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Browser Shootout - Internet Explorer 7 or Firefox 2
Tools and Technology, Internet SecurityTags: Firefox 2, Internet Explorer 7.
Here’s something interesting. I know most of our readers are ardent Mozilla Firefox fans (over 62%, astonishing), myself inclusive, but lately because of Vista upgrade that I did a month ago, Internet Explorer is creeping back slowly to my life.. Let’s see
You love tab browsing
Yes, I love tab browsing, and that’s the main reason why I’ve switched to Firefox a year plus ago and ditched the whole Internet Explorer idea. Microsoft knows the edge on this that 
Mozilla has on Firefox and has this feature included in IE. Copycat you may say, but it seem to work seemlessly like your old Firefox browser. And they do have a Quicktab option that displays all tabs at one go, works like print preview and shows you most of the tab contents, in thumbnail form.
Loading Firefox is fast
Lately I’m starting to feel different for Firefox. I’m not sure whether I can feel improvement between version 1.5 to version 2 as my experience with 2 isn’t as pleasant as it seem before. Firefox 2 seem to have big memory leaking problem when I use it. Firefox 1.5 USED to be fast in loading sites as well as starting up for me.
The weird thing is you can see my CPU usage jolts up to unbelievable height when I leave Firefox 2 on different ocassions. FYI, I’m running an Intel E6600 Duocore and 4GB Ram, so there’s really no reason to doubt my system’s resources. Probably IE7 is optimised for Vista, thus I don’t really experience the same thing with the new IE.
You love Addons
This is still a strong feature of Firefox that continues to edge over IE, despite IE trying their best to have this feature embedded on the new version. Firefox addons are more robust and definitely have strong community of people developing different types of tools.
Security
I would say both of them has their pros and cons. Malicious worms used to target at Internet Explorer (alone), and people made the switch to Firefox because Firefox is more secure, but things are changing. Worms are targeting both Firefox and Internet Explorer now. Don’t believe me? Check out this USB Worm that’s affecting Firefox. Whatever it is, both shares almost the same security risks on exploits and worms.
You can tighten pretty securely for Firefox by getting Noscript addon though. This solution edges out IE since they only allow disabling of ActiveX. And if you’re doing surfs/ autosurfs. Firefox with Noscript, is a boon and a MUST.
You love Firefox because of the RSS Feed feature
Well, IE7 has really improved in this aspect and reading RSS from IE really doesn’t seem to be cumbersome anymore. No feeds for me on browsers though. We can probably discuss RSS readers like our email clients (Probably a Outlook and Thunderbird shootout in the future) next time. Oh and if you still don’t know what the heck is RSS, check this out.
You love Firefox because you love Google too
Well hands down to Firefox on this one, since I’m an avid Google search fan. IE7 integrates search function easily, but uses MSN Search, something which I.. rarely or hardly use at all.
Conclusion..
Firefox used to be my favourite, but IE7 is climbing back for me as a preferred choice when it comes to utilizing my system resources. I still remember when Firefox 2.0.0.1 was rolled out, there was so many issues with Vista that I ditched Firefox for a moment.
For now I’ll be using both for different purposes.
So which is your choice of browser?
Popularity: 3% [?]
Maxthon
All the Goodness of IE7 with the Flexibility of Firefox.
I’ve always been partial to IE, even before 7, system resources have never been a problem….
IE7 is still as dangerous as IE6 ever was. For a person who claims e-gold is his favorite e-currency you are playing with fire when you access your account with IE (any version).
BTW, you can add Google search to IE7. I am using XP and have added Google as the default search engine.
My favorite browser is Firefox.
NelsonN, you have any idea what is that worm that’s affecting IE users on E-gold account?
I don’t know. There several that can attack.
Here is one:
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/w32filib.html
BTW, here is the page from where you can add features such as Google search to IE7:
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ie/searchguide/en-en/default.mspx
Couple of things you ought to keep in mind:
1) Windows Vista is the last straw for loads of users. Literally, the straw that broke the Camels back. That’s why thousands if not millions are switching to linux (Ubuntu being the most popular. Why? Cos it installs and particians your hard drive). Install it and never look back at windows again.
2) The other point to note. Explorer is not safe for browsing plus the forced firewall on Windows Vista can reap havoc through it.
Take a little hint switch to linux and kiss a monopolistic MicroSoft Corp good bye.
From a web developers standpoint IE7 is still a browser you have to use several hacks for because it not as compliant with W3C and CSS standard and features.
For this reason alone - Firefox continues to outshines IE7.
Firefox without a doubt
Konqueror, Opera, and Firefox all have their plus points and all work under linux
IE is the swiss cheese of browser security IMO
I think 2 good options would be to buy a mac and a copy of parallels to run virtual machines if there’s a must have app that’s only available on the Microsoft platform that you must run. Virtual machines means you can wipe it and start clean every time with a read only ISO file
configured the way you want it. OR just stick with a locked down mac platform. But you need a few gigs of ram to run virtual machines.
I agree, you should never access egold via Internet Explorer. Most worms and trojans your antivirus picks up are usually found in the internet explorer temporary files folder……… |:-( hmmmmmm
For those of us who haven’t managed to become millionaires through hyips and can’t afford to shell out for a mac, Linux is the obvious way to go for its out of the box security i.e. everything is turned off and you have to turn it on as opposed to windows where everything is turned on and you have to turn it off.
Virtual machine platforms also exist for Linux in the form of Virtual Box and 2 other programs that I cant recall off the top of my head. So it is possible to run windows under linux too if you REALLY must
But if we’re going by a security point of view for financial transactions, you can be ultra OTT and use a LIVE read only CD or run a virtual machine like BEOS or an operating system so obscure no ones ever heard of it to hack :-p
I mean, how far should we go with this?
Firefox 99%. Occasionally Opera or Netscape. IE only at gunpoint.
I don’t plan to make the switch to Vista until absolutely necessary. By then I might give Ubuntu another shot just to give Bill and his crew at Microsquish a poke in the eye.
Maxthon! Lol! I used it for several months even knowing it used the IE browser engine. Good solid browser. Only reason I went to FF was the security issues.
Firefox for me, been using it since 2004 exclusively and although I do have IE7 installed on my computer, I never use it.. Firefox just feels and works so much better in my opinion.
Jude,
I just installed the Noscript add-on. So, should I allow scripts for my high yield program sites or not? What about other personal accounts that require passwords? I know I had to allow scripts to read my e-mail.
Rico
With Noscript, I just noticed that you can’t log in to certain personal accounts when scripts aren’t allowed. So it seems that you want to allow scripts on a case-by-case basis. I’ll probably only allow them if I have to in order to access a website.
Rico
Funny the diferences in opinion on this subject.
Personally I think Firefox is slower and a bigger security risk than IE.
And it mis-renders too many webpages… supporters say FF is more compliant with web standards than IE.. but I say, what does that matter to the end user if IE is the only choice for viewing so many website s properly.
Firefox is updated sooner than explorer if a bug appears, has a lot of different extensions and add-ons to protect you when browsing websites and respect standards.
Explorer is respecting a little more the standards with IE7 (never before) and if you compare the updates in Windows s.o. with Explorer and how Microsoft delay in these updates… I think that IE is not a good option.
All browsers, programs and operative systems have some bugs sooner or later, but the most important here is when they are updated. And of course I don’t like depending of a proprietary browser, Firefox has a great community.
HYIP Hound,
The problem is not the guy designing a standard compliant website but those that keep developing their website for IE only. If developers stopped trying to develop for a single browser than the standard will prevail — as it should be.
Good wired article here on this very subject
http://www.wired.com/software/coolapps/news/2007/05/firefox_bloat
@NelsonN …. hehe.. that is a chicken and egg argument, so it cant be won be either side!
Website developers have been making websites for 10 years… Surely you can see some advantage in coding a browser to be backward compatible with what exists? And have enough “give” in it to handle small html errors which would exist in more than 90% of online sites at a guess.
As a web developer, the quicker Firefox loses market share and dissapears, like Netscape, the better. It sucks worse than Netscape ever did as far as senstivity to coding standards.
Maxvre: thanks for sharing that article, pretty interesting
As a 20 year veteran of computer service and repair, I think IE7 suck on most computers unless you have a new machine that comes with Vista. I have had many, many, many computers needing repair - connects to internet, but won’t display web pages. It has also caused erratic behavior and crashes.
Firefox does seem to load a little slower with v.2, but I have had no problems other than that. Opera is suppose to be even faster, and I am just now starting to test it.
So, unless you have Vista, I recommend staying away from IE7.
Linux is still the safest choice when working with E-gold, in my opinion.
spam, edited out - Jude
wow, someone needs to cut back on the tokies
(lre: last comment)
Firefox wins for me personally. I only use IE when I want to play games as most game sites don’t work with FF.
I’m still itching to get back to MAC’s … one day
Dolphin
hey xiaoxin - fuck off, asshole!
I fall in love with FF since i know it, and i remember the first version of FF that i use was 1.0.4 :D, I love it not just its security but FF is light and fast.
The new version (2.0) is consume “unusual” memory resources and until now i stack with 1.5.xx for that reason.