes, which makes the browser as a whole a lot more stable. Other features? Support for the Do Not Track...
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Last week, Mozilla released Firefox 5--just three months after launching Firefox 4. While the company had previously indicated it was moving to a faster release schedule and a whole-number versioning system, the launch caught many users, particularly corporations, off guard. Mozilla claimed that a rapid release schedule would allow it to deliver "new features, performance enhancements, security updates and stability improvements to users faster." In the eight days since FF5 debuted, some 55 percent of FF4 users auto-updated to the new edition. Web tracking data indicates that the number of Firefox 4 users dropped from 16 percent to 7.2 percent, while Firefox 5's market share increased from 0.5...
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The past 18 months have seen a significant evolution in browser graphics. Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and Opera have all added support for such standards as OpenCL, HTML5, and Direct2D acceleration. (HTML5 isn't a graphics standard, strictly speaking, but it allows the browser to handle certain activities that once required Flash plugins). Support for WebGL, a browser-friendly derivative of OpenGL, has been added to Firefox and Safari (with Chrome and Opera versions under development). Microsoft, however, has announced it won't be including WebGL support, claiming that the standard is far too insecure to be safely deployed. As it turns out, the software giant has good reason to be concerned. Ever...
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Online data tracker Net Applications published data yesterday that shows IE9 coming on strong, but not necessarily the way Microsoft would like. Adoption trends show that much of IE9's gain was offset by fewer people using Internet Explorer 8. This implies that while customers see the advantages of IE9, they're not turning to Microsoft to provide them with a high-end product. Microsoft has seen the same reports as everyone else, but prefers a different focus. The company claims that Windows 7 and IE9 fit together like peanut butter and chocolate. A recent blog post by Ryan Gavin repeatedly emphasizes how the IE9 development team "built IE9 to help developers unleash faster and richer web...
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Didn't Microsoft just unveil Internet Explorer 9 a few months ago? Sure feels like it, but it's never to soon to start thinking about what's next, right? Right! At MIX 11 this week in Las Vegas, Microsoft revealed a preview build of IE10, despite the fact that IE9 just left beta months ago. What's new with Internet Explorer 10? Well, for one, it won't run on Vista, so it's clear that Microsoft is intent with moving beyond an OS that many felt was underwhelming. The company's offering the preview build of IE10 for download right now on their "Test Drive" site, with the browser providing support for CSS Gradients and CSS3 Flexible Box Layout. Give it a download if you haven't, and let us know how...
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Reducing mobile power consumption has been a top priority of the PC industry for years. Much of the work in this area has focused on hardware, but a recent post from Microsoft's IE blog raises the question of whether or not browser choice can make a difference in battery life*. It's not a question people would've considered for most of the past decade, but the advent of smartphones, hardware-accelerated browsers, and even netbooks have changed the way people prioritize battery life as a must-have feature. Microsoft tested Chrome 10, Firefox 4, IE9, Opera 11, and Safari 5 in the following scenarios: Windows 7 without any browsers running (provides baseline). Browsers navigated to about:blank (power...
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The world still loves Firefox. That's what we learned from the launch of Firefox 4, which in a single day managed to grab hold of nearly 2 percent of the worldwide Internet browser market, according to StatCounter's statistics. That's more than both Opera 11 and IE9, the latter of which was released last week and claims a 0.87 percent share of the market compared to Firefox's 1.95 percent. "Firefox 4 has really hit the ground running and has eclipsed the launch of IE 9," commented Aodhan Cullen, CEO, StatCounter. "Although IE 9 has undoubtedly been hampered by its lack of compatibility with Windows XP." Download numbers tell a similar story. Microsoft was justifiably excited when IE9 logged 2.35...
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Note to Microsoft: Put out a browser that doesn't suck and people will download it. That's the lesson Microsoft should take away from the recent release of Internet Explorer 9, arguably the first version of IE that's truly able to compete with Firefox and Chrome. Perhaps because of this, IE9 was downloaded more than 2.3 million times in its first 24 hours. "We want to thank everyone around the world for downloading IE9 and the enthusiastic reception," Microsoft wrote in a blog post. "2.3 million downloads in 24 hours is over double the 1 million downloads we saw of the IE9 Beta and four times that of the IE9 RC over the same time period." IE9's download numbers aren't on the same level as Firefox,...
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Microsoft has been very thorough in their approach to launching Internet Explorer 9. The browser has been in beta for quite some time now, but it's clearly that the company is eager to get a new build into the wild to take on Firefox, Safari and Chrome -- all of which are gaining serious momentum as IE8 falters. Right on schedule, Microsoft released the newest, final build of IE9 today for users everywhere to try out. The company has recently urged consumers to upgrade from IE6, but it's notable that IE9 only runs within Windows Vista and Windows 7. If you're on Windows XP, 2000 or anything earlier, you're out of luck. Early reports of IE9 use are largely positive. The only real annoyance seems...
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Are you ready for a "more beautiful web?" It's coming soon, according to Microsoft. The company who invented Internet Explorer is nearly ready to release the finalized version of IE9, and Microsoft has just officially announced that it will launch to consumers on March 14th. That's during SXSW, a festival in central Texas that's becoming more and more Internet-focused. March 14th marks the 1-year anniversary of the IE9 Platform Preview, and the browser has definitely matured in those 12 months. The download will be available starting at 9PM PT on the 14th, so set your clocks. Will you be downloading the final release of IE9? Have you been using the beta? Are you a Firefox or Chrome convert who...
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The next generation of browser wars is just around the corner. While Mozilla inches closer to shipping Firefox 4, which is currently in its eleventh beta, Microsoft on Thursday announced the availability of Internet Explorer 9 in Release Candidate form. That means it's essentially finished, at least in terms of features, and should have most of the bugs ironed out. "With the Release Candidate, we've taken to heart over 17,000 pieces of feedback about IE9," Microsoft said in a blog post. "You will find the product has made progress on all fronts -- performance and standards, user experience, and safety and privacy." On the subject of privacy, IE9 introduces a new Tracking Protection feature. This...
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Google launched the latest version of Chrome late last week with support for multiple new features. While Google no longer labels Chrome with a version number or admits such a thing exists, information under the "Stats For Nerds" link in the browser's task manager confirms that this is Chrome 9.0.597.84. There are no default UI changes, at least not when updating from Chrome 8.2. One of the new features Google is introducing with Chrome 9 is disabled by default. It's called Chrome Instant and it extends Google Instant functionality across the entire browser. For those of you who aren't familiar with it, Google Instant refers to the search engine's relatively new ability to return search results...
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Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser still claims the lion's share of the browser market, but let's be honest here, it's been so long since IE led the pack in terms of features and performance that Microsoft has forgotten what it's like for users to be genuinely excited about a browser release that doesn't belong to Mozilla, Google, or any of the other competition. Hence the feeling of euphoria emanating from Redmond over the initial interest in Internet Explorer 9 Beta. "The initial reaction has been pretty overwhelming, and we are very humbled by the response our customers have had," Microsoft announced in a blog post. "In the first two days, over 2 million people worldwide downloaded IE9...
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The "September" time frame was confirmed already, but the next major installment of Internet Explorer now has a firm launch date: September 15. That's the date that Microsoft has set for the debut of the first IE9 beta, which is the company's first major attempt to battle the advancements made by Chrome and Firefox over the past months and years. Since the start of the Internet, Microsoft's browser has dominated in terms of market share. Most say that's because IE comes pre-installed on Windows-based PCs, but people are beginning to notice that free rivals from Mozilla and Google (and Apple, if you include Safari) offer more features, less exploit threats and a generally better user experience....
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Most of us here behind the scenes roll through the Web with Firefox or Chrome, but for those of you still clinging to Microsoft's Internet Explorer, you'll have a new browser to play with in September. That's when the Redmond software juggernaut will push out the first fully fledged beta (as opposed to that highly limited Preview release floating around) of its next-gen browser, Microsoft Chief Operating Officer Kevin Turner said during a financial keynote. We have little reason to doubt Turner's time frame for IE9. Following the release of the first developer preview back in the middle of March, Microsoft has been pumping out updated test builds every 8 weeks. There's still no word on when the...
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My, how the mighty have fallen. It wasn't long ago that Internet Explorer simply dominated the Internet. Everyone used it be default, and no other browser came close in terms of market share. IE was so powerful that the European Union banded together and forced Microsoft to insert a Browser Selection Screen on all new copies of Windows 7, and we wouldn't be surprised if other nations followed suit.Since then, a number of worthy competitors have not only hit the market, but gained serious steam. Mozilla's Firefox has become a huge player, and Google's Chrome has grown faster than pretty much any other unconventional Web browser in the history of the space. The newest data from Net Applications...
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If you've managed to glance through any of our recent netbook reviews, you'd know that we're big fans of NVIDIA's Ion. This technology has enabled netbooks to handle multi-media in a way they never could using older integrated GPUs, and we honestly wish there were more options out there just like it. One area that often gets overlooked is just how important a GPU is when browsing the Web, particularly when viewing graphically intense sites like Bing Maps or YouTube HD. Believe it or not, the GPU is becoming a more and more important part of browsing as the Web advances, and that trend isn't slowing down soon.NVIDIA managed to get an early build of Internet Explorer 9 onto a pair of netbooks,...
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When we previewed Internet Explorer's new rendering engine this week we noted that the same features that made IE9's hardware-acceleration possible probably aren't compatible with Windows XP. Microsoft initially dodged giving a straight answer to the question of XP support but has since admitted that the new browser won't be XP-compatible when it launches. This has created a small tempest of protest from those users still using XP, but this is less of an arbitrary decision than some appear to think. It's literally impossible to port Windows Vista/Win 7-style hardware acceleration backwards into XP. Microsoft would have to either develop a workaround from scratch or create a CPU-driven "software...
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See that headline? If you'd asked us last week if we'd ever use the word "sexy" to describe a browser—particularly a Microsoft browser—we'd have beaten you with a stack of TPS reports. This week, well, it's a different story. The actual IE9 browser isn't available for download yet, but Microsoft has made what it calls the Internet Explorer 9 Platform Preview available for download. Internet Explorer 9 offers a bevy of new features compared to IE8 (or anything else), but the most exciting feature is the browser's built-in GPU hardware acceleration. As it turns out, there's quite a bit Microsoft can do, even with a modest integrated GPU. AMD's Robin Maffeo has put together a blog post that summarizes...
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